BELIZE FOLK MUSIC - THE JUNGLE WOOD MADE MARIMBA

BELIZE FOLK MUSIC - THE JUNGLE WOOD MADE MARIMBA

2004 Festival winners

Welcome to this website of the annual MAYA MOUNTAINS FOLK MUSIC FESTIVAL.
We are offering a folkloric collection of old Marimba music to keep history alive. We presume only collectors would be interested?

The Marimba instrument came to Belize about 1890. We have one 92 year old man who has been playing the instrument for 78 years. It was more popular in colonial days of British Honduras. Bands would go to remote mountain jungle camps for the Christmas Festivities. Lots of drinking and dancing for logwood cutters and chicleros. There are only about 3 band groups left in Belize playing the Marimba and around 8 orchestra instruments. Playing is usually done in the Wild West of Belize at village fiestas, weddings and the occasional tourist hotel.

Volume 1, of the Belize Marimba Folkloric collection of old time Marimba melodies.

CD sales go to the operation of the ANNUAL MAYA MOUNTAINS FOLK MUSIC FESTIVAL TRUST. This is charitable and non-profit.

You can order a CD of BELIZE ALPS Marimba memories here. A single CD of Volume 1, is $25 USA with $4.50 for shipping and handling. Prices drop for a dozen, at $20 each and for two dozen or more, they cost $15 each. As of August, 2005 we have sold only two. They are only made to order, there is no inventory. These are unique Folkloric historical memories of
Western Belize.

CLICK HERE TO E-MAIL AN ORDER:

The Annual MAYA MOUNTAINS FOLK MUSIC FESTIVAL is held each December in Hillview, a suburb of the twin towns of Santa Elena and San Ignacio. These country towns are at the end of the opening of the Macal River Gorge and are an ancient trade route into the Guatemalan interior. Mayan pyramids dot the hilltops through the hill pass, from the broad Belize River plain to the Peten District interior of the ancient Fuedal Mayan Kingdoms of Guatemala. Logwood, forestry, chicle have been the traditional products of this Wild Western area. Today a growing tourist trade of adventures into caving, river canoing, Mayan temples keep a very small cadre of tourist guides busy. Most other activities are to do with ranching and farming. The area is the site of a very large Mennonite farming community below the Yalbac Hills. The twin towns, and a number of small villages lie in the foothills of the Belize Alps about 70 miles away as the parrot flies.