The Colombian group Estrellas del Vallenato performs "La cañaguatera / The Woman from Cañaguate" at the 2009 Smithsonian Folklife Festival as part of the Las Américas program. They are featured on the Smithsonian Folkways album ¡Ayombe! The Heart of Colombia's Música Vallenata. Representing several generations and a range of song styles, the musicians in this all-star group hail from small towns and ranches on Colombia's Caribbean coast, a region known as La Guajira.

In the words of GRAMMY®-winning popular singer/actor Carlos Vives, "Colombia is one of those great musical quarries of the Americas, as have been the American South, the Antilles, Mexico, Brazil, and Argentina." Since the late 20th century, the music of the vallenatos- people of a small valley region of the Caribbean coast- "has best portrayed the true way of being and feeling of the Colombian people." ¡Ayombe! The Heart of Colombia’s Música Vallenata, features two dozen seasoned vallenato performers spanning three generations, playing polished renditions of the music they know best-paseos, merengues, sones, and puyas.