Meet Andres Arevalo | Artist and cultural events producer

We had the good fortune of connecting with Andres Arevalo and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Andres, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
I consider myself a creative person who was born for the arts. From a very young age, I thought about creating different, disruptive and unique spaces, and when I arrived into the United States, as an immigrant, I began to put my ideas together, telling myself, “I have to make a living using all these ideas” and since that moment I have not stopped creating experiences that generate ethical, social, and cultural values in people.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
As an artist I am a dancer, actor and percussionist, my specialty is dance and Afro-Peruvian music. What makes me different from most Peruvian artists, even from Latin America, is that my show Tumba y Cajon, is an interactive show,

people participate at all times and above all learn about music concepts using their own body, I also talk about my history, and the history of my folklore with funny anecdotes and demonstrations of my musical instruments and dances. One of the things that makes me most excited and proud is when a person from any other country knows and excitedly demonstrates to me something they learned from my culture.

I decided that I would dedicate myself to the arts at the age of 15, before I wanted to be a military or soccer player, but when I discovered the dance, I realized that I was not born for soccer or for military life, then I studied Folklore as a professional career and along the way I worked with the best artists and groups of Peru, parallel to my artistic career, I was training as a teacher of dance and music, but what is the difference? Both concepts are different, that is, you can be a very good artist or performer, but not a very good teacher, or you can be a very good teacher but not a very good artist or performer, and I was able to develop both,

I am happy on stage and in a dance studio. It has been 25 years of trajectory and it has been a difficult road, of hard work and dedication, it is the only way to achieve success.

I have learned to manage my emotions and to understand that my compatriots are very complex and unpredictable, and this is where the story gets a little difficult, the vast majority of Peruvians lost that link with their culture, in my experience, Peruvians feel more Peruvian only with soccer or in our national holidays, but that feeling is not sustainable over time, so I am concerned about the future of our identity.

I want the world to know that Peru is much more than its gastronomy, that our culture is millenary and our folklore is one of the richest in the world. And that I am a tireless artist and fighter for my dreams.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
If we talk about Peru, I would definitely start on our coast in the city of Lima, we would walk through the historic streets, museums and galleries, we would definitely have lunch in a restaurant, the food of the coast is exactly what has led us to be recognized worldwide, then we would go to the beach, and the cultural district of Barranco and at night to a peña, which is a show of Peruvian music and folklore.

After having known the best places in Lima, I would take you to the millenary city of Cusco, in the Peruvian highlands, to know our past and the history of our ancestors, its gastronomy, its folklore.

Then I would take you to Iquitos, in the Peruvian jungle, to know its flora and fauna, its cheerful people and its exotic food. In my country there are 3 different worlds, we are a country of all bloods.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
I dedicate this to my parents, my children and my wonderful wife Ary Cotto.

Website: www.andresarevalo.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tumbaycajonmiami/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TumbayCajonOficial/

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHDtX8ubyv5r0cs9tC-607Q

Image Credits
Some of the images belong to my late friend Luis Olazabal.