Latunes: An Introduction

Abstract

Beginning in the 1930s, a new type of song entered American popular music—the so-called "latune," that is, a tune with a Latin beat and an English-language lyric. Although latunes drew on a variety of genres, what prevailed were Cuban rhythms, and particularly the "rhumba," an elastic term (unrelated to the Afro-Cuban rumba) that included up-tempo sones as well as languid boleros. At one time or another, many of the best-known American composers—Irving Berlin, George Gershwin, Cole Porter, Hoagy Carmichael, Johnny Mercer—contributed to the latune songbook. In spite of their popularity, however, latunes have elicited little attention, for they have been regarded as vapid, watered-down versions of authentic Latin American music. Arguing that these songs furnish important clues about the United States' absorption of Latin American culture, this essay undertakes a study of the history, features, and principal categories of latunes.

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