by Velvet Wu
At La Cocina de Sandra on Temple Street, a line of bomba drummers tapped a quick, lively rhythm to the movements of Andrea Sanchez’s flowing black skirt. In a ruffled lilac blouse, Sanchez fanned out the drapes of fabric while sidestepping and turning in a semicircle. Finally, she transitioned into a series of quick backward jumps to the edge of the floor. While Sanchez spun, Miriam Magalis Cruz, her fellow dancer, sang steadily into the microphone.
Sanchez and Cruz are bomba dancers. On Saturday evening, they performed at the fifth annual Día de Muertas festival hosted by Vivan Las Autonomas, an anti-femicide organization in New Haven, to honor and remember lives lost to gender-based violence.
“I just want them to know that they’re not alone and that we’re here and we believe them and we will walk that fight with them no matter how hard it gets,” said Vanesa Suarez, the founding director of Vivan Las Autonomas.
On a platform behind the drummers sat a ceiling-high ofrenda, shrouded in brilliant orange and yellow marigolds and adorned with framed photos of loved ones, flowered skulls in violet and white, a powder-pink guitar with a skeleton sitting inside of it, fairy lights, candles, and other personal objects. Among the photos were those of lives lost to femicide in the past five years, alongside photos that loved ones and family members arranged on the altar.
Ensembles of bomba drums consist of a primo, a higher-pitched lead drum which taps to the rhythm of the dancer, and the lower-toned buleadors.
While the dancers performed, visitors watched and took photos while sitting around tables cluttered with hot chocolate and pan de muerto, a Mexican sweet bread traditionally served on Día de Muertos, or the Day of the Dead. Those who knew each other gave hugs, laughed and chatted. Other attendees waited for their faces to be painted as colorful skulls. A wall to the left of the entrance featured photos of the 19 lives lost to femicide in Connecticut in 2026 as of November.
The tradition began in 2020 after the murder of Lizzbeth Aleman-Popoca in East Haven, according to Suarez, when Vivan Las Autonomas organized a procession around the Fair Haven neighborhood.
“Ever since then, we have continued our tradition,” said Suarez, and drawn from “feminists in Mexico who have taken Día de Muertos to specifically highlight the femicides that are happening.” That’s why the festival is named “Día de Muertas,” the feminine conjugation of the Spanish word for death, instead of “Día de Muertos,” the masculine conjugation.
Suarez explained that Vivan Las Autonomas is completely volunteer-run.
Throughout the year, the organization holds artistic and cultural events and offers court accompaniment and rapid-response support to victims of gender violence who are undocumented or struggle to navigate the legal system due to fear of their abusers.
The ofrenda, at La Cocina de Sandra, took two weeks to assemble, according to Vanesa
Yasmin Georgina, who has worked with Suarez since her friend Naiesha Jean-Claude was killed by her husband earlier this year, said that the festival is the organization’s culminating event.
“Everything they have planned out throughout the year leads up all to this,” she said. “This all accumulates into this for support for people to breathe, for people to gain more community.”
Bomba dancing was new to the festival.
Sanchez and Cruz perform as part of a group organized by Movimiento Cultural, an organization dedicated to preserving Afro-Puerto Rican heritage, music, and dance. Both Sanchez and Cruz have been dancing bomba for three years.
“It’s very releasing for the soul. It’s connecting with the community and it’s also connecting inward, like ancestrally,” Sanchez, who has Puerto-Rican heritage, said.
Bomba dancing is a 400-year-old tradition, originally brought to the Americas by enslaved peoples from West Africa, said Kevin Diaz, Movimiento Cultural’s founder.
“It’s part of our DNA, it’s part of our history,” said Diaz. “It’s important that we honor that because it’s not taught in school enough, and it’s not teaching our young people to be proud of who they are.”
In bomba, there are typically many drums, but only one drum is a solo drum, which follows the dancer.
“It’s an experience that is like a silent communication,” said Sanchez. She described it as “close to meditation.”
Cruz joined bomba after being crowned Miss Puerto Rico of Greater New Haven in 2023.
“I’ve been doing bomba for about three years now, and I’ve been singing ever since I could speak,” she said.
For the festival this year, Suarez requested that the group perform a Puerto Rican adaptation of the song “Canción Sin Miedo,” originally composed by Vivir Quintana. The song is an anthem condemning femicide that pays tribute to the women who continue to fight across Puerto Rico, and it names Puerto Rican victims of femicide. The adapted version is sung to the beat of bomba.
Cruz said the group took around two to three months to practice the performance.
“When I was rehearsing and I was singing, kind of got a little teary eyed just because I can imagine the hurt and the pain that the families are going through,” she said.
Suarez said it felt special to have artists not just perform, but to perform art that “can really send a message of love and solidarity to families that are grieving.”
“It’s very beautiful to see every year how this comes together,” said Suarez. “It’s truly a labor of love.”
Vanesa Suarez joined Sanchez in her dance. As the bomba dancers performed, they invited members of the audience to dance with them.
Visitors ate while watching the bomba dancers perform. In the back, near the entrance to La Cocina de Sandra, a wall displayed photos of the 19 individuals whose lives were lost to gender-related violence in Connecticut in 2026.