Every farm with slaves was a slave-breeding farm. Raising slaves was mostly a cottage industry.

Chano Pozo created the role of the conga soloist in the modern band, somewhat th way Coleman Hawkins created the solo tenor sax.

Like slaves on the sugar plantations of the Antilles, ...the sugar slaves of southern Louisiana had negative birthrates for as long as slavery lasted.

Miguelito, liberated from having to sing with Cugat, sounds like he just got out of jail and is letting it rip.

That spirit of mockery characteristic of the guaracha was part of the mambo from the beginning.

One often reads that the 1950s was the golden age of Cuban music, but it was really one long phase, from 1937 to 1958, each year with its own splendour.

Up through and including Lincoln, American politicians nursed a fantasy of repatriating blacks to Africa.

Things are happening out there. Don’t waste your life in wishful thinking. Get out of your cocoon and go make a name for yourself. Life is too short to be wasted in oblivion.

But everybody still walked in eggshells around the two of them, trying not pick sides, though loyalties were inevitably divided.

Our enemies leave our bodies for the crows and the wolves. Our friends bury us in secret graves.

The number one skill in life is not giving up.

Language most shows a man speak that I may see thee.

Streets that follow like a tedious argumentOf insidious intentTo lead you to an overwhelming question...

When people tell really good stories in songs, I really like it.

I look at my homely sketch. It doesn't need anything. Even through the river in my eyes I can see that. It isn't perfect and that makes it just right.

I wouldn't have seen it if I hadn't believed it.

We want the air to unite the peoples, and not to divide them.