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ALTHOUGH a rehash of the 1992 Phil Ramone-produced Candela Viva, which brought la Momposina — a native of Momposa island in Colombia — to the world’s attention, this album contains many songs recorded at the time but never before released.
Toto, like Violeta Parra in Chile or Aurelio Martinez in Honduras, has worked for years to preserve the authentic music of her people. Inhabitants of the northern Colombia Caribbean coastal regions, they are part Indian, part black and part mixed race.
During the eight-year-long left-wing guerilla war of 1948 her family had to live in hiding in Bogota and survived performing as a child-dance group lead by her mother.
The mix of percussion and voices emanates a joie de vivre that is vibrant and expressive as are lyrics like those of Dos de Febrero, which challenges single-motherhood taboos.
