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LATIN MUSIC USA
Monday night at 9:30, PBS

"Latin Music USA," PBS' lively and irresistible new series about where this vital force came from and how it stands today, quickly makes a crucial point about Latinos and their culture.

Our public discussion, on matters from music to immigration policy, far too often treats Latinos as kind of a separate subculture existing inside the "real America."

It's true that Latinos, like all groups, do have their own subculture. Many, in fact. But more to the point, they are also deeply woven into the larger country, from our food to judicial policy.

"Latin Music" takes this point beyond any possible argument by methodically detailing the infiltration of "mainstream" popular music by artists from Cuba, Mexico, the Caribbean and South America, who came bearing timbales, congas and other unstoppable forces of rhythm and melody.

Narrated by Jimmy Smits, this four-part series runs two hours tonight and two more hours next Monday. When it's over, you will wish there were more.

Tonight's opener tracks America's modern popular Latin music to the 1930s, when trumpeter Mario Bauza came here from Cuba. He survived a few sneers from established bands and eventually launched the rumba craze, filling dance floors and introducing beats and rhythms that people couldn't get out of their heads.

He was followed by a line of names as famous as any in 20th-century popular music, starting with his brother-in-law Machito.

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