Grupo BanRara perform a traditional ribbon maypole dance from Guantanamo, Cuba.
The tradition of maypole dancing in Guantanamo came from Haiti via France where maypole dancing was in style in the 18th century as an art dance. The origins of maypole dancing may have began in ancient Babylon during sex worship and fertility rites.
The men dance around one maypole and the women dance around another until a cat’s cradle is intricately woven between them and the dance becomes more frenzied and the two become one.
