Choric dance ceremonies, known as areítos, were documented in the sixteenth century as celebrations of living, ancestral, and mythological individuals among Indigenous societies of the circum-Caribbean, a region spanning the Antilles and Isthmo-Colombian areas. This presentation employs archaeology, iconography, and ethnohistory to evaluate areítos from approximately 800 CE to the sixteenth century. Tied to ancestral memory and elaborate funerary rites, such ceremonies made the inaudible audible, allowing mortals to hear voices or messages from ancestral or divine entities. Historical accounts further show that areítos and related, musical performances presented large-scale oral histories commemorating elite achievements and mourning the deceased. These sixteenth-century events, saturated with Indigenous politics and spirituality, arose from traditions with a long history of music, song, and dance.