A Year in Uruguay

Las llamadas are the traditional carnaval parades of the candombe troupes. This year, for the first time, they split the parade over two days. We went yesterday night and watched it from a friend of a friend's balcony.

I'm not sure how many drum troupes we saw, but the first reached us around 9:30 and the last one passed after 2:00 a.m. The parade flowed more smoothly than the inaugural parade until the rain caused intermittent delays.

We could see the flags of each new group long before they reached us, when the drumbeats were just a faint throb. Dancers came next, costumed in feathers, sequins, and bright fabric. The 40-70 drummers followed, producing an enormous sound. Audience members joined behind the drummers dancing and clapping.

See my video.

Labels: candombe, carnival, Uruguay, video