Browse Items (10 total)

In June of 2009, Raíces Cultural Center Folkloric Ensemble was invited to collaborate in a cultural performance at the annual Brooklyn Puerto Rican Day Parade. The collaboration was made up of additional musicians and dancers from NJ and NY.

Traditionally, vejigantes carried inflated cow or goat bladders on the end of a stick and use it to tease, taunt and chase those participating in the celebrations, or las fiestas, especially children. Today a balloon or paper bag is what is commonly…

Gabriela Pérez dancing plena at a public educational performance in New Brunswick, NJ. Plena is the national music dance of Puerto Rico and is commonly played, sung, and danced in the diaspora at festivals, parties, plenazos, performances and…

Gabriela Pérez dancing picoteos de bomba at the Raritan River Environmental Festival in New Brunswick, NJ.

There are many styles of bomba dresses and costume, both traditional and contemporary. Raíces Cultural Center had these costumes handmade by a local NJ seamstress for their educational performance series Los Vejigantes de Puerto Rico in 2009, opting…

Gabriela dancing bomba with students at the Greater Brunswick Charter School in New Brunswick, NJ, sharing the folkloric traditions of bomba, plena and los vejigantes de Puerto Rico.

Gabriela Pérez dancing bomba with Los Vejigantes.

As part of the 2009 Los Vejigantes de Puerto Rico residency program, the Raíces Cultural Center Ensemble performed the music, dance and song of bomba and plena at the Greater Brunswick Charter School. As in all bombazos, audience/community…

Bomba performance by the Raícitas Youth Program participants. Illustrates bomba dance, a conversation between the dancer and the drummer.

Raíces Cultural Center delivered an arts and culture residency about the history, music, song and dance of the vejigantes at the Greater Brunswick Charter School in 2009. This culminating assembly performance was part of the 2009 Raíces Production…