Bomba de Aquí is one of our 2026 Massachusetts Storytellers of the Year. We recently sat down with co-founder Brenda Cepeda to learn more about the group’s journey and approach to cultural storytelling. Join us on October 15 in Holyoke for our awards ceremony featuring Bomba and plena music, delicious food, and more. Reserve your tickets here.
Mass Humanities (MH): Holyoke is where Bomba de Aquí got its start. Can you describe the connection between the city and Bomba’s journey?
Brenda Cepeda (BC): Holyoke is truly where my journey blossomed. While my roots are deeply planted in Puerto Rico through my family, Holyoke gave me the opportunity to bring those roots to life and share them with others. It is the city that embraced Bomba de Aquí in its earliest days and believed in our mission to preserve and celebrate Afro-Puerto Rican culture. Here, we built relationships with schools, community organizations, families, and artists who saw the value of our traditions. Holyoke became more than just the place where we performed—it became home. Every performance, every workshop, and every child who picked up a maraca or danced their first piquete helped shape what Bomba de Aquí has become today.
MH: What is the connection between family, culture, and music & dance? Your grandfather, Rafael Cepeda, is considered the father of Puerto Rican Bomba music.
BC: For me, family, culture, music, and dance are impossible to separate. I am the granddaughter of Don Rafael Cepeda, who is recognized as the father of Puerto Rican Bomba, but what he left us was much more than music. He left us a responsibility to preserve our history, honor our ancestors, and continue telling our stories.
Growing up, Bomba wasn’t something we simply watched—it was how we celebrated, how we mourned, how we gathered, and how we expressed ourselves. Every rhythm carries the voices of those who came before us. Every dance is a conversation between the drummer and the dancer, built on respect, listening, and trust.
Today, Saul and I continue that tradition together. He brings the heartbeat through the drums, and I help tell the stories through dance, education, and community engagement. Together, we are not just performing—we are passing on a living tradition to the next generation.
MH: What does it mean to you and Saul to be recognized as Storytellers of the Year?
BC: Being recognized as Storytellers of the Year is incredibly humbling because we’ve never viewed ourselves as entertainers first—we see ourselves as cultural storytellers.
Every workshop, performance, children’s book, school residency, and community event is an opportunity to share the history, resilience, and beauty of Afro-Puerto Rican culture. To have that work recognized means that people understand storytelling doesn’t only happen through books or words. Stories can be told through the beat of a barril, the movement of a dancer, a song passed down through generations, or a child discovering their heritage for the first time.
For Saul and me, this recognition belongs to our families, our ancestors, our students, and everyone who has walked this journey with us. It reminds us that culture survives because people choose to share it.
MH: Education is part of Bomba’s mission. What is it like to see people of all backgrounds and cultures experiencing Bomba and plena music and dance?
BC: Education is at the heart of everything we do. My background as a special education teacher shaped how I teach today. I believe every person deserves to see themselves reflected in learning and to experience culture in a way that is welcoming and accessible.
One of the most beautiful parts of our work is watching people who have never heard Bomba before become completely immersed in it. We’ve worked with students from preschool through college, families, educators, and communities from many different cultural backgrounds.
Music has a unique way of breaking down barriers. When people are playing together, dancing together, and learning together, labels disappear. They begin asking questions, respecting one another’s histories, and seeing connections between cultures. Those are the moments that stay with me.
MH: Puerto Rican heritage, identity, and culture are of course key parts of this music and dance. What ideas do you want people to take with them after they see a performance?
BC: I hope people leave with a deeper understanding that Puerto Rican culture is beautifully diverse and that Bomba represents the strength, resilience, and creativity of Afro-Puerto Rican communities.
I also hope they recognize that culture is something we actively preserve. It doesn’t survive by accident—it survives because people choose to teach it, celebrate it, and pass it on.
Most importantly, I want audiences to leave feeling connected. Whether someone is Puerto Rican or not, everyone understands joy, resilience, family, and community. Bomba reminds us that our stories matter, our histories matter, and that music has the power to bring people together across generations and cultures.
For Saul and me, this recognition belongs to our families, our ancestors, our students, and everyone who has walked this journey with us. It reminds us that culture survives because people choose to share it.
MH: What is your perspective on the arts, culture, and humanities in the western Massachusetts region? What might people who live in Boston not know about this area?
BC: Western Massachusetts is filled with extraordinary artists, educators, historians, and cultural organizations doing meaningful work every day. Sometimes people think they have to travel to larger cities to experience world-class arts and culture, but that’s simply not true.
Communities like Holyoke, Springfield, and the surrounding region are rich with immigrant stories, Indigenous history, Black history, Puerto Rican culture, and generations of people working to preserve their heritage. There is an incredible spirit of collaboration here. Organizations support one another, artists teach in schools, and cultural traditions are woven into everyday community life.
What people in Boston may not realize is that western Massachusetts has become a cultural crossroads where traditions from around the world are not only celebrated but lived. It is a place where a child can experience Afro-Puerto Rican Bomba, Native traditions, African drumming, and other cultural arts in the same community. That diversity is one of our region’s greatest strengths, and it’s something we should all be proud of.
