Aurelio - Garifuna music from Honduras

“Searing vocal melodies and delicious grooves. Aurelio, in fine voice throughout, has an uncanny knack for melding joy and sorrow with his vocal delivery.

These are songs of hope and striving; you hear it in every note.” - Banning Eyre, Public Radio International Born in the tiny hamlet of Plaplaya on Honduras’ Caribbean coast, Aurelio Martinez grew up steeped in the Garifuna traditions of his ancestors, a group of shipwrecked slaves who intermarried with the indigenous people of the island of St. Vincent, only to be deported to the Central American coast in the late eighteenth century.

He went on to sing and play guitar and percussion in groups performing in a variety of styles before returning to his roots in the late 1990s.

Since then, he has become one of Garifuna culture's leading voices as both a musician (he is often seen as the successor to the late Andy Palacio) and a politician (he is currently a member of the Honduran Congress).