Jesús “Chucho” García is a renowned human rights activist, ethnologist and president of the Africamérica Foundation in Caracas, Venezuela, and editor of the journal Africamérica, dedicated to the study and research of the contributions of the African peoples to the culture of the Américas. The Africamérica Foundation arose from the international Afro-descendent forum held in 1993 in Caracas, Venezuela, organized by UNESCO with participants from countries of África, Europe, the Américas and the Caribbean. The foundation was started with support from UNESCO through the Decenio Mundial for Cultural Development program, and with support from CONAC, Venezuela's cultural development organization. Areas that Fundación Afroamerica are developing include organizing multicultural music celebrations, publication of the magazine Africamérica and small monographs and develop action plans to encourage Afro-descendent populations to start businesses, host seminars and conferences.

Clave: Chucho, what is the influence of Jazz in Afro-Venezuelan music?

Right now, for example, we linked our last percussion event in Barlovento, last year in May, with jazz. We invited the best jazz percussionists, the best jazz drum set players, one of the best percussionists on tumbadoras, an important vibraphonist, and people like the percussionist Miguel Urbina. We then had an important discussion on the importance of Afro-Venezuelan percussion in jazz.

Almost all of the groups that play jazz in Venezuela have now been incorporating this kind of percussion. For example, a very well-known musician who is now a professor at Berklee College in Boston, made a record working mainly with the musical structure of San Millán, using the culo’e puya drums from Barlovento. Andrés Briceño has done the same thing, as well as the group led by Alfredo Naranjo. Another group, called Naroa, led by a young man who also studied in Berklee, is also doing this work. In other words, Afro-Venezuelan music is currently enriching the language of Jazz.