From drumming with its roots in Africa, to Spanish-influenced guitar and harp music and the indigenous contribution of maracas, Venezuelan music is largely unknown outside the country.
With a blog based on videos of key groups and individuals I hope this music will reach a wider public and get the attention it deserves.
Joropo, calypso, tambores, salsa, cumbia, pop, rock, Latin jazz, electronica - even slushy love songs by soap opera stars - Venezuela has it all.
Here's a summery tune about the Venezuelan beach town of Choroni by Grammy-Award winning songwriter and producer Aureliano Mendez, who records and performs under the monickers Panasuyo and Sr. Mendez.
Aureliano's exciting mix of traditional Venezuelan folk music, dance, electronica, drum n bass and ragga brought him chart success in Venezuela with his first album "Monte y Culebra" (Scrubland and Snakes"), which included tracks like "Tierra Querida".
Born in Guanare, Portuguesa State, where the influence of Llanero music is strong, he incorporates traditional instruments such as cuatro (four-string guitar) and maracas into tracks made up of live performances, loops and samples.
In 2006 he contributed to a landmark album of remixes of famous tracks by Venezuelan folk legend Simon Diaz.
His biggest triumph so far was winning two Latin Grammys in 2007. One for producing the album "Residente o Visitante" for the Puerto Rican hip-hop group Calle 13 and another for penning "Pa'l Norte" - the hit song from that album (he also sang on the track "Tango del Pecado" performed with Gustavo Santoalalla and Bajofondo).
In 2008, "Residente o Visitante" won the Grammy for best Latin Urban Album.
"Choroni" is a collaboration with the Colombian group Palenke Soultribe and comes from Aureliano's excellent second album "Papa del Panasuyo". The video was produced by Venezuelan director Otto Scheuren.
UPDATE: Tonight 10 May at 7:30 p.m. - Free Concert by Wilmer Sifontes & his Afro-American Project at the Venezuelan Cultural Centre in Bolivar Hall - 54-56 Grafton Way London, W1T 5DL
There was a time in the UK when it was impossible to find Venezuelan folk music, either live or on CD, and you had to rely on friends to burn off some tracks for you or travel to Venezuela to hear it for yourself somewhere warm and exotic like Choroni.
Thankfully, those days are over with the arrival on the scene of an exciting new band led by the Venezuelan master percussionist Wilmer Sifontes.
Called the "Afro-American Project", the group is made up of professional musicians and talented newcomers who are determined to bring the full-on experience of a Venezuelan folk fiesta to the people of the UK.
The clip shows Wilmer and his group playing a medley of Afro-Venezuelan songs, including calypsos from the southern gold-mining town of El Callao, and the kind of tambores from the coast that you can hear in Choroni on a typical Friday night.
If you want to know how true tambores is danced in these small fishing villages watch the girl with the curls swinging her hips at the end of the video.
Wilmer is already well-known on the Latin-London music scene as the percussionist for Conjunto Sabroso and the The Charlys Orchestra.
But now he is determined to spread the news about Venezuelan music to a wider audience and sees the Afro-American Project as a way to get more musicians interested in learning and performing Venezuela's rich legacy of African and Afro-Caribbean roots music.
For more information about the band or to book them for a Venezuelan, South American, or Caribbean themed event contact Wilmer Sifontes
UPDATE: Tickets now on sale half price if you book direct from the Red Cross on 020 7877 7115
Incorporating a vibrant fusion of folk music, dance and history, "Venezuela Viva" is one of the most ambitious musical extravaganzas ever produced in Venezuela.
Luckily for us, it will be coming to the London Palladium on October 10th 2011 for a one-off charity event on behalf of the International Fundraising Committee of the British Red Cross.
Created by Carolina Lizarraga and featuring master harpist Carlos Orozco, the show electrified audiences in Edinburgh in 2005 when it played at the Scottish capital's famous annual arts festival.
"The show masquerades as a history lesson, tracing the birth of a nation from Spanish conquest to independence and beyond... but don’t be fooled; it’s one big party!", wrote an excited reviewer in the Guardian.
Anna Millar of The Scotsman newspaper was also bowled over by the show... "this large-scale spectacular celebrates Venezuelan life with gorgeous dancing girls, sensational Caribbean salsa and South American rhythms as 12 dancers and 12 musicians create a dazzling fantasy of flamenco passion and tropical energy."
Hugely ambitious in scope, "Venezuela Viva!" traces the evolution of Venezuelan folk music from its roots in four continents: the Arab culture of the Moors, who ruled most of Spain for nearly 800 years; the rhythms and vocal stylings of the fandanguillo de Malaga, flamenco and cante jondo brought to Venezuela by the Spanish conquistadors; the indigenous music of the native inhabitants of the New World played on flutes and maracas in sacred ceremonies overseen by shamans; and the hip-shaking drum dances of Africa, kept alive on sugar and cocoa plantations by the descendants of slaves.
Now bigger and even more spectacular than the Edinburgh shows, it features 25 dancers from Carolina Lizarraga's dance troupe supported by 10 musicians on stage playing everything from flamenco to modern salsa.
"From 1492 to the present day, the pictures, with voiceover, spin through 19 short scenes, journeying across continents and centuries, charting a history of wars, conquests and discoveries," wrote Lynne Walker in the Independent. "Each stage is portrayed in vivid choreography, danced with equal measures of grace and exuberance... As the show ends, you just want to jump on the next plane to Venezuela."
A UK tour organized by Theatre Productions Limited will follow the London Palladium show, although the dates and venues have yet to be released.
Tickets are on sale from £27.50 for Upper Circle seats, £65 for the Royal Circle and Stalls and £105 for the top priced Royal Circle and Stalls seats.
VIP tickets are also on sale from the Red Cross at £250, including top-price seats, an interval reception and post-show party in the presence of the artists
UPDATE: Tickets now on sale half price if you book direct from the Red Cross on 020 7877 7115
Venue: London Palladium Date: 10 October 2011 Time: 7:30 p.m. Tickets: www.seetickets.com or call the British Red Cross 0207-877-7115
Every year on the 24 June coastal towns and villages celebrate the Feast of Saint John the Baptist, described locally as "the saint of the blacks", or the "party saint". This is clearly a syncretic fusion of African traditions brought over by slaves and Catholic iconography. In Choroni and Chuao the statues of Saint John the Baptist are taken down from their places in the church, washed and dressed, offered rum to drink and carried in procession. Devotees carry red flags, the colour associated with San Juan, which adds to the colourful spectacle. Every couple of years there is a "meeting of the saints", when fishing boats take the various statues out to sea to meet and then go in procession to one of the coastal villages for drums, drinks and revelling. A true fusion of the sacred and the profane, folk music does not get more Venezuelan than this. For the drummers, it is a great honour to take part in the exhausting all night, all day celebrations, which generally start on the 23 June and can last up to three days or more.
The Afro-Venezuelan drum music of the coast gets a high-energy pop twist in the capable hands of Hector Silvera and his group Tambor Urbano, who tour the country's beaches in this video. The band was formed in 1988 by Silvera and friends from Catia in Caracas who wanted to explore their Afro-Venezuelan roots. It is still one of the best party bands in Caracas and distills the essence of tambores traditions from several places along the coast into a fiesta-friendly cocktail of mad dance beats.
This is a good introduction to Venezuelan tambores music. The two guys on the ground are playing cumaco drums made from hollowed avocado tree trunks with deer or cowhide skins. Behind them are two other drummers playing on the trunks with hard sticks called "palillos" or "laures" that give the distinctive taca-ta-taca-ta sound that drives the dancing. The singer or cantor is accompanied by a chorus, as is typical with Afro-Caribbean call and response drum music. The male dancers try and get as close as they can to the muchachitas, while the ladies spin away to avoid them. Anybody, male or female, can cut in at any time and take over. Tambores is popular in all the old plantation towns along the coast and harks back to slave days. Chuao is a historic plantation where Venezuela's finest cocoa beans are produced. It is reached by sea from Choroni .
The best party in Venezuela has to be Thursday or Friday night in Puerto Colombia, Choroni, where if you're lucky the Afro-Venezuelan drums will be playing, setting pulses racing on the seafront malecon. Try some of the local hooch - guarapita - a deadly cocktail of passionfruit and cane alcohol. Sweet.
