From Veracruz to Los Angeles: The Tradition of Son Jarocho

The African Mexican music tradition of son jarocho comes from the Veracruz region of Mexico. As a performance practice, son jarocho has strong ties to social justice and civil rights, and is a thriving genre both in Mexico and in the United States. This article includes teaching suggestions for guitar or ukulele lessons in general music settings for elementary or middle school level students. The phases of World Music Pedagogy are applied to several son jarocho resources.

Digital Resources: Piedra Rodante (Mexico’s Rolling Stone Magazine)

The short-lived Mexican countercultural magazine, Piedra Rodante (Rolling Stone), is a unique and invaluable primary source for researchers interested in the global sixties from a Latin American perspective. From December 1970 to January 1972, Piedra Rodante reproduced translated articles and interviews from Rolling Stone magazine, together with original reporting by Mexican music critics and writers on a vast array of topics relevant to youth in the context of late 1960s and early 1970s Mexico. Piedra Rodante was launched by a young advertising executive, Manuel Aceves, a follower of the US and British countercultural and rock scene. In 1971, Mexico’s own countercultural movement, known as La Onda, was bursting with artistic creativity as well as marketing potential, especially in the music industry. In the wake of the 1968 student movement, however, Mexico’s government was wary of the untethered political potential mobilized by La Onda (epitomized by the outdoor rock festival, Avándaro, held in September 1971). With little warning, the government shuttered Piedra Rodante as part of a broader suppression of La Onda throughout the culture industry. Absent a missing issue 0, this fully digitized collection of issues 1–8 is the only complete set available to the public.

Identity and the Neoclassical Ideal in Martha Graham and Carlos Chávez's Dark Meadow

If the ideal artistic collaboration is one of shared vision, open communication, and exquisite professionalism then Martha Graham and Carlos Chávez strayed far from it in the making of Dark Meadow (1946). As this article documents, their relationship was full of antagonism, misunderstanding, disdainful gossip, and regret on both sides. Three sources of conflict are examined: 1) a misunderstanding between the two collaborators on the meaning and utility of Greek allusions in art created conflicting aesthetic expectations for a dance with a plot derived from Greek mythology; 2) both artists defied the modernist community's expectations about how each of them should perform their gender identity as artists; and 3) similarly, the press's consistent Othering of Chávez in racist, nationalist terms was contagious, influencing Graham's beliefs about what Mexican music could or should be. Despite significant obstacles, Chávez and Graham produced a work that continues to represent the mid-century Modernist aesthetic.

El II Festival Internacional de Música Mexicana, impacto social y educativo en la formación musical nacional / The II International Festival of Mexican Music, social and educational impact in the national musical formation

El Festival Internacional de Música Mexicana es el único dedicado exclusivamente a la música mexicana de concierto; busca rescatar, promover y difundir la música de academia, a través de conferencias, clases magistrales, recitales y conciertos con orquesta de cámara, orquesta juvenil y orquesta filarmónica. Los objetivos primordiales de este proyecto de investigación-acción son: mejorar el aprendizaje de la música mexicana en los alumnos aspirantes de las diferentes licenciaturas que ofrece la Facultad de Música, promover la creación de autores e intérpretes a través de exposiciones artísticas; evaluar los cambios en el proceso de aprendizaje, potenciando una enseñanza más ágil y activa; utilizar el conocimiento de los elementos musicales y artísticos en el análisis de producciones artísticas propias y ajenas, y hacer partícipe al público en general del escaparate cultural que este festival ofrece. Mediante el diseño de la investigación-acción se efectuó un estudio descriptivo con el fin de estudiar las diferentes estructuras musicales, los autores y el contexto histórico de sus obras dentro del marco del II Festival Internacional de Música Mexicana. Los resultados mostraron que el Festival tuvo un impacto directo en el enriquecimiento académico de los estudiantes de las diferentes licenciaturas en música.

Music and Folklore Research in the Departamento de Bellas Artes, 1926–1946

The Departamento de Bellas Artes (DBA; Department of Fine Arts) was founded as one of the departments of the Secretaría de Educación Pública (SEP). It had a Music Section, which centered its activities on teaching music, at all levels in the entire country, with socialist ideology and under the firm belief that the fine arts should be part of the education of the people. To do so, it defined a repertoire of songs and their arrangements that was coherent and had a nationalistic discourse. The selection of songs was taken from diverse sources, some of which were the result of bibliographic research, mostly done in the DBA, but the important groups of melodies and songs that were sung in schools and adult choruses came from the National Music Archive, which was created to be the foundation and massive sample compilation of Mexican music. The composers and researchers at the time had little or no idea what the characteristics of indigenous music was; and to create nationalistic music and national dances, they needed references of what was Mexican, what was traditional. The archive was a massive and ambitious project, and the DBA was a national institute with the authority to write to all the governors in the country asking for references of folk music, local fiestas, and traditional dances, of which composers and researchers knew very little. Composers and musicians participated in sending in samples of scores or lyrics, then institutional programs were designed for rural teachers to compile music in distant regions and towns. Much of the material that was sent in was well known songs, popular ranchera music, and the indigenous music that was expected to create teaching and nationalist programs required so further research. Much of the music used in the educational programs derived from contributions made by rural teachers, and the indigenous music was compiled by few specialists who travelled only with their ears, pencils, and paper and returned with a rough selection of melodies that outlined the indigenous music of Mexico. Other sources of reference, music scores and dance descriptions, came from official events and dance contests held by the DBA in Michoacan, Hidalgo, Estado de México, and Mexico City.