The tale of Andy Palacio and the Garifuna Collective traces its roots to the early 1980s, when a teenage Palacio traveled from his home in the Central American country of Belize to Nicaragua to serve in a literacy campaign. Palacio is Garifuna, a unique culture based on the Caribbean coast of Central America that blends elements of West African and Native Caribbean heritage. Andy was told that Nicaragua’s local Garifuna traditions and language were all but extinct. He was en route via boat to the Nicaraguan village of Orinoco to begin his first literacy assignment, when a storm forced a change of direction, leading to a surprise encounter that had a lasting impact on Palacio’s music, career, and life mission. The legacy of this life-changing meeting lives on in the music of Wátina, a stunning new album featuring an all-star, multigenerational lineup of Garifuna musicians from Belize, Guatemala, and Honduras released by the recently-formed record label Cumbancha.
Palacio uses music to keep Garifuna culture alive
By Andrew Gilbert
Special to the Mercury News
Everybody wants to be cool, especially young people," says Andy Palacio, 45, the moving force behind the Garifuna Collective, a band that's attracting international attention to the endangered, little-known Garifuna culture of
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