What gets paved over in the pursuit of “development?” Led by Peruvian philosopher Lucho Mena and clown Lourdes Saenz de Bravo, global roots musicians David Berzonsky and Estela Knott travel deep into the Andes to record and unite Peru’s indigenous musicians.

What gets paved over in the pursuit of “development?” Led by Peruvian philosopher Lucho Mena and clown Lourdes Saenz de Bravo, global roots musicians David Berzonsky and Estela Knott travel deep into the Andes to record and unite Peru’s indigenous musicians.

Lima. The mixing pot. Here Salsa, Cumbia, and Merengue give way to roots music. The landó, the festejo, the highlands and coastal fusion styles the Marinera, Samba-cueca, techno-cumbia, chicha, huayna, and saya. The authentic antithesis of what’s paraded out for the gringos.

Nevermind the ponchos and pan flutes. Think cajón (wooden box), guapeo (clay pot), and quijada (jawbone of a burro), indigenous instruments of the Afro-Peruvian beat, backed with guitar and double bass. Shaped by the neo-African slaves of the 1700s, Afro-Peruvian music assimilates into its Creole heart everything from the Spanish jota, the Viennese waltz. A fusion of forms, its coastal rhythm is echoed in the highlands, there taking different Andean cues.

Enter Sicuani, in the province of Cusco, halfway to Lago Titicaca. Here local musicians innovate on Peru’s pre-encounter musical traditions, the huayno and yaraví. In Sicuani, our story truly begins … and potentially ends.

Roots music is about origins. What inspires a Herbie Hancock or Paul Simon and sires the latest incarnation of the New York Mambo. It is the music of rite and passage. By the beach or in the highlands of Sicuani, it innovates and informs, secret, secluded and sacred – formulated on a geography and way of life, fragile and impermanent.

On Sicuani’s near horizon is Transamazônica, the Trans-Amazon Highway. After the construction of its Brazilian leg, deforestation and cultural degradation followed, bringing with it agribusiness and cattle-ranching schemes. Entire villages were wiped away in the name of economic development. This highway is slated for Sicuani in 2010.

The largest obstacle to this fusion project may be the musicians themselves, who come from disparate geographies and traditions – and bring with them their own prejudices, jealousies and indignations. Can these artists unite to preserve their roots? Or will their artform be buried under 4,000 miles of asphalt?

EL SON DEL FIN DEL CAMINO debunks the notion of the Third World as a cultural backwater – establishing it, instead, as the true root of artistic tradition, authenticity and innovation – without which the developed world loses its inspiration … possibly forever.