Here's an excerpt from another Internet article on Venezuelan music:

http://www.lafi.org/magazine/articles/ven-music.html


"Geographically, Venezuela is divisible into distinct regions—the coast, the plains, the mountains, and the rain forest. Native American music is concentrated in the latter, toward the interior of the country, while African manifestations are heard mostly along the central coast to the north. The Spanish influence is predominant in the Andes. Early Spanish colonists came mainly from Andalucía, the Moorish stronghold in Southern Spain. Thus, the music that migrated with them to Venezuela was marked by Arabic and Islamic influences.

Perhaps the Venezuelan music known best outside the country is the joropo, a genre from the plains... A number of other styles from the plains have received less international attention, but are just a representative of the country's roots; for instance, the Venezuelan merengue, which is not at all like its more famous counterpart from the Dominican Republic, and the Venezuelan calypso, which reflects the closeness of Trinidad and Tobago and, beyond them, the other Caribbean islands.

The earliest music of Venezuela was that of the native peoples. Today, their traditions are maintained by only a small percentage of the population located principally in the Amazonian interior. Their major contribution to the popular music of today has been the accompaniment of the maracas, ever-present in a variety of styles. While indigenous Venezuelans typically use a single maraca to accompany their songs, popular music normally makes use of a pair, each one with its own pitch. Venezuelan maracas are unlike the kind often used in the U.S., which derive from Cuba and Puerto Rico; they are smaller, with a softer sound. While a typical rhythmic triplet for Caribbean maracas places the accent at the end—one/two/THREE—, the counterpart for Venezuelan maracas inverts the accent—ONE/two/three.

The Spanish brought with them different styles that were popular in Europe over the years, with the instrumentation to match. Thus, among the more popular instruments in today's folk and popular music are the guitar and the mandolin, with their relatives, the cuatro and the bandola; the harp and violin; and, along the Colombian border, the tiple. The bandola is similar to the cuatro, but is shorter, often pear-shaped, and more percussive or stronger-sounding due to the manner in which it is played, with a plastic pick. (For more information on the cuatro, see related article on page 5). The bandola is strung differently in different regions of the country, but, in general, has four courses of strings.

The Africans contributed to the development of Venezuelan music as well. The origins of the Africans forcibly carried as slaves to Venezuela are difficult to pinpoint, because the slave traders noted the points of embarkation, rather than the localities of capture. There is general agreement, nevertheless, that among West and Central African influences the ones from the Congo predominate. (For a more detailed discussion of Afro-Venezuelan culture, see the interview with Jesús García in the May/June and August/September 1999 editions of Clave). Not surprisingly, drums were a primary African contribution to Venezuelan instrumentation, including what may be a unique phenomenon in the Americas — very large wooden drums (called mina, tambor grande, cumaco, or burro) with a skin on one end, laid along the ground and sometimes propped up by crossed bars at one end. The enormous mina is found in the region of Barlovento. The principal player of a mina mounts the drum like a rider to strike the skin end with a beater, while one or more players beat the side of the drum with wooden sticks called palos or laures. They may be accompanied by a smaller, upright, drum called a curbata.

Also along the central coast are found other smaller drums with skin on both ends, redondos and tamboras. The latter name echoes that of the double-headed drum typical of merengue ensembles in the Dominican Republic. Redondos (also called culo 'e puya) are less common, and are held between the legs while standing. Similar drums are used in other coastal areas outside Barlovento. The cumaco of the region of Litoral has a skin that is nailed to its frame rather than affixed with pegs and wedges. It is laid flat on the ground, but is also mounted by a principal player, who uses his bare hands on the skin, while other players strike the sides with sticks. In the coastal town of Naiguata there are barrel-shaped drums called pipas, and tamboras or tamboritas are used to play fulias for velorios to honor a saint or the Cross (see section on velorios below). Chimbangueles are conical drums that are hung from the player's shoulder and played by one hand with a stick. A final coastal percussion instrument of African origin is the quitiplás, a set of short bamboo tubes held one in each hand and struck first against the ground in turn, then against each another, producing the three-part sound for which it is named.

Popular Music with Religious Roots

The most obvious remnants of African music in Venezuela today occur as part of religious ceremonies, but not like those of santería, candomblé, and voodoo in Cuba, Brazil, and Haiti, in which the deities invoked, even in their syncretic form, correspond to their African origins. In Venezuela, the ceremonies are very much Catholic in inspiration and origin, celebrating various feast days of the saints and Corpus Christi. The local churches take part, for example, in the feast of San Juan (St. John) where a wooden figure of the saint is abducted from a designated house and taken in succession to other dwellings. The Parranda de San Pedro takes place on June 29 in the town of Guatire. The feast of San Benito (St. Benedict the Moor) is celebrated during Christmas week and New Year's Day. San Antonio (St. Anthony of Padua) is celebrated on or around June 13. On these occasions, drums are the primary instruments. The content of the events is undoubtedly Catholic, but the music is notably African in its rhythms, instrumentation, and call-and-response structure. The religious orientation of the feasts does not keep dance and alcohol from playing a leading role in the festivities."
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This article goes on to describe some of these principal feast days. Additional information on Venezuelan music is included in this comprehensive article.