The distinction is well deserved. Santiago's obsession with all manner of music expression is evident at every turn. The city hosts such annual events as the International Choir Festival and the Festival of Caribbean Culture, and it is graced by dozens of local groups dedicated to the preservation of traditional musical forms. In the Casa de la Trova (House of Song), an airy hall dedicated to maintaining the art of the folk ballad, local musicians and vocalists gather throughout the day and night to give new life to a venerable tradition. Even in the streets, vendors selling fruit, vegetables, household goods, and services create their own musical verses--pregones--to sell their wares. The city recognizes this unique art form once a year when los pregoneros compete in a festival to select the city's best pregon.

Santiago also takes pride in being the home of Esteban Salas, Latin America's first indigenous composer of international stature. A Creole priest who died in 1807, Salas spent the most productive years of his life as director of music at Santiago's cathedral, creating works for small ensembles and choir. Recent recordings of his compositions, Cuban Baroque Music of the Eighteenth Century and Cuban Baroque Sacred Music, attest to the high level of cultural sophistication the provincial city attained two hundred years before Heitor Villa-Lobos, Alberto Ginestera, and other Latin American composers attained fame abroad.