hispanic research journal, Vol. 14 No. 3, June 2013, 256–72 © W. S. Maney & Son Ltd 2013 DOI 10.1179/1468273713Z.00000000048 Melodies from the Past, Melodies from the Present: Music and Identity in the Cuban Diaspora Ivan Darias Alfonso SOAS, University of London, UK This article discusses the impact of popular music on the Cuban diaspora (London) by focusing on the ways in which music is used to construct notions of identity and nation. It is argued that, in the host country, Cuban emigrants benefit from a diverse soundscape, which enables them to choose, consume, and perform a selection of popular, national, and diasporic music devoid of the political charge music acquired in their homeland. In diaspora, new listening strategies engage migrants in reconsidering the role certain artists had in shaping their previous knowledge about what constituted national music. A new knowledge, produced in diaspora, influences per- sonal processes of subject construction and the appropriation of a national identity, which departs from previous notions learned in the homeland. The article is based on a series of qualitative interviews with members of the Cuban diaspora in London and participant observation carried out during 2006–07. keywords diaspora, identity, Cuban diaspora, Cuban music, popular music and society, migrant groups in London Introduction In the fifty years since the triumph of the Cuban Revolution, images of fleeing masses have characterized critical periods of the Caribbean island’s recent history. Until the early 1990s, emigration from Cuba was ‘forever’ and to traditionally nearby regions, either geographically (the United States) or culturally (Latin American and Spain). This changed when Cubans were gradually allowed to travel to other parts of the world. The emergence of Cuban communities outside the United States has attracted scarce, albeit significant, academic interest. The majority of studies (Wimmer, 2001; Charon Cardona, 2004; Berg, 2007; 2009; Ackerman, 2007; Duque, 2007; Sánchez Fuarros, 2008) coincide in presenting an existing but ‘invisible’ émigré community still