This style of music will get you on your feet! We're talking about Cumbia.
For this Hispanic Heritage Month, we show you how it's enjoyed here in the Coastal Bend.
"Any type of music that comes out of here you can feel the influence of the Latin culture," Dusty Olivera, or as many people call him, "El Dusty," a music producer in Corpus Christi, said.
Throughout the last few decades, he's seen how Cumbia has evolved.
"The culture here is like Hispanic Culture, Mexican influenced culture, so it's definitely like a hub for Cumbia music and always has been, and with Selena and stuff like that she definitely put Corpus on the map, I often call that city Cumbia just as a term because so much is brewing here," Olivera said.
He's even added a new twist, "Electro Cumbia".
"That's a little bit my contribution in this remix tip, in a newer style of Cumbia, not so traditional but influenced by everything," Olivera said.
Dusty said he's grateful to be a part of this community.
Colombia is known as the cradle of Cumbia music since it was there where it originated.
This rhythm and dance combines three cultures, African, Indian, and Spanish, and today it is a genre that is listened to worldwide.
Javier Salinas, a Latin American Musical Studies professor at Texas A&M Kingsville said while this genre has evolved, it shows how each culture has adopted its own form of Cumbia.
"The genre serves as a dance piece so for example right now our prominent groups that are presenting this style and this genre are frontlines Grupo Frontera but it has this lenitive until the 1800s when this was Afro Caribbean usually inspired by African slaves," Salinas said.
Salinas said this certainly holds true here in the Coastal Bend.
"I think it's something that as a consumer people like to listen to, dance is always going to be a part of our culture here in South Texas whether it's led by early Tejano or early orchestras within Tejano music or more Conjunto music, Cumbia is also served more as a preliminary type of dance style and or ritual in that sense," Salinas said.
Cumbia remains a big part of the Hispanic community.
Olivera said he continues to see the interest among the new generation of music lovers.
"There's a lot of young people coming up, dancing like Cumbia Wepa, it has a lot to do with kids watching it on TikTok and stuff like that, it's all these kids dancing to these different Cumbia songs and it's great to see everybody a little bit into it now," Olivera said.
Dusty said he hopes that Cumbia and its different styles will touch more generations and homes for many years to come.
