In the following interview, LeAna López, member of Los Pleneros de la 21 (LP21), talks with Dr. Douglas Peach (Folklife Specialist, American Folklife Center) about the group’s Community Collections Grant project, her personal history with the traditions, and what has been surprising to her about interviewing members of her community. LP21 is an organization based in New York City, whose members practice the traditional Puerto Rican musical genres of bomba and plena. In 2024, as part of the Library’s Of the People: Widening the Path initiative, the American Folklife Center (AFC) awarded LP21 with a Community Collections Grant (CCG) to document their community. Read more about the CCG program here.
Doug Peach: LeAna, tell me about Los Pleneros de la 21’s Community Collections Grant (CCG) project and what inspired you to undertake this work?
LeAna López: Our project is titled, “The Evolving Practices and Perspectives of Bomba y Plena in the Diaspora.” We’re focusing specifically on the New York City tri-state area [Editor’s note: the tri-state area is New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut]. My inspiration, I think, is really a response to the shifts that are happening within our community, my expanded role in the community, and the increased responsibility that I now have. I’ve always had an interest in doing research and taking a more retrospective “bird’s eye view” into our cultural practices. The Community Collections Grant presented itself and was a perfect opportunity to do so.
COVID-19 created some major shifts in our community in the ways that we practice and share our musical traditions. Change is inevitable, but during COVID-19, something extraordinary happened where we were all forced into our homes and had to resort to technology. And I think technology was extremely helpful, and has been extremely helpful, in connecting us. Bomba is now practiced in Japan! In giving others access [to our cultural practices], it allowed us to connect, to take classes, to learn, to continue to grow. But, I think it also shifted the culture in other ways.
As our elders begin to age and shift their practices or unfortunately pass away, it created yet another change. Those who have studied under these masters for years are now stepping into new roles as cultural bearers and educators. There are different responsibilities, levels of accountability, purposes, and intentions. Outside factors such as technology, social media, and COVID-19 felt like they expedited these evolutionary processes. For these reasons, it felt like we needed to collectively pause and look at what was happening. In passing, we have conversations about how everyone is feeling because of these changes but for me, it felt like we needed time to be intentional, to reflect, and have these one-to-one conversations with elders and practitioners. Bomba and plena for most of their histories have been oral traditions. This grant presented an invaluable opportunity to be in the trenches of the community in a different way and document our rich culture and history. I know most of us wish we could go back in time to see pictures and videos of those who came before us. I wanted to document this not only for us, but for the many generations that follow. This was my inspiration for this project.
Doug Peach: What are you doing to have these conversations?
LeAna López: I am accomplishing this project through interviews. The interviewees are a mix of elders, those who I like to call straddlers—those who aren’t just quite elders yet, but also aren’t new to our traditions—and then some people who are fairly new and up and coming in our practices. Everyone’s interview looks a little bit different. I ask foundational questions of everyone, but everyone’s story is also so colorful and so beautiful. Beautiful, beautiful stories and reflections.
Doug Peach: Let’s back up for a bit. If you were describing bomba and plena to someone who had no idea about these traditions, what would you tell them?
LeAna López: Bomba and plena are our musical expressions, cultural expressions. It’s our identity, whether we are in Puerto Rico, or in the diaspora, it is part of who we are. Our ancestors brought over their knowledge of the drums, and when they arrived in Puerto Rico and encountered the Taínos and the Spaniards, it was then that bomba was born. Bomba also has influences from other Caribbean islands as people migrated through the various islands—Haiti is one of them.
In bomba, the relationship between the drummer and dancer is highlighted. There is a non-verbal conversation where the drummer interprets the dancer’s improvisational body movements on the drum. When playing bomba, you are part of a collective. As a dancer, you oscillate between the world that you are in when you dance, but also your place within the community and playing close attention to the music that you are creating. Bomba is composed of song, dance, and percussion and each aspect has its element of storytelling and invites everyone to be an active participant.
And then you have plena, which is the younger genre of music which came out of the working-class communities of Puerto Rico, and it is referred to as “the sung newspaper.” Plena is played with hand drums that are similar to tambourines. In the songs you can hear stories about love, the neighborhood, gossip, and socio-political affairs. Bomba and plena are both Puerto Rican musical expressions, but not one in the same.
Doug Peach: When you’re talking to these elders or youngsters or straddlers, what kind of questions are you asking them?
LeAna López: I’m asking them, first of all, where their journey began. I think that there are so many people in our community who we see, who we know in passing, but don’t know the origin story of how they encountered bomba. And everyone’s origin story is a little bit different. Some have been living in New York for many years but are from Puerto Rico—their first encounter with bomba and plena was there. Some have never had the experience of playing bomba and plena music in Puerto Rico first-hand, but their first experience of the genres was in New York. Those origin stories have been so diverse and so beautiful in that way, no matter where your entry point was into our traditions. Some of the other questions that I asked them are who their elders are, who their inspirations are, depending on the practitioner, the socio-political climate of their time, and how these genres of music have responded to what was happening. And if you have an elder, we can go as far back as the sixties and the seventies and what was happening at the time. Bringing it to the present day, we have Black Lives Matter. We have the issues in Puerto Rico with the government. So, there are many different perspectives, but bomba and plena still serve the same purposes and provide a vehicle for responding to these societal issues.
Some of the other questions that I’ve asked is about their response to the changes that have been happening in our culture—the good ones, the maybe not so good ones, too. And, where do they see themselves as a part of the future of our communities? What’s going to be their contributing role? How has technology affected, improved, shaped, shifted what we’re doing?
I ask them about their own work as practitioners—whether it’s dancers, drummers, or singers. I also ask about the inspiration behind the pieces that they’ve created, history about their specific town, their practices, and how that differs from other places. I also ask about the influences that New York City and the diaspora have had on their practices. In New York, we are exposed to so many different cultures—from Latin America, the Caribbean, and beyond—and we’re seeing that we are all running in similar circles. I’m also curious about how being exposed to these different cultures has contributed to and shifted what we do, how we play, and who we know. We’ve gotten very personal. It’s been cathartic and a time of reflection for everyone!
Doug Peach: At this writing, you’ve done about ten interviews for your CCG project. Can you tell me what’s been surprising to you in the interviews so far?
LeAna López: What’s been surprising to me is that some of the people that were born in Puerto Rico had access to bomba and plena, but they didn’t really take off on their journey with these traditions until they got here to New York and into the diaspora, which is very interesting, right? Because you would think—“Well, I have access there.” You can go to Puerto Rico and you can see bomba anywhere. You can see plena anywhere. But for some, it was just practiced during the Christmas season, it was just maintained during the holidays. But, when you’re away from home, there is a need to connect back to your home. We call it plantando bandera, like “planting your flag.” There is this need to affirm yourself and find your community outside of home. So, it was [in New York] where their journeys took off as practitioners of bomba and plena. So, I found that very interesting.
Doug Peach: One of the great things about the CCG program, is that it gives community members who may or may not have prior experience doing oral history interviews, the chance to interview those from their own community and document history from their community’s perspective. You didn’t have any experience doing oral history interviews before this project, right?
LeAna López: No.
Doug Peach: What have you learned and what have you experienced through the process of conducting these interviews for your project?
LeAna López: There’s been a huge learning curve. I began my interviews in a very rigid way, fixated on the questions and making sure that I got through them. But as the interviews continued, I realized that I needed to trust the process. I’ve been [doing bomba and plena] my whole life. My journey wasn’t always linear, however, but this has always been part of my life always. So, trusting that process, trusting my knowledge, and letting them tell their story. There is a flow to each interview—a beginning, a middle and an end that we want to get to. But allowing them to express themselves and to tell their story. In that storytelling, the questions will be answered. And, I am learning to be present, be in the moment, listening.
What I found most interesting was we are typically in silos. And these interviews are a chance to just reflect on your own practices, your own intentions, your own philosophy as an educator. You think within yourself all the time, but when someone asks you something and you bring the questions to your awareness, it’s a little bit different. There are certain questions that I ask where people say, “Wow, I’ve thought about this, but I need a moment to answer.” I think I’ve cried after every interview. So, it’s just really been a surge of emotion and gratitude.
Doug Peach: You mentioned that you grew up with bomba and plena. Can you tell us about your background with these traditions and with Los Pleneros de la 21?
LeAna López: I began as a student with Los Pleneros de la 21 in 1997. I didn’t have prior knowledge of bomba or plena. It was a Christmas thing for me. Then, I walked into a class and saw them playing the panderos [Editor’s note: a pandero is a hand-held drum, commonly used in plena music]. And, that was it. I haven’t turned back since I was a student. I was around 15 years old when I began to teach. Then, I began to perform professionally around the tri-state area. I was always a practitioner. I was always in the community. However, I went on to finish school, get my master’s, and to become an educator. And then in 2018, I came back to teach with LP21. It is a full circle moment. My journey speaks very much to the mission of the organization, the intergenerational connections, the passing of the torch. And that’s what I do here. I teach the children, I teach adult classes, I develop lessons, curriculums, I oversee the educational programs. I teach dance and play a supportive role in teaching percussion alongside my co-teachers Jorge Vazquez and Matthew Gonzalez. I also make it a point to integrate history into our classes. I am also part of LP21’s school performance ensemble which is part of our “In the Schools” and “In the House” educational programs.
The most beautiful thing about this project has been speaking to my teachers—that is what has made me cry. I got the chance to actually thank them for their impact. The village has been so monumental in my life. I think that when you’re young and you’re in it, you don’t realize it. It isn’t until you get older that you realize and appreciate the contributions these people have had on your life and the community. It has been really nice to hear people’s stories and learn from their wealth of knowledge.
Doug Peach: What are your future goals for this project, and what do you hope will happen with this body of work 5, 10, 20 years down the road?
LeAna López: I would hope that everyone has access. I would love for everyone in our community to access this somehow. To hear the voices, to hear the stories. We all want the same things for our culture and for our music. We just haven’t had the time to really sit and be intentional about how we’re going to do that. I hope that we can continue having conversations and having those difficult conversations sometimes, especially as our elders are passing and some of us are stepping into new roles. And I hope that everyone can feel that this is theirs. This is not for me. This is for us. I’m the conduit. I’m a vehicle, a vessel for everyone.
Doug Peach: Thank you, LeAna. It will be an honor to steward your collections at the American Folklife Center, where others can access these important interviews. We wish you the best for the rest of your CCG project.
Read more about other AFC’s Community Collections Grant projects here, on the Of the People blog.