Los Pleneros de la 21: Plena in the Diaspora

When Puerto Ricans carried their music to New York, plena traveled with them — and one ensemble made sure it thrived there: Los Pleneros de la 21.^[1]

Founded in El Barrio

The group was founded in 1983 by the percussionist and educator Juan Gutiérrez, a native of Santurce, Puerto Rico, who had learned plena from the legendary plenero Marcial Reyes Avilés.^[1] Its name nods to a bus stop — la parada 21 — in Santurce, anchoring the New York band to the island neighborhood where the tradition lived.^[1]

Bomba, plena, and the panderetas

Los Pleneros de la 21 specialize in Afro-Puerto Rican bomba and plena and their related dances — plena played on the hand-held frame drums called panderetas, bomba on barrel drums in the call-and-response duel between dancer and lead subidor.^[1] Run as a community-based, not-for-profit educational company, the group soon drew support from the National Endowment for the Arts and the New York State Council on the Arts.^[1]

Why it matters

In 1996 founder Juan Gutiérrez received an NEA National Heritage Fellowship, and in 2005 the group's album Para Todos Ustedes was nominated for a Grammy.^[2] By teaching and performing across decades, Los Pleneros de la 21 ensured that the rhythms of el negro bembón and the bomba drum would endure in the diaspora — a living bridge between San Juan and New York.^[2]