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—Dr.
Lynne Guitar (1999)
When did the merengue
begin? Where did the merengue come
from? These are questions that make
Dominican historians very uncomfortable
about the republic’s national
dance because, despite documentary
evidence, they do not want to admit
that it appears to have begun during
1822-1844, when the country was under
Haitian control. (The Haitian meringue
is nearly identical to the traditional
Dominican merengue except that it
has a slower tempo and is usually
performed in a minor key, whereas
the Dominican merengue is performed
in a major key. The Haitian dance
evolved from a syncretism of European
dance styles and the calenda and chica
dances that were popular among French
San Domingue’s slaves.) To counter
its Haitian origins, a myth arose
that links Dominican merengue to Haitian
resistance and the foundation of the
Dominican Republic. An oral myth,
it was first published in 1927 as
the text for a musical album by Julio
Alberto Hernández. In this
romanticized version, a unit of Spanish
soldiers was gathered around a campfire
in 1844, celebrating their victory
over a Haitian column in the Battle
of Talanquera. They composed and sang
the first merengue to mock the cowardice
of one of their fellows, a mulatto
deserter named Tomás Torres.
The main soldier dancing around the
campfire, supposedly, had been wounded
in the leg during the battle, thus
explaining what has been called the
“limping” or “dragging”
step of the dance.
Almost one hundred years later, at
the height of the Trujillo Era, another
myth arose, another political maneuver
to “whiten” the dance
and counter Fradique Lizardo’s
assertions of its Haitian-African
origins (Fradique Lizardo is recognized
as the first scholar to legitimize
studies of Afro-Dominican culture).
These were assertions that historians
like Flérida de Nolasco found
“shocking” and “unpatriotic.”
In her 1956 Santo Domingo y el folklor
universal, she credits the musician
Juan Baptista Alfonseca with the creation
of the merengue. Alfonseca did compose
many meringues in the 1850s that introduced
the rhythms and themes of the new
republic’s folk music to the
upper classes, but he did not create
the merengue.
One thing that is certain about the
merengue is that it was attacked from
the outset by the country’s
elites for the “immoral”
way it was danced (couples holding
each other close) and for its “crude
and obscene” lyrics. Debates
raged in the capital’s Oasis
newspaper about whether or not the
dance should be outlawed (Puerto Rico’s
governor did promulgate a fine and
jail sentence for anyone caught dancing
meringue on that island). By 1875,
even the president of the Dominican
Republic, Ulises Francisco Espaillat,
was actively publishing diatribes
against the merengue under the pseudonym
“María.”
By the turn of the twentieth century,
the elites were no longer playing
meringues nor dancing them in their
salons, but merengue had a strong
foothold among the “folk.”
Throughout the mostly illiterate Cibao
in particular (the agricultural heartland
of the country), merengue was an important
means of oral communication and social
commentary—and Espaillat’s
political excesses were fertile fodder.
The most popular merengue musician
was the accordionist Francisco “Ñico”
Lora from the Cibao, who wrote more
than 500 merengues in the early 20th
century. “He was like a journalist,”
observed Augustín Pichardo,
“because he commented on everything
with his accordion.”
The typical instruments used to play
merengue were the güira (scraper),
tambora (a small drum that is made
with the hide of a female goat on
the side played with sticks and the
hide of a male goat on the side played
with the hand), guitar, cuatro (a
small, four-stringed instrument),
and an African stringed rhythm instrument
called the marimba. The upper-class
meringues introduced by Alfonseca
also incorporated violins, flutes,
and panderetas (a kind of tambourine).
In the 1870s, Bernabé Morales
and Joaquín Beltrán,
two Spanish merchants in Santiago,
introduced a new instrument, the German
button accordion, which displaced
the guitar and cuatro. Circa 1910,
the saxophone was introduced, which
would change the sound of “pop”
merengue in the 1950s and blast in
onto the international music scene.
Merengues at the turn of the century
were composed of two parts. The first
was a 16-measure segment called the
merengue proper, and the second was
a four to eight bars long jaleo segment
in which the percussion section went
wild with improvised variations (the
word “jaleo” comes from
Spain, where onlookers encourage Flamenco
dancers with shouts and rhythmic hand
clapping). In 1922 an introductory
paseo of eight measures was added,
inspired by the European waltzes and
polkas, which set the standard for
what has come to be called Merengue
Típico (also called Clásico
or Foklórico) , which is still
cherished today.
The 1916-1924 U.S. occupation of the
Dominican Republic stimulated a renewal
of upper-class interest in the merengue.
The music was used as a political
tool to strengthen Dominican pride
and resistance. Ñico wrote
a popular protest merengue at this
time and Juan Francisco “Pancho”
García popularized symphonies
such as “La Quisqueya,”
which were based on merengue themes.
The oldest known merengue, “Juangomero,”
was the standard closing number at
elite balls of the era. The U.S. occupation
was also the catalyst for at least
two new variants of merengue: the
merengue estilo yanki (yankee style
merengue), which combined traditional
choreography with a simple one-step
dance from the U.S., and the pambiche
(Palm Beach) style popularized by
Monquito Peralta, a female accordionist
in Puerto Plata. Her style, which
she learned in the border region between
the Dominican Republic and the Republic
of Haiti, was faster than the typical
Dominican merengue. The combination
of faster beat and simpler dance steps
became the national Dominican dance
of the 1930s.
When Rafael Leonidas Trujillo Molina
campaigned for the presidency in 1930
and 1931, he took along the merengueros
Ñico Lora and Toño Abreau
to sing his virtues—it was an
inexpensive and effective means of
propaganda. Rumor has it that Trujillo
promoted merengue because he thought
he cut a dashing figure on the dance
floor with it and because he was too
poor of a dancer for the more complicated
European and U.S. dances of the era.
He encouraged merengue’s popularity
in the salons of the elite as well
as in the pueblos of the poor, and
he hired composer Luis F. Alberti
to compile and rearrange all types
of Dominican music, especially the
merengue; Alberti’s orchestra
became the Orquesta Presidente Trujillo
and was one of the most popular of
the Big Band Era. More sophisticated
orchestrations of merengue were played
beginning in 1941 with the inauguration
of the National Conservatory of Music
and the Ciudad Trujillo Symphony Orchestra.
In 1946 merengue reached new heights
when it was featured on the new La
Voz radio station owned by Trujillo’s
brother José, and with the
1952 launching of Trujillo’s
national television station. Merengue
continued to be played at political
rallies and at places where foreigners
congregated, such as concerts, high
society salons, and tourist hotels.
International big band leaders like
Xavier Cougat, Edmundo Ros, and Billy
Frometa integrated meringues into
their sets.
The 1930s were the golden age of merengue,
which had by then evolved into two
main variants: perico ripiaos (also
called típicos conjuntos),
normally composed of three musicians,
for the poor and dance bands of various
sizes for the elite. Big-band ensembles
like the Orquesta San Juan José,
which featured vocalist Joseito Mateo,
the “King of Merengue,”
sped up the tempo of their arrangements,
substituted the saxophone and other
brass instruments for the accordion,
and further “jazzed up”
their merengues by eliminating the
paseo introduction. After Trujillo’s
assassination on May 3, 1961, the
country and its music were subjected
to more foreign influences than ever,
for Trujillo had tried to control
them. Not only more U.S. soldiers,
but also American Rock ‘n’
Roll invaded the island, as did other
forms of popular Caribbean music,
including the Afro-Cuban rhythms of
Salsa and Mambo, which had profound
effects on merengue. The most popular
new merenguero of the 1960s was Johnny
Ventura, whose music was “happier,”
faster and more “modern”
than the music of the Trujillo Era.
He was particularly inspired by Elvis
Presley, explaining, “If you
can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.”
His big hit of the 1970s, “Abusadora,”
is still popular and succeeded in
its mission “to get you to your
feet.” The U.S. group called
the Bee Gees, with their distinctive
high-pitched voices, also had a profound
influence on merengue.
Merengue has gone through dozens of
evolutions in the past forty years.
But one thing has not changed in well
over 150 years—many still complain
about merengue’s “suggestive”
lyrics. The truth is that the dance’s
contagious rhythms, simple steps,
and down-to-earth, playful lyrics
have combined to make it one of the
most popular of international music
and dance forms. And merengueros like
Juan Luis Guerra still use merengue
as a means to instill national pride
and promulgate social messages. One
of the most popular of Dominican meringues,
for example, is “Ojalá
que lleva café,” newly
reorchestrated by Guerra. The song
is based on the Dominican tradition
whereby poor coffee farmers would
head to the fields with only a flask
of strong, heavily sugared coffee
to fill their empty bellies. When
empty, wouldn’t it be nice if
it would rain coffee and they could
refill the flasks? On a higher level,
the song is also one of hope for more
commercial success for the Dominican
people, for it asks for more rain
to increase the coffee crop, a commercial
crop. And on an even higher level,
the song is a prayer set to music
and dance, a prayer for the hope of
a better future for all of human kind—it
is a prayer that reminds us of our
roots and of the needs of the people
of the campo, not just the needs of
the elites…. Ojala que lleval
café. Let’s all hope
for a coffee rain.
ADDITIONAL READING:
Unfortunately there’s not much
available in English about merengue
but for short newspaper articles,
mostly out of New York, although most
good guides to Latin American or Caribbean
music cover it briefly. The most complete
treatment is an unpublished master’s
thesis by Paul Austerlitz, “A
History of Dominican Merengue Highlighting
the Role of the Saxophone” (Middletown,
CT: Wesleyan University, May 1986).
Merengue is featured in J.M. Coopersmith’s
Music and Musicians of the Dominican
Republic (Washington, D.C.: Pan American
Union, 1962) and in Nicolas Slonimsky’s
Music of Latin America (New York:
Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1945).
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