Music in Colombia

Music, and dance, are part of Colombia's popular culture. When friends get together, it will always end up with some dance.
It is difficult to give a general view of Colombian music in just one post.
The music scene is very lively and diverse. From hard electronic music to traditional rhythms, there is a lot to discover.

Maybe a split between urban and traditional could help even though there are a good number of bridges between the two cultures.
Traditional music: Cumbia, mapalé, Porro, vallenato, joropo
"Imported" music: Salsa, Champeta, Ranchera Mexicana, Tango
Urban music: Reggaeton, Bachata, Rap/Hip-Hop, electronic music (and all its variations)
Rock influences: Punk/ska, metal, and of course all the pop/rock variations, including what some call "tropipop" or pop latino.

Some interesting groups appeared these last 10 years, who are mixing a strong urban culture (electronic/ hip hop) with traditional rhythms and instruments (mainly cumbia). The most emblematic band for this genre is probably Bomba Estereo ("Fuego" being their debut hit single).

Modernized Vallenato is an important trend of pop music in Colombia. Flagship of this pop vallenato is Carlos Vives, even though his influences go much further than just vallenato.
Other important artists would be Jorge Celedon, Silvestre Dangond, Felipe Paez, and of course Diomedes Diaz.

I'm having a look at my Colombian playlist and I can find: Alkilados (urban dance/pop), Andres Cepeda (pop/rock), Andy Rivera (Reggaeton), Carlos Vives (pop Vallenato), Fonseca (pop latino), Fruko y sus Tesos (salsa), La Derecha (rock), La Sonora Dinamita (salsa, cumbia), La 33 (salsa), Lucas Arnau (pop Latino), Maluma (reggaeton), Manuel Medrano (pop), Ondatropica (project group of contemporary cumbia), Peter Manjarres (vallenato), Piso 21 (reggaeton), Santiago Cruz (pop/ballad),

There are a lot of music festivals for all kind of musics from Summerland for electronic music in Cartagena, to the Festival de la Leyenda Vallenata in Valledupar for Vallenato. The biggest music festival is held in Bogota, and is called Rock al Parque. It's a free music festival for Rock lovers (metal, hard rock, punk...).

Pretty comprehensive for just one post!  I would just mention that in Cali, salsa reigns.  For the Fair of Cali each year, the Salsódromo is the opening event in which over 1000 dancers parade and dance along a 1.5 kilometer route to salsa music.  They celebrate and share with Puerto Rico their adulation for more traditional groups like Gran Combo and Grupo Niche, as well as much older music like from Celia Cruz that never goes out of style. 

Ranchera music from Mexico and all music from Cuba is popular.  Bachata although more from the Dominican Republic is also heard, as well as the other styles Steve mentions (and which I know just about nothing!).

I have a collection of the "Best 100" of older songs from Ecuador, and my colombiana wife knows and sings along to many of them - they are a wonderful mix of different instruments, different influences, and always melodic.  The more I hear and learn about Latin music, the more I realize how complex and vast the overall music scene is, and how it plays a very big part in people's lives.

In Cali they listen to it all - but if you can't dance to it, it's probably not going to be very popular.

Yes, OsageArcher, you're spot on.  I focused on Colombian music and artists, but in everyday life, music from all over Latin America and the Carribean can be heard. Big "music nations" would include Argentina (loooooots of Rock bands from Argentina are very famous in Colombia), Mexico, Cuba, Santo Domingo, and of course the Spanish speaking US music scene.  Brazilian music is not as popular, probably due to the language barrier.
Colombians pay a lot more attention to the lyrics than may do, and, especially in pop music, lyrics can be very nice even sometimes poetical.
There is a genuine Latin music culture all over Latin America.

We're mostly interested in traditional Colombian, Jazz and Classical music.  I've listened to enough bad rock, Euro Trash, faux Rap and watered down pop to last a lifetime.  We're targeting Medellin as a possible expat area. I'm aware of the club scene there and don't think that's where I'll get most of my music.  I've been watching an international News Stream  and it does seem that Bogota has a number of really interesting large music festivals that avoid the pop-thingie-of-the-moment (yawn) that seems to be such a part of big city clubs everywhere. Any ideas about such in Medellin? We're visiting in December.

It's good to see a mention of classical music. The discussion of "different types of music" here, which all turn out to be pop genres, has me chuckling.

claaay wrote:

It's good to see a mention of classical music. The discussion of "different types of music" here, which all turn out to be pop genres, has me chuckling.

In all fairness, I think the original question asking about the most popular music in Colombia was what most of us caught and ran with...

I enjoy classical music, too, along with many other genres.  I am sure my love of classical music is shared by probably 1%-2% of Colombians LOL...in my travels I have yet to hear anyone playing classical music on the streets or in the car, no advertisement of classical concerts on posters or billboards (although you can find them on the web) and although Cali does have a philharmonic orchestra I doubt the majority of caleños even know they have one...