Book "Origins of the Habanera" Arsenio Rodríguez Quintana Ediciones Muntaner 2026

 

This book emerges to fill a crucial gap in the literature written in recent years in Europe about the habanera rhythm and (havaneres). This gap relates to the scant or nonexistent information about the African rhythm (Black and Afro-Cuban) that is the essence of the habanera and the cadence of its beat. In the nineteenth century, the habanera was called by many names: tango rhythm, tango de negritos, habanera rhythm, americanas, and even criollas, but it was always the same thing. It also challenges other misconceptions held by those who claim that the habanera left Cuba in the nineteenth century, took root in Europe, and was abandoned there—this is false. I also document its success in nineteenth-century Spanish zarzuelas and in habanera festivals in Torrevieja and Calella de Palafrugell since the 1950s.

It contains the most complete profile ever published in a music book about María (Gamboa) Martínez, a freed Black Cuban woman who toured Cuban tango with her guitar through Madrid, London, and Paris on their finest stages from 1936 to 1950, subsidized by Queen Isabel, and who captivated many, including Charles Baudelaire, who dedicated a poem to her that is included here.

All three branches of the habanera—instrumental, lyrical (bel canto), and popular—continued to be created in Cuba. From 1803, when the first ones appeared, including "La bella cubana" by J. White, "La Bayamesa" by Fornaris, and "Tu" by Sánchez de Fuentes, all three are habaneras by Cuban authors of the nineteenth century. Manuel Samuel left more than fifty written works, as did Ignacio Cervantes and Escudero—three nineteenth-century authors who demonstrate this with their sheet music.

In the twentieth century, the first RCA Victor recordings included "habaneras," and later the Regina and Martí theaters in Cuba became venues for Cuban zarzuelas like Niña Rita (1927), Cecilia Valdés (1931), and Amalia Batista by Eliseo Grenet, Lecuona, and Prat—all filled with tangos and habaneras. We should not forget that María Teresa Vera, Gonzalo Roig, Marta Valdés, and many others have written habaneras up to the present day.

This book addresses the Afro-Cuban legitimacy of the habanera, which emerged from the Cuban contradanza and tango. With photographs, sheet music, and objective data, and perhaps the most complete historical chronology of this genre at the end of the book.

Published June 2021

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GN39MVCK