Cuban Hip Hop - Birth of A Cuban Scene

Birth of A Cuban Scene

The change in both attitude towards hip hop and the move towards home grown expression was in part facilitated by the involvement of Nehanda Abiodun, a U.S. Black Liberation Army activist in political exile in Cuba. The U.S. is the birthplace of hip-hop, so of course played a major role in the birth of hip-hop in Cuba. U.S. hip-hop artists continue to be hip-hop's most important innovators and are very influential to Cuban rappers. Cuban rappers admire the success of U.S. rappers and desire to achieve the same amount of success, so they begin to model themselves after them.

Hip hop's transfer to Alamar (the birthplace of rap cubano), a suburb east of Havana (with the best radio reception to Miami radio stations 99 JAMS and HOT 105), was so successful that in 1995 Rodolfo Renzoli, a rapper from Alamar's original hip hop collective, Grupo Uno, organized Cuba's first hip hop festival with the aid of the Asociación de Hermanos Sais(AHS). Despite poor promotion and the remote location, the first festival, organized as a friendly competition among the growing group of rap artists in and around Havana, became a huge success with moneros' and 'raperos'. 'Rap cubano emerged as a distinct genre when Amenaza (now known internationally as the Orishas - France, EMI) incorporated Afro-Cuban bata percussion into their performance at the 1996 festival, winning them first place in the competition. The same year, Cuba's first all-female rap group, Instinto, secured second place for their energetically-charged rap flow and performance. By 1999, through the aid of the Hip Hop Manifesto (written by DJ Ariel Fernandez), rap cubano and rock music (another marginalized musical genre in Cuba) was declared "an authentic expression of Cuban culture" by Abel Prieto, Cuba's Minister of Culture. Fidel Castro deemed hip hop music to be at the "vanguard of the Revolution" because of its revolutionary message. This resulted in the formation of the Agencia Cubana de Rap (The Cuban Rap Agency). The Agencia Cubana de Rap is the state's organization that runs a record label and hip hop magazine, Movimiento.

Upset with what she saw as blind imitation of commercial US rap culture with its depiction of thug life, violence, and misogyny, Abiodun began working with the Malcom X Grassroots Movement in the US to bring progressive US hip hop artists to Cuba. This led to the Black August benefit concerts held in New York and Havana.

The project has featured progressive artists such as Erykah Badu, David Banner, Common, dead prez, Fat Joe, the Roots, Jean Grae, Les Nubians, Chuck D, Gil Scott-Heron, Dave Chapelle, Tony Touch, Black Thought, Mos Def, Talib Kweli, La Bruha, Imani Uzuri, Jeru and the Coup.

The Black August Collective that was formed, and the concerts these progressive US artists gave in Cuba, played a key role in expanding and raising the profile of conscious, politicized rap within Cuba. Many Cuban rappers felt an affinity to the revolutionary aspects of the work these artists created. The Black August Hip Hop Collective Statement of Purpose offers that "Our goal is to bring culture and politics together and allow them to naturally evolve into a unique hip hop consciousness that informs our collective struggle for a more just, equitable and human world". Despite the movement's association with an identity other than Cuban, the government supported The Black August Collective and allowed the rappers to perform as they were supportive of the revolution. The youth of Cuba were fascinated not only by this style of music, but also by the Black Pride of the performers. This consciousness of struggle and achieving the goals of revolution are a key characteristic of a majority of Cuban hip hop today. In the USA, early hip hop was a DJ-based music: it was the creative transformation of the turntable from a mere playback device to a full-fledged percussion instrument that established "break beat" music as a new cultural form. Cuba however, had neither turntables nor black vinyl, making it impossible for these exotic new sounds to be duplicate within Cuba. Due to a lack of sophisticated equipment in Cuba, the Hip Hop that has emerged features simple beats which naturally leads to an emphasis on the lyrical content. Just like earlier American Hip Hop, Cuban Hip Hop has developed as an outlet to convey politically charged and socially conscious messages. These messages, over a simple beat, create a raw "old school" sound which draws the underground and alternative Hip Hop crowd such as the artists mentioned above for some authentic inspiration. Some say that Havana, host of the Hip Hop Festival, is the new home of old school.

Another contributor to hip hop's recognition as authentic Cuban culture was Grupo Uno, a collective from an East Havana cultural center, and rock promoter Rodolfo Renzoli. In 1995, with the help of the Asociación Hermanos Saíz (AHS), an offshoot of the Communist Youth Organization that promotes young artists, they began an annual hip hop festival, known as the Festival de Rap Cubano, in the Havana district of Alamar, seen by many as the birthplace of Cuban hip hop. The event aimed to provide a public arena for Cuban rappers to display their talents in the center of a poor, black neighborhood teeming with youthful energy, creative spirit, and cultural pride. In an effort to spurn political criticism that Cuban rap was not nationalistic, the festival teamed with the Asociacion Hermanos Sais to help jump start the project. The greatest boosts to this movement came from the Hermanos Saiz Associations support, the Orishas phenomenon, the foundation of the Cuban Agency of Rap and an increase in public appreciation. The aesthetics and style of the Cuban rappers draw from Afro-Cuban rhythms and roots, the influences of jazz, reggae, funk, soul and rock and roll, and social consciousness. Among the premier bands participating in this festival are Obsession, Doble Filo, Hermanazos and Anonimo Consejo. Attracted to the social themes embedded in the lyrics and the energetic, rhythmic beats, the festival was a hit. Hundreds of rappers converged on the stage and for the first time were publicly able to share their words and ideas. The winner of the festivals rap contest was a group by the name of Primera Base, a name that made reference to both Cuba's national sport, baseball, and that a base for rap in Cuba was being established. – Cuban rap had arrived. In Music, Space, and Place, ed. Whitely, Bennett, and Hawkins, 89-107. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2004. Ariel Fernández of AHS compares Cuban hip hop with the Nueva Trova of the 1960s - a revolution within the revolution. In his words, "The social role it is playing is very important, Cuban rap is criticizing the deficiencies that exist in society, but in a constructive way, educating youth and opening spaces to create a better society." previously to hip hop, protest music in Cuba have been growing a heritage of three decades; adopted from the tradition of Nueva Cancion, emerged the Cuban protest songs of Nueva Trova. many parallels connect those two styles Nueva Trova and hip hop in Cuba, where both were "misunderstood by state" in the beginning then they became adopted by the Cuban government. Nueva Trova, became the formal representing genre for the Union of Young Communists of the early revolutionary Cuba, same as it is the case for the Cuban hip hop scene, where in its early stages, was adopted by AHS, streamed from the Communist Youth Organization, to become a form of protest songs that the president himself would have a hand in its development. Harry Belafonte is credited with explaining hip hop culture to Fidel Castro at a luncheon. Fidel was so impressed that he called hip hop "the vanguard of the revolution" and was even seen rapping alongside the group Doble Filo at the opening of a baseball game.. Fernandez claimed that the founders of Nueva Trova "showed the direction for how to make revolution with the music... those musicians explored how, as a revolutionary you talk about the things that are bad within the revolution " (Foehr 2001:35)

Hip hop and rap clubs, while scarce today in Cuba, have emerged as an open and affordable gathering space for lower and middle-class Cubans who are increasingly excluded from other forms of Havana nightlife due to rising prices, dollarization of popular clubs and increasing segregation on behalf of tourists and the wealthy Cuban elite. Under these divisive socio-economic conditions, hip hop and rap concerts have now come to represent a space of open debate and social and political discussion for many young Cubans. Topics such as racism, tourism and police harassment are often addressed openly in these spaces through music and performance as well as through participatory discussion.

Many Cuban rappers use their music as an opportunity to speak out against problems within Cuba or on global issues including war, racism, and pollution. Many Cuban rappers refer to the subjects of their rap as temas sociales or social themes. By involving these social and political themes, they try to make their music constructive and influential to their listeners. Two important themes that are manifested in many of the songs involves the global issue of AIDS and the destructiveness of war. Although these themes may be useful to the listeners in Cuba, many people speak against the governments use of music to influence people. Politics is so deeply rooted in the hip hop scene in Cuba that the revolutionary image of Che Guevara is frequently seen, as the late figure represents the early stage in the Revolution and embodies youthful idealism. According to Geoffrey Baker, the history and legend of Che allows artists to practice “safe radicalism.”

The United States was such a big influence due to the close economic relationship between the United States and Cuba, as well as the successful U.S. intervention in Cuba's War of Independence (1890–1899) against Spain. Due to a corrupt history of U.S. involvement in Cuban affairs, which culminated during the reign of Cuban Dictator, Fulgencio Batista, Fidel Castro's Revolution was created as anti-colonialist and anti-imperialist. With the ongoing issues between Cuban and the USA, including numerous assassination attempts on Fidel Castro by the U.S. government, a cultural revolution within Cuba denied citizens from listening to U.S. forms of music, resulting in the formation of a small underground music community within Havana. In the First Havana Rap Festival in 1996, the Orishas won first prize and signed their first record deal. In the article Music, Space and Place, the authors cite Ice-T, Ice Cube, Snoop Doggy Dogg, Dr. Dre, 2Pac, and the Notorious BIG as models and favorites among the artists in Cuba. In Katie Millbauer's article Hip Hop Fridays: Hip Hop A Lo Cubano, she writes about the US rap scene's effect on Cuban rap, "A generation of people born after the revolution are expressing themselves through art, expressing their African identity through culture—doing a lot of things that hip-hop initially started out doing here in the United States."

Probably the most successful rap group to come out of Cuba was the Orishas. Starting off under the name "Amenaza" or "Threat," the group was the first to deal with issues of race and challenge Castro's idea of colorless, or "color-blind," society. However, the Orishas relocated in Paris in 1998, landing a record deal with a European label. There, they produced rap and hip-hop with the classic Cuban sounds of salsa and rumba. This sparked criticism for submitting to commercial influences and abandoning the anti-materialism message adopted by most Cuban rappers.

Cuban hip hop thrives while it is contingent upon Fidel Castro's maxim "Within the revolution, everything," an idea that allows for critical debate as long as it is not seen as counter-revolutionary. Inevitably, as an art form based on individuals' expressions of everyday life, Cuban hip hop often finds itself at the cutting edge of this boundary. As with all industries in Cuba, music production is closely monitored by the government. However, due to publicity campaigns run by hip hop zealots such as Havana University Professor Pablo Herrera, Cuban hip hop has been accepted by the authorities as "an authentic expression of cubanidad" and as such has elicited funding from Cuba's Minister of Culture, Abel Prieto, for the annual rap festival. Every day is a social and political balancing act, however, and rap cubano faces increasing encroachment by reggaeton, a music with less political and arguably more misogynistic lyrics that is "easier" to dance too.

The AHS and ACR continue to represent only a handful of the islands estimated 200 rap groups (according to Herrera in 2007) and the current Director of the national rap agency (ACR), Magia Lopes (a rapper in mixed-sex rap group, Obsesion, with her husband, El Tipo Este or Alexei Rodriguez), has organized all-female rap showcases. This 'feminism' in rap cubano is predominantly aimed at denouncing the machista attitude prevalent in Cuban society in spite of tremendous strides for women's rights by the national, state-run Federation of Cuban Women (FMC). Much is written about these Cuban 'hip hop feminists' by scholars Marc Perry (2004), Margaux Joffe (2005), Dr. Sujatha Fernandes (2006, 2007) and Dr. Tanya Saunders (2007). While many female rappers exist, the lesbian trio, Las Krudas, have received a lot of attention in numerous documentaries and dissertations for their open homosexual identity. Las Krudas went on to form Omega Kilay (a female rap collective) in 1999 with fellow female rappers (raperas), I-n-I, DJ Leidis, DJ Yary. The majority of these women have left Cuba, however, along with many other male rappers due to ongoing censorship and lack of performance opportunities. The female group Explosion Femenina (or Oye Habana) combines sex appeal with wit to captivate its audience. Other female rappers like Mariana and Telmary have broken out of all-male crews to establish their own voice and talents.

Although Cuban hip hop challenges certain norms, bands must be careful not to offend the government with their edgy lyrics, and a careful balance of the two has ultimately led to state-run promotion of various bands, i.e. Cuban stars Anonimo Consejo, and funding from the government for tens of thousands of dollars of audio equipment through the Young Communist Union's cultural arm, Asociacion de los Hermanos Saiz.

While rap, as stated before, has played a huge part in giving marginalized Afro-Cuban youth a voice to express their discomforts with ongoing racism in an "egalitarian" society, the “underground” rap scene is increasingly at odds with more mainstream Cuban hip-hop and reggaeton. According to Geoff Baker, rap artists “deride reggaeton for being trite and mindless, for promoting pointless diversion and for dancing over social commitment and reflection.” One popular rap group Los Aldeanos has been particularly vocal in their critique of reggaeton. The lyrics of “Reparticion de bienes” express the popularly held beliefs in the rap community about the reggaeton genre being for sell outs while rap is “for maturing the mind of the immature.” This ongoing debate is also reflective of Cuba’s particular struggle with the growing prominence of capitalism since the start of the Special Period and the disconnect many Cuban hip hop artists feel between the current state of society and its more collectively focused roots.

As such raperos often find themselves harassed by the Cuban police, whose job includes guarding against counter-revolutionary acts. However the perception of what is and what is not counter-revolutionary is a debate unto itself.

To illustrate the dynamics of the situation, during one instance of police trying to shut a hip hop event down for being subversive, the minister of culture arrived to insist that what was taking place was vital to the revolution and must go ahead.