Costa Rican Music: Styles, Artists and Where to Hear It

Costa Rican music runs from the marimba-and-guitar folk of Guanacaste to calypso sung in Creole English on the Caribbean coast, with salsa, cumbia and reggaeton filling dance floors everywhere in between. If you want to hear it live, the best bets are a town fiesta, a Limón calypso night or a concert at San José’s National Theatre.

Costa Rica doesn’t have one signature sound the way Cuba or Jamaica does. What it has is a handful of regional traditions and a busy local scene that borrows from all over Latin America and the Caribbean. This guide covers the main styles, the names worth knowing and where travelers can hear them.

Folk

Traditional Costa Rican Music from Guanacaste

Guanacaste, in the dry northwest, is the center of Costa Rican folklore. Its music grew out of the cattle ranches, home of the sabanero cowboy, and the Chorotega Indigenous culture of the Nicoya Peninsula. Our guide to Guanacaste culture covers the region’s history.

• The marimba: a large wooden xylophone, usually played by two or three musicians at once. Costa Rica is the southern end of Central America’s marimba tradition, and the instrument is still at the heart of Guanacaste fiestas.
• The punto guanacasteco: Costa Rica’s official national dance, a heel-and-toe couples’ dance set to a lively tune composed around 1900. You’ll see it at school events, folk shows and national holidays.
• Old instruments: the quijongo, a single-string musical bow with a gourd resonator, and the chirimía, a reed instrument, survive in parts of the Chorotega region. Clay ocarinas date back to pre-Columbian times.
• Bombas: short, humorous rhymed verses shouted during folk dances, usually followed by a cheer from the crowd.

For more on the dances and instruments, see our guides to traditional dances and folklore and Costa Rican musical instruments.

Caribbean

Calypso and Reggae on the Caribbean Coast

Limón province has a different musical history from the rest of the country. Many of its families descend from Jamaican and other West Indian workers who came in the late 1800s to build the railroad and work the banana plantations, and they brought English, Creole and Caribbean music with them.

• Calypso limonense: Costa Rica’s own calypso, related to but distinct from Trinidad’s. Songs are usually sung in Limón Creole English, often with guitar, banjo and percussion, and they tell local stories with a lot of humor.
• Walter Ferguson: the “King of Calypso,” from Cahuita, wrote many of the genre’s best-known songs. He died in 2023 at 103.
• Cantoamerica: a group led by Manuel Monestel that has carried Caribbean Costa Rican music to a wider audience.
• Reggae: strong all along the coast, especially in Puerto Viejo and Cahuita, where live sets in beach bars are part of the evening. See our picks for Caribbean coast hotels.

Read more in our guide to Afro-Caribbean culture in Costa Rica, and see the Tico Times profile of Walter Ferguson.

Dance floors

Swing Criollo, Chiqui-Chiqui and Latin Dance Music

Ticos love to dance, and most popular music in Costa Rica is dance music.

• Swing criollo: a fast, footwork-heavy dance done to cumbia and other Latin rhythms, mixing in moves from 1950s American swing. It started in working-class dance halls in San José and is now recognized as part of Costa Rica’s intangible cultural heritage; the Central Bank even issued a commemorative coin for it in 2025.
• Chiqui-chiqui: a late-1980s style mixing merengue, cumbia and Afro-pop, made popular by bands such as Los Hicsos and Jaque Mate.
• Salsa, cumbia and merengue: staples at weddings, parties and dance clubs across the country. Dance schools in San José offer classes for visitors.
• Reggaeton: the default sound in clubs for younger Costa Ricans, as it is across Latin America.

Artists

Costa Rican Musicians Worth Knowing

• Editus: an instrumental trio that won a Grammy with Panamanian singer Rubén Blades for the album Tiempos.
• Malpaís: a band that mixes Costa Rican folk with jazz and rock, and one of the country’s best-loved groups.
• Debi Nova: a Latin Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter.
• Guadalupe Urbina: a singer from Guanacaste known for folk and traditional songs.
• Manuel Obregón: a pianist and composer who has worked to record and preserve traditional music.
• Gandhi: one of Costa Rica’s best-known rock bands.

Classical music has a home at the National Theatre in San José, where the National Symphony Orchestra performs its season.

Where to listen

Where to Hear Live Music in Costa Rica

• Carnaval de Limón (October): parades, calypso and Caribbean bands in Puerto Limón, held around October 12, the Day of Cultures.
• Día de la Persona Negra (August 31): celebrations of Afro-Costa Rican culture, with music, especially in Limón.
• Guanacaste fiestas: town fiestas with marimba, topes (horse parades) and folk dancing, especially around July 25, Guanacaste Day, in Liberia and Santa Cruz.
• Festival de la Luz (December): San José’s holiday parade with marching bands and floats.
• Fiestas de Palmares (January) and Fiestas de Zapote (late December): big crowds, carnival rides and concerts. See our guides to Palmares and Zapote.
• The National Theatre: symphony concerts, ballet and touring artists in San José year-round.
• Puerto Viejo and Cahuita: bars often have live reggae and calypso, especially in high season.

Good to know

Costa Rican Music FAQ