According to Salsa Roots, the bomba represents "the survival of African traditions in a nearly pure form." It is a dance that was traditionally performed by residents of Ghana, who may have been descendants of the Akan tribe. The dance is usually accompanied by two drums as well as a maraca and a cua. The songs are usually "call and response," meaning the lead singer starts the song and is answered either by the melody or other singers who respond with a chorus.
In the 1700s, slaves were brought from Ghana to Puerto Rico to work in the sugar cane plantations. The first recorded bomba in Puerto Rico was in 1797, and was witnessed by a French botanist named André Pierre Ledru who saw it performed at a party.
Because the slaves were restricted from practicing their own religion by their masters, they adapted many feasts days from the Catholic religion. It was on these feast days, as well as during celebrations at the end of the harvest, that the bomba was performed. Performances at christenings as well as weddings were also tolerated. Before the end of slavery in 1873, these performances were also where the slaves planned revolutions against their masters.
The northern bomba, which is performed in the northern part of Loizia and San Juan, has gained attention thanks to the Santiago Apostal festival as well as the efforts of Don Rafael Cepeda and his family and other dance groups. Thanks to the combination of these events and people, the bomba gained popularity around the world beginning in the 1930s.
The southern bomba, performed in Ponce, Guayama and other southern places in Puerto Rico, gained popularity thanks to two main groups: Bambule and Paracumbe. In Salinas, two workshops teach the bomba and continue the tradition of the dance.
Salsa musicians Rafael Cortijo and Ismael Rivera, performed the bomba on TV as well as on the big screen in the 1950s. The popularity of the dance grew and grows even today as bomba clubs spring up in major cities like New York.