What is a Traditional Dance in Nicaragua

It takes some research and effort to figure out what is a traditional dance in Nicaragua. Being a part of the global tourist and economic industries, there are many influences from other cultures ranging from as far as the Middle East to as close as Cuba. For this reason, tourists may go to Nicaragua and dance something like the salsa, and think they have experienced some of the traditional dance forms of Nicaragua.

That's an unfortunate assumption, because Nicaragua does have a traditional or "folkloric" dance tradition ranging back to pre-Colonial times. To find these dances, though, one needs to go to one of the many festivals and fiestas throughout the country, where the adults and children alike join together to perform dances they've learned in their schools and in their homes, passed on teacher to student, parent to child. These dances include things like:

• Las Inditas – a masked dance about courting girls.
• Los Diabilitos – literally translated "the little devils," this is the boys' version.
• Las Negras – another masked dance celebrating the African influences in Nicaraguan culture.
• El Baile de los chinegros – a dramatic reenactment of a battle between Christians and Moors.

There are also many dances featuring animals and other characters from everyday life and legend, such as the Baile de la Vaca (Dance of the Cow) to El Baile de la Gigantona (Dance of the Great Giant). The latter includes the use of a giant puppet figure in the dance, and all have colorful costumes and other props for the dancers to use. Most dances are accompanied by a wide variety of instruments, especially percussion, but the marimba stands out as being especially rooted in Nicaraguan culture. It is like a xylophone but made of wood with rich, mellow tones, and it is played throughout the world as a part of symphonic percussion performance. Its origins, though, belong to the folkloric traditions of Nicaragua.

Nicaragua is known for being a country with many political and cultural upheavals, especially in the late 20th century. Often when governments change they try to either appropriate or erase many of the traditions of the country as a measure of control over the populace.

Nicaraguan dance has, for the most part, been spared that fate, largely due to the work of Irene López beginning in the mid-1960's. She absorbed and preserved the work of historian Enrique Pena Hernandez, who had cataloged the many forms of cultural dance that had survived the turbulent years between 1940-1950. Preserving the art forms wasn't enough, though, and López also began working with the composer Camilo Zapata to expand and promote the traditional dance forms throughout the Nicaraguan populace.

Starting with a small dance school, she taught only to small groups for fifteen years until the Sandinistas took over the government in 1979. Recognizing her value as a cultural resource, they appointed her as director of the newly-formed National School of Dance.

The National School was exactly that, teaching the folkloric forms in the schools and producing a generation of new dancers steeped in their own historic movement forms as well as ballet and social dances imported from the Soviets and Cuba. Bayardo Ortiz was one of these, a dancer from the age of seven from Masaya, one of the key centers of traditional Nicaraguan culture. Ortiz not only promoted dance but also music and stories on his own radio program, and López put him in charge of a touring dance troupe that performed all over the country and also internationally throughout central America.

The success of the National School of Dance led to the formation of many other dance companies in Nicaragua, including the Experimental Workshop of Folkloric Dance and the Sandinista Association of Cultural Workers. While these newer groups drew some of the interest and resources from López's school, the key work of preserving their cultural heritage had been accomplished. To this day cultural dance festivals celebrating the arts old and new are held yearly in Nicaragua. Even through all the changes in the country since then, the internet now serves as a video cultural ambassador, making the traditional dances available to everyone.

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