The Fourth Annual CubaCaribe Festival presents three consecutive weekends of thought provoking performances, workshops, and lectures featuring the work of choreographers. Drawing from a constellation of outstanding African-dispora artist from traditional folklore to experimental fusion. Like no other area in the United States, the Bay Area is a particularly strong mecca for Cuban expatriots trained in the performing arts by the Cuban goverment. As carriers of multiple historic lineages, these artist bring their expertise as choreographers, dancers and musicians to the stage in intriguing partnership.

​

SPRING BEGINS TO MOVE - Friday April 18 & Saturday April 19 at 8 pm and Sunday April 20 at 7 pm.
A mixed program of Cuban, Haitian, Brazilian, and Congolese folkloric, popular and modern dance generes.

​

Playing on the words of the thirteenth-century Persian poet Rumi, "The music of desire, as widespread as sponge, begins to move," CubaCaribe presents Spring Begins to Move, a sequence of performances by celebrated Bay Area folkloric, popular and modern dance companies. This program showcases Caribean dance, but streches to embrace African and Afro-Brazilian traditions, highlighting differences and commonalities. The program includes Aguas de la Bahia, directed by Tania Santiago (Brazilian folkloric), Las Que Son Son (Cuban popular), Loco Bloco's Drum & Dance Esemble (Brazilian Popular), Napoles Ballet Theatre, directed by Luis Napoles (Afrocuban modern), Nsamina Kongo (Congolese), Tou Limen (Youth Ensemble, directed y Portsha Jefferson (Haitian folkloric) and Urban Jazz Dance Company, directed by Antoine-Devinci Hunter.

HAITI! - Thursday April 24, Friday April 25 & Saturday April 26 at 8 pm.
A program juxtaposing traditional Haitian & Cuban-Haitian folkloric dance.

​

Haiti! celebrates the first black republic in the Western hemisphere and its cultural links to Cuba. Music and dance in the eastern provinces of Cuba have been deeply influenced by successive waves of haitian immigrants settling in Cuba after the Haitian Revolution in 1791. This program juxtaposes Haitian and Cuban-Haitian traditions through twin compositions choreographed by noted authories in each genre: Michelle Martin directing Mechelle Martin & Kanopayi (Haitian folkloric) and Danis "La Mora" Pérez Pradas directing Oyu Oro (Cuban-Haitian folkloric). Currentrly based in New York City, Oyu Oro will be making it´s SF debut.

BLOOD + SUGAR - Thursday May 1, Friday May 2, Saturday May 3 at 8 pm and Sunday May 4 at 2 pm & 7 pm.
In this ambitious production, choreographer Ramón Ramos Alayo narrates a hard-hitting, yet lyrical, story of betrayal, cruelty, suffering, resistance, and triumph. Blood + Sugar traces the charged history of slavery from the shores of West Africa, through the Middle Passage and finally to Cuba, where the intensification of sugar cultivation in the early nineteenth century precipitated a mass importation of enslaved Africans. Blood + Sugar is a testament to personal transcendence the tenacity of a people, and the continuity of culture, Music by Elouise Burrel, Colin Douglas, Alex Kelly and Rogelio Kindelán Nordet, Spoken word by Muriel Johnson.

​

In the every shifting composition Grace Notes, two masters of improvisation: jazz bassist Jeff Chambers and Afro-Cuban modern dancer Ramón Ramos Alayo - collaborate for the first time to interwine bass with body. Musician and dancer draw from their own cultural forms that share common African roots and formal elements, yet emerge from disparate histories in the United States and Cuba.

​