The Cuban Spirit Festival will begin in the eastern city of Bayamo on Friday with a program, musicians and performers scheduled to set a milestone in the history of such events.

Designed to celebrate the most genuine roots of the island’s nationality, cultural gathering, planed for October 17th through the 20th, is linked to transcendental events in the birth of the nation, including the beginning of the first war of independence against Spanish colonial rule in the 19th century and the fight against slavery. The prestigious Cuban cultural project, Guerrilla de Teatreros, will delight audiences on October 17th with a program that includes  music, dance, theater, magic and other art forms in sites where the forefathers of the above mentioned war camped 146 years ago.

The 20th Cuban Spirit Festival is set to include memorable moments, such as the Idol of Bayamo, an indigenous piece found in 1848, which will be on display in the so called Monument City for the first time. Other important moments included in the event’s agenda: the participation of Cuban National Fine Arts Laureate, artist Ever Fonseca; musician Pancho Amat and the show Son con Tres; the protagonist of the film Behavior, actress Alina Rodríguez, and some popular Cuban comedians. On October 20th, when all Cubans mark the Day of Cuban Culture, coinciding with the date when Cuba’s National Anthem was sung for the first time in 1868 in Bayamo, the city’s Was Museum is scheduled to unveil a wax statue of renowned late Cuban musician, Juan Formell, who founded and directed Cuba’s most famous band Los Van Van, which will give a concert that day.

The Cuban Spirit Festival is dedicated to young art and to commemorate the burning of Bayamo by its dwellers, which preferred to set the city on fire before it fell in the hands of the Spanish rulers, one of the most moving events in the history of Cuba. The gathering is also dedicated to the establishment of the historical Constitution of Guáimaro, both occurred 146 y