Presented by the Lewis Center for the Arts’ Program in Theater
¡La Gran Cumbia Espectacular!
Run Time
Approximately 70 minutes with no intermission.
Program Notes
We invite you, the audience, to come dance and celebrate with us! Originating along Colombia’s Río Magdalena, cumbia (a rhythm/dance/music genre, with African and Indigenous roots) has since come to serve as a means of home-making through its ability to traverse music, memory, and migration across many Latin American countries and parts of the United States.
This show celebrates cumbia and community, journeying through three styles of cumbia: cumbia folklórica colombiana (traditional Colombian folk dance), cumbia wepa, (a style that originated in Monterrey, México) and cumbia tejana (a social dance that originated in Texas). We will teach you how to dance cumbia, and share what cumbia and our communities mean to us.
Audience participation is encouraged but by no means required. If you’d like to participate, please sit in the first two rows or designated stage seating areas. Audience members who would rather watch the show and not participate are welcomed and equally celebrated.
Content Warnings
This production contains loud popping noises and strobe lights.
Special Notes
Please silence all electronic devices including cellular phones and watches, and refrain from text messaging for the duration of the performance.
Company
Kaelani Burja ’23*
Miel Escamilla ’25*
Jordan Hines ’23
Orion Lopez-Ramirez ’26*
Lane Marsh ’23
Raquel Ramirez ’24 *
River Reynolds ’24
Gabriel Samcam-Vargas ’26
Wasif Sami ’25*
Natalia Solano ’22
Virtual Company
Tammy Yamile Leon Molina ’26
Alison Parish ’24
Musician
Hannah Faughnan ’23
Production Team
Director, Thesis Proposer: Kaelani Burja ’23*
Director’s Assistant: Alexandria Griner
Choreographer: Andrea Guajardo
Dance Captain: Lane Marsh ’23
Music Director: Hannah Faughnan ’23
Stage Manager: Ash Jackson ’25*
Assistant Stage Managers: Aneekah Uddin ’24* and Kira Fitzgerald ’24*
Stage Management Mentor: Anna Allport ’23*
Sound Designer: Ishea Johnson ’23
Costume Design: Zhudi Pan ’23
Lighting Designers: Austria Merritt ’26 and Silvana Nasim ’24
Playwriting Contributions: John Venegas Juarez ’25* and Emily Garcia ’26
Devising Contributions: Seyi Oderinde ’25
Run Crew: Le’Naya Wilkerson ’25* and Rocco Malvicino
Stitchers: Anne Xu, Gaea Lawton ’23*, Tanaka Ngwara ’24*, Wyatt Kim
*denotes a certificate student in the Program in Theater
Faculty Advisors
Elena Araoz, Primary Advisor
Vivia Font, Secondary Advisor
Tess James, Design and Production Mentor
Special Thanks
Special thanks to Wasif Sami’s dad for the vocals!
Land Acknowledgement
An estimated 10 million Native Americans lived in North America before the arrival of European colonizers. Many thousands lived in Lenapehoking, the vast homeland of the Lenni-Lenape, who were the first inhabitants of what is now called eastern Pennsylvania and parts of New York, New Jersey, Maryland, and Delaware.
Princeton stands on part of the ancient homeland and traditional territory of the Lenape people. In 1756, the College of New Jersey erected Nassau Hall with no recorded consultation with the Lenni-Lenape peoples.
Treaties and forced relocation dispersed Lenape-Delaware to Ohio, Kansas, and Oklahoma. We acknowledge the violence of settler colonialism and pay respect to Lenape peoples past, present, and future and their continuing presence in the homeland and throughout the Lenape diaspora.
For more information about ways you can engage with and support the Indigenous community on campus please visit the website of Native American and Indigenous studies (NAI), Natives at Princeton and Princeton Indigenous Advocacy Coalition.
Lewis Center for the Arts
Chair: Judith Hamera
Executive Director: Marion Friedman Young
Director of Program in Theater: Jane Cox
Producing Artistic Director, Theater And Music Theater Season: Elena Araoz
View a full list of the Program in Theater Faculty & Guest Artists
For a look at all the people working behind the scenes to bring you this event, view a full list of LCA staff members »
The programs of the Peter B. Lewis Center for the Arts are made possible through the generous support of many alumni and other donors. View a full list of LCA Supporters »
