We are starting to spread out across the United States, but New York is still the world’s biggest Puerto Rican city. Through music, Puerto Rican culture dominates world youth culture.
Our culture is a mix of Indigenous Taíno and Island Carib, Spanish colonizer, African Diaspora, and for better and worse, the Americans. We almost got free, and then the Americans came.
Traditional Puerto Rican culture includes: bomba, plena, and música jíbara. We have good merengue too.
Contemporary Puerto Rican culture includes: mural art, spoken word, theatre, Latin jazz, salsa, reggaeton, latin trap, oh and Christmas. We have the world’s longest Christmas celebration, with Three Kings Day being the peak.
We call ourselves by our Taíno names, “Boricua” the people of the island of Borikén.
The Taíno tribe was absorbed, but lives on in our blood, in place names, and in the communal nature of island life. We are still here. No doubt!
The island really is the last colony with no vote in Federal elections.
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Puerto Rican Culture
The Carlos Henriquez Nonet Plays Nuyorican Jazz at Dizzy’s Including New Year’s Eve
DIZZY’S CLUB, Jazz at Lincoln Center, Columbus Circle, Manhattan 🇵🇷
Continue Reading The Carlos Henriquez Nonet Plays Nuyorican Jazz at Dizzy’s Including New Year’s Eve
Mexican Opera “Florencia en el Amazonas” Stars Ailyn Pérez in Spanish at the Metropolitan Opera
METROPOLITAN OPERA, Lincoln Center 🇲🇽 🇧🇷 ~ 🇦🇷 🇨🇦 🇮🇨 🇨🇺 🇬🇹 🇮🇹 🇳🇮 🇵🇷 🇪🇸
Papo Vázquez Mighty Pirates Troubadours Play a Puerto Rican Holiday Jazz Parranda at Hostos Center
HOSTOS CENTER, Mott Haven, The Bronx ~ The NEA Latino Master and Grammy nominee leads a jazz version of the Puerto Rican holiday parranda tradition. 🇵🇷
Ozuna Joins the MegaBash Urban Music Festival at Prudential Center
PRUDENTIAL CENTER, Newark, New Jersey 🇩🇴 🇵🇷
Continue Reading Ozuna Joins the MegaBash Urban Music Festival at Prudential Center
Los Pleneros de la 21 Celebrate 40 Years with Arturo O’Farrill & the Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra “Una Navidad Nuyorkina” at Hostos
HOSTOS CENTER, Mott Haven, The Bronx 🇵🇷
Danza Fiesta Performs “Baile y Teatro Puertorriqueño” at Hostos Center
HOSTOS CENTER in Mott Haven, The Bronx ~ New York’s Puerto Rican folkloric dance company dances the grand finale to the 14th South Bronx Folk Festival. 🇵🇷
Continue Reading Danza Fiesta Performs “Baile y Teatro Puertorriqueño” at Hostos Center
“The Other Side Story” is a One-Man Musical Comedy About the Brilliance and Resilience of the Puerto Rican Diaspora at Hostos Center
HOSTOS CENTER, Mott Haven, The Bronx ~ Ángel Vázquez, Resident Artist at the Center for Puerto Rican Studies at Hunter College, tells funny, but true stories, about the brilliance and resilience of the Puerto Rican Diaspora. 🇵🇷
Nélida Tirado Dances Traditional Rumba Flamenco Wednesdays at Chez Messy
CHEZ MESSY, Washington Heights ~ This New York Puerto Rican and her company dance traditional Spanish flamenco at the highest levels with rumba flamenca flavor. ¡Olé y WEPA! 🇪🇸 🇵🇷
Continue Reading Nélida Tirado Dances Traditional Rumba Flamenco Wednesdays at Chez Messy
Ballet Hispánico is One of America’s Leading Latin Dance Companies
🇺🇸 🇧🇷 🇨🇴 🇨🇺 🇮🇹 🇲🇽 🇵🇷 🇸🇻 🇪🇸 🇻🇪
LINCOLN CENTER “Latinx Immersive Experience”
92ND STREET Y contemporary dance
NEW YORK CITY CENTER Spring season 🇨🇺 🇨🇴 🇪🇸
Continue Reading Ballet Hispánico is One of America’s Leading Latin Dance Companies
Puerto Rican News
Puerto Rican NYC
Puerto Rican Art
El Museo del Barrio; in “El Barrio” East Harlem; is New York’s Puerto Rican, Caribbean, and Latin American art museum. 🇵🇷
Taller Boricua in “El Barrio” East Harlem, is a gallery and artist’s workshop in the Julio de Burgos Cultural Arts Center. tallerboricua.org 🇵🇷
Puerto Rican Cultural Centers
The CCCADI, Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute presents African Diaspora culture. 🇵🇷
The Clemente Soto Vélez Cultural & Educational Center houses many Puerto Rican theatre groups. 🇵🇷
Julia de Burgos Performance and Arts Center is a community cultural center in “El Barrio” East Harlem. jdbpac.org 🇵🇷
Toñita’s Caribbean Social Club is NYC’s last Puerto Rican social club. @tonitasny 🇵🇷
Puerto Rican Dance Companies
Ballet Hispánico is a contemporary dance company that has grown into America’s largest Latinx cultural organization, and one of America’s cultural treasures. 🇨🇺 🇲🇽 🇵🇷 🇻🇪
Bombazo Dance Company is one of NYC’s leading bomba dance companies. bombazodanceco.com 🇵🇷
Danza Fiesta is one of NYC’s leading Puerto Rican folkloric dance companies. 🇵🇷
Los Pleneros de la 21 is one of NYC’s leading bomba & plena music and dance companies. 🇵🇷
Puerto Rican Festivals
Three Kings Day, on January 6, is the Puerto Rican side of Christmas.
New York Puerto Rico Week is the second week of June. 🇵🇷
Puerto Rican Heritage Month is November. 🇵🇷
Puerto Rican Food
A lot of New York Puerto Rican food is street food, just like in Puerto Rico.
Casa Adela is a small diner in the East Village that serves Puerto Rican comida criolla (home food). web 🇵🇷
Lechonera La Piraña is a trailer known for the best Puerto Rican lechon (roast pork) in NYC. It’s at East 152nd St and Wales Ave in the South Bronx. nytimes.com 🇵🇷
Que Chevere is a Puerto Rican fast food place in the Essex Market Manhattan’s Lower East Side. quechevereles.com 🇵🇷
Sofrito is an upscale Puerto Rican restaurant in Riverbank State Park along the Hudson River in West Harlem. sofritony.com 🇵🇷
Puerto Rican Film
The International Puerto Rican Heritage Film Festival is New York’s Puerto Rican film festival. 🇵🇷
Puerto Rican Music
There are many New York Puerto Rican musicians.
Bronx Music Heritage Center in Melrose, The Bronx, is a community performing arts center that celebrates the many cultures of The Bronx. 🇵🇷
Hostos Center; at Hostos College in Mott Haven, The Bronx; is one of the top Latin culture presenters in the Northeast. 🇵🇷
Lehman Center at Lehman College presents many top Latin artists. 🇵🇷
Puerto Rican Parades
The El Museo Three Kings Day Parade celebrates Three Kings Day in “El Barrio” East Harlem in January. 🇵🇷
June’s National Puerto Rican Day Parade is America’s biggest cultural celebration. 🇵🇷
Spoken Word
The Nuyorican Poets Café in “Loisaida,” the East Village, is New York’s Historic House of Slam Poetry. 🇵🇷
Puerto Rican Street Fairs
The 116th St Festival 🇵🇷
The 152nd St Festival kicks-off the National Puerto Rican Day Parade in Longwood, The Bronx in May. 🇵🇷
The Afribembé Festival is the CCCADI, Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute’s August street fair.🇵🇷
The Loisaida Festival is an East Village/Lower East Side community festival in May. 🇵🇷
Puerto Rican Theatre
Pregones/PRTT is a bilingual performing arts troupe that produces at Pregones Theater in Concourse, The Bronx; and Puerto Rican Traveling Theater in Hell’s Kitchen, Manhattan. 🇵🇷
Teatro LATEA (Latin American Theater Experiment Associates) is a Latino performing arts company in the Lower East Side. 🇵🇷
Teatro SEA is a Latino theatre for young audiences known for its puppetry in the Lower East Side. 🇵🇷
Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico really is the island of enchantment. We lived in Borikén for four years and always felt safe and welcome, even though we ran in Puerto Rico’s wildest places.
Bomba
This is the batey (sacred dance circle) of Los Hermanos Ayala, one of the first families of bomba Puertorriqueña. Their house is in Loíza Aldea, the Puerto Rican town with the strongest Afro-Puerto Rican culture. It’s the cultural heart of bomba.
There are many very famous bomba singers and drummers in this video. It’s great to see how the children get it. This is for real.
Plena
This video is a bit old fashioned, but it does capture the spirit of the plena. It was produced with the Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña which is still a very important guardian of Puerto Rican culture. Puerto Rico isn’t like this anymore. It really changed in the 1950s.
We love the section at 8:30 which is the famous old plena “Tintorera del Mar.”
Tintorera del mar
Classic plena “Tintorera del mar.”
Tintorera del mar
Tintorera del mar
Que se ha comido un americano”
A tintorera is a female tiger shark. The verse says that the tiger shark ate the American. That’s basically what happened to us.
Salsa
This video captures so much of the character of the island today. “I love my town. I love my people.” 🇵🇷
La Perla
La Perla is a small barrio outside the walls of Old San Juan. It can be intense, but is a very real and beautiful Puerto Rican neighborhood. Respect.
Loco Pero Feliz
Pirulo is representative of some of what’s happening now in Puerto Rico. It’s not quite salsa, but a little more timba. The music lives and grows.
¡WEPA!