Category Archives: New York City

sudaca/bronx/jam

sudaca/bronx/jam

I am ultra-excited to be a part of Spanic Attack’s 5th year anniversary jam this Sunday in the Bronx!

Urayoán Noel will be hosting the poetry segment (starts at 4:00pm) featuring Edwin Torres, Latasha Diggs, and Oscar Bermeo.

Please spread the word and come on by if you get a chance.

Spanic Attack at Haven Arts Gallery
Sunday July 27th, 3-10pm, Free!

Sudaca: A pejorative term coined in Spain to refer to Latin American migrants, stemming from SUDAmeriCAno (South American). Perhaps related to sudar, from the Latin sud_re, to sweat.

Like Black emcees who claimed the N-word in the 1980s to subvert its racist history, a group of Latin American, Latino and Caribbean artists are flipping the script on the term sudaca.

Through a potent mix of photography, spoken word and nueva canción, “Sudaca Bronx Jam” will explore representations of sudaca, sweat and el Sud, the South.

It will all take place in the steamy South Bronx, at the Haven Arts Gallery’s new patio space, on Sunday, July 27 from 3 p.m. to 10 p.m. Take the 6 train to 138th Street and Alexander Avenue, the first stop in the Bronx. The address is 50 Bruckner Blvd., Building A (walk south on Alexander to Bruckner).

Also dubbed “Sud-aka-Bronx,” or “Suda-Cabronx!” the latest event in the gallery’s summer matinee series is a summit of sorts, joining urban spoken word performers with singer-songwriters in the nueva canción tradition.

A movement in Latin American music developed in the 1960s in the Southern Cone, nueva canción combined folk music with politicized lyrics.

Featured artist Rafo Ráez, a Lima, Peru-based singer and composer who made his mark in the mid-1990s with his Psych/Prog album “Suicida de 16 y otras canciones,” will make his New York City debut.

Other performers include: Oscar Bermeo, Edwin Torres, Rebio Díaz, LaTasha Diggs, el objeto, Jarana Beat, Los Charlatanes, R-Tronika and LaSovietika. Photographers Jonás Hidalgo, Chris Kralik, Mar Cuervo and Adriana Mateos will exhibit their work.

Each musical artist or group will perform its own set, but they will also collaborate spontaneously, as some visual artists improvise.

www.spanicattack.com

X-Post: The Neighborhood of the House That Ruth Built


BxMh_Bridges_07
Originally uploaded by Pro-Zak

The Bronx Is More Than Just Yankee Stadium
By SETH KUGEL

THIS season is your last chance to catch a game in the old Yankee Stadium, before the House That Ruth Built is replaced by its modern cousin across 161st Street, the House That Steinbrenner and Taxpayer Subsidies Built.

That means a lot of first-timers will be heading into town and up to the South Bronx, and they might have no idea what else there is to see and do around the stadium. They shouldn’t feel bad: most lifelong Yankees fans who have been up there hundreds of times don’t know, either.

That’s in part because the area still suffers the hangover of decades of bad press. But Howard Cosell is dead, the Bronx isn’t burning, and sticking around after the game does not have to mean crowding into beer-soaked bars across the street from the stadium.

You don’t even have to go very far; you’re only three blocks away from the Grand Concourse, the once-stately, still-impressive thoroughfare that in its day was a most desirable address. It’s working-class these days, but you can still sense the grandeur in the sheer width of the 11-lane road and the architecture that lines it.

More here.

X-Post: No Thonx for the Bronx

Bronx Journal
Borough Gets Scant Notice for Hospitality
By DAVID GONZALEZ

The people who published AAA’s 2008 New York tour book had a hard time recommending any hotels in the Bronx. They could find only one, in fact.

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“The more things are supposed to change, the more it stays the same,” (says Julio Pabon, a local businessman and community advocate.) “People think the Bronx is still a no man’s land so nobody wants to stay here. So there’s no place to stay.”

More here.