The Island Service of Historical Heritage of the Cabildo de Lanzarote is promoting the podcast project Tales of the Canary Grandparents, a proposal that seeks to preserve and disseminate the richness of the oral memory of the elders of Lanzarote and La Graciosa. Through the voices of its protagonists, this initiative transforms words into heritage, recovering experiences, expressions, and stories that are an essential part of the island's identity.
The project, composed of eight episodes, is promoted by the Charter 100 Canarias Association, a non-profit entity made up of women entrepreneurs, businesswomen, professionals, and executives from the Archipelago, whose objective is to highlight female talent and promote the active participation of women in the social, economic, and cultural development of the Canary Islands. Under the direction of Alma María Perdomo, Cuentos de los Abuelos Canarios (Tales of the Canary Grandparents) is consolidated as a pioneering proposal in the field of cultural communication and the preservation of intangible heritage.
The presentation of this second episode was presided over by the island's highest public representative, Oswaldo Betancort, and the president of Charter 100 Canarias, Nardy Barrios, along with the promoter and director of the project, Alma María Perdomo.
"Tales from the Canary Grandparents" reinforces Lanzarote's commitment to the protection of intangible heritage and the transmission of popular culture to new generations, shaping a sound legacy that will remain as a testament to the soul of the Island,” declared Oswaldo Betancort, as president but also as head of the Heritage Department. “Preserving the memory of our elders is a way of honoring our history and strengthening the collective identity of Lanzarote and the Canary Islands,” emphasized the president.
Keeping the voice and memory alive
The series opened with an interview with Ángela Pérez Fernández, born in Tías in 1937, whose voice opened this sound archive of popular memory. The second episode, presented this Friday in the Cabildo's Plenary Hall, features Francisco Armas Barreto, a resident of Yaiza, who offers a close testimony on the economic and social evolution of the Island, from the years of traditional agriculture to the tourist and urban transformation.
“Our dream is to create a great sound archive where the stories, accents, and expressions of our grandparents are not only saved but also remain alive in our voices. Canarian identity is not something inherited, it is something shared,” declared Alma María Perdomo, director of the project Cuentos de los Abuelos Canarios (Stories of the Canarian Grandparents), who thanked the media, public representatives from various institutions, as well as Pancho Armas himself, and members of the Fundación Canaria Flora Acoge and the Asociación de Salud Mental El Cribo for their presence. “We encourage them and all groups to collaborate in the dissemination of the project, and thus contribute to keeping alive the voice and memory of those who built the history of Lanzarote,” added Perdomo.
For her part, Nardy Barrios stated that *Cuentos de los Abuelos Canarios* "gives voice to those who have sustained the soul of our islands, especially women who, with wisdom and sacrifice, have transmitted the deepest values of our culture," and thanked the president of the Cabildo for his enthusiasm and support in promoting this initiative.
The podcast project, available on various platforms such as Spotify, Apple Podcast, iVoox, Amazon Music, and Podlink, will continue with new interviews with Agustín Rafael Márquez Fernández, Antonia Cabrera Perdomo (Toña), María Dolores Panasco Armas, Dimas Martín Martín, Francisca Perdomo Sosa (Paquita), and Esteban Betancort Medina. All of them were interviewed by Alma María Perdomo, who, on behalf of the Charter 100 Canarias Association, thanked the selfless collaboration of musicians Yamandú Costa, Domingo “El Colorao,” and Toñín Corujo, whose compositions accompany the podcast's narratives, as well as the participation of photographer Rubén Acosta, author of the images that illustrate this oral history project.
