Peruvian Music Queen

Berklee College of Music celebrates Latin Culture Month by welcoming one of the world's foremost Afro-Peruvian performers, composer and singer Eva Ayllón. Part of the Sovereign Bank Music Series, the concert takes place at the Berklee Performance Center on Thursday, November 6 at 8:15 p.m. Tickets are $30, and are on sale now at Ticketmaster.com and the Berklee Performance Center Box Office, (617) 747-2261. For more information, visit berklee.edu/events. The BPC is located at 136 Massachusetts Avenue and is wheelchair accessible.

A renowned singer/songwriter known as the "Queen of Lando" in her native Peru and around the world, Ayllón will perform songs from her extensive catalog with a 25-piece Berklee student and faculty group led by Oscar Stagnaro, bass professor, and featuring Ramon Stagnaro on guitar. The percussion-heavy program will include works by Peruvian composers like Chabuca Granda, Andres Soto, Victor Merino, and Victor Miranda. 

For over 35 years, Ayllón has been selling out theaters around the world. She is known for singing the landó, the festejo, and the vals, all mestizo blends of Peruvian, African, and Spanish musical heritage. Her music represents the elegant and lively genres from the coastal plains of Lima. The guitar recalls flamenco idioms one moment and alludes to Andean mountain music the next. The cajón—a wooden percussion box thought to be derived from an agricultural crate—translates African rhythms to Latin America. Call-and-response, complex syncopation, and polyrhythms combine with sweet, melancholic melodies to create a sound unique to Peru's diverse ancestry.

Opening the show will be Inkas Wasi, playing a short set of music and dancing from the Andes.