Conga (dance)

The conga is a popular Cuban dance of African origin that has a syncopated rhythm and is accompanied by drums. It serves as an accompaniment to carnival troupes and originated in the festivities carried out by black slaves. This toponymy created in Camagüey, appears in the 1930s, with antecedents of "La Arrolladora" of Izaguirre, with barrel drums, bells (Comandos, Muchachos Durmientes, Los Pulpos, Farola, Los Caribes). During this decade it became a ballroom dance.

Drums of various types participate in its instrumental, barrel-shaped and single-headed (conga, tumbadora, quinta); bass drum, cowbells, pans and other metal objects.

At the beginning of the republic it was used as an element of political propaganda, used by the candidates in the pre-election period to move the popular masses behind their rhythms and songs, in which their victory was advocated.

"The dance is reduced to going to the compass of the characteristic rhythm, in which alternatively, in all the peers, a syncopa stands out that the dancers emphasize lifting a leg slightly and marking the blow with a abrupt movement of the body. »

Emilio Grenet: Cuban People's Music, 1939

Then they danced in a more free way. The largest conga on record was the Miami Super Conga that took place on 8th Street on March 13, 1988. The line was made up of 119,986 people.^{[citation needed]}

The conga is a danceable and singable genre, where the joy, rhythm and flavor of Cuban music stands out.

These festivals were held on occasions when the authorities allowed certain distractions to the slaves: on the Habeas festival, on Sundays and mainly on Three Kings' Day. It was a musical and social event that filled the cities with joy, subordinating the songs, drumbeats and fabulous choreographies, in a revelry that contrasted with the ballroom dances that the bourgeoisie generated for their enjoyment and even with the so-called cradle dances., where various strata and social groups mixed.