“Under the Radar – A Survey of Afro-Cuban Music” is a documentary that introduces viewers to the distinct music of Cuba, examining the enigmatic island’s music scene as it was in 2001. The film documents the travels and recordings of its producer/director, jazz saxophonist, J. Plunky Branch, and executive producer, Alvin Skipper Bailey, and highlights their musical interactions and collaborations of Afro-Cuban rumba, son, salsa, timba, rock, changui and hip-hop musicians and rappers.
Branch and Bailey, both African-Americans, traveled under the auspices of a number of US universities, and in collaboration with the humanitarian organization, Pastors For Peace, to carry out this project. They toured the cities of Havana, Guantanamo and Santiago de Cuba, to research and record a wide range of musicians. The results of their work is being disseminated through this 85 minute educational film and a series of three compilation music CD’s.
For more than 50 years the United States has maintained an economic blockade against the Island of Cuba, restricting travel, investment and cultural exchange between Americans and their Caribbean neighbors just 90 miles south of Florida. Afro-Cuban music has inarguably been recognized as some of the most vibrant and influential rhythmic music in the world.
