Welcome to the celebrations – today Alegría turns one! We’ve had an amazing twelve months of exploring music from the Latin world, and I hope this has brought a little joy into your day and maybe even shown you some new part of culture that you’ve taken away to dig into on your own. Personally I’ve made a bunch of discoveries: we trotted through salsa, cumbia, porros, but then we broadened out to salsapunk, cumbia rebajada and parranda music. We dipped into the unique cultures of Afro-Peruvian rhythms and their abundant musical styles: marinera, festejo, landó, tondero, zamacueca. We played some psychedelic sounds of tropicalismo from 1970’s Brazil, and tambora music played in Palenque towns formed by escaped slave communities on the Carribean coast of Colombia (a personal favorite).

It’s been a great pleasure to take this journey with you and thanks for reaching out with feedback and suggestions that made the show all the better.

I’m going to take a break after today, but I’m sure we’ll cross paths down the line. For now, I hope today’s show brings you a little Alegría.