DESCRIPTION:
Los Pleneros de la 21 is a group that performs the Afro-Puerto Rican traditions of bomba and plena. The group features Juan Gutiérrez, a recipient of a NEA National Heritage Fellowship Award in 1996.

Plena music originates in Puerto Rico's coastal cities. Plena features a driving rhythm provided by a group of panderetas (round-frame drums), as well as alternating solo and group refrains that are often improvised on contemporary topics.

The group also performs bomba - a centuries-old form rooted in traditions brought to the plantations from West Africa. Bomba features a lead drum (requinto) that engages in an improvized dialog with a solo dancer. Bomba songs often have mystical connotations.

Juan Gutiérrez was born in 1951 in Santurce, Puerto Rico, and grew up in the San Juan suburbs. He came to New York and continued to study plena with master Marcial Reyes Avelo. Gutiérrez later found teachers who could help him to master bomba.

Los Pleneros de la 21 was founded in New York by Gutiérrez and Reyes in 1983; the name literally means "the plena musicians of bus stop 21." For thirty years the ensemble has been recognized as ambassadors of Puerto Rican bomba and plena, with extensive international tours to their credit. This rare video is from 1991.

In honor of CTMD's 45th Anniversary in 2013, we are pleased to present Treasures of the CTMD Archive, a 10-part series of video shorts posted weekly to this page and to CTMD's Facebook site beginning May 1.

Treasures of the CTMD Archive features rare, one-of-a-kind video of leading masters of immigrant music and dance traditions that have been recently digitized from our Archive. Most of the artists presented in this series are (or were) based in the New York metropolitan area. Sadly, a number of these masters are no longer with us, and so the CTMD Archive provides vital, and sometimes singular, documentation of their artistry and traditions.

To view the entire series go to www.ctmd.org/archives.htm