"The Sound of Panama" i​s a multi-layered project that aims to fuse music with cultural heritage preservation and community organizing. This recording project will cover songs that represent and tell the story of the African West Indian in Panama and the culture they created as builders of the Panama Canal, also presented as a community performance. The recording project will serve as the foundation for a short documentary that traces the waves of immigration that gave rise to the distinct culture and identity of the Afro-Panamanian community, stretching back four generations from the West Indies, to Panama and into the United States.