El Baile Del Pueblo

In this final chapter, the author provides a macro perspective of the música típica genre as a form of national music, focusing on the challenges musicians face as performers of a popular commercial music that is, at the same time, firmly rooted in folkloric traditions to which Panamanians remain deeply attached. Through a series of case studies, the author shows that the “pull” of tradition is a constant in música típica musicians’ lives. This is never more evident than in ongoing discussions regarding what to call this music and the challenge of sorting out the demands of baile performance as distinguished from shows patronized by concertgoers, or even viewed by a nation-wide television audience. This sense of música típica’s unchanging nature also lies at the heart of the perplexity and frustration felt by performers when they consider the unrivalled popularity música típica enjoys in Panama even as it is virtually unknown beyond the country’s borders. Finally, when compared to most other forms of popular music in Panama, the sense of national pride provoked by música típica’s connection to folkloric music and the fact that it is embraced by so many Panamanians means that musicians are praised for their contributions to modernizing the genre even as they run the risk of being accused of undermining what is regarded by many Panamanians as the nation’s cultural patrimony.

Standing Out While Fitting In

Chapter 6 extends the discussion of the previous two chapters by examining the musical choices música típica musicians make to forge an identifiable individual style that is the key to establishing a career, distinguishing the sound of individual conjunto musicians, and achieving a coveted region-based following. This focus on specific musical strategies through which musicians draw creative inspiration—whether from renown música típica performers and/or genres that have achieved broad international success—allows the author to explore música típica’s development as a form of cutting edge popular music that is, at the same time, firmly tethered to sentiments of tradition, regionalism, and populist nationalism. The technical approaches for developing the all-important original sound described by the musicians who are featured in this chapter opens the way for the author to theorize the relationship between style and genre as well as to discuss issues involving the common usages of these terms and concepts in ethnomusicological discourse.

Accordion Conjuntos and the Commercialization of Panamanian Música Típica

Moving through the 1940s to the late 1960s, chapter 3 examines música típica’s sudden and wholehearted embrace by Panama’s popular classes. This boom was produced in significant part by massive internal migration of rural people both to the capital and other parts of the interior, the transformative effect of the arrival of cash-based economies in rural areas, the advent of commercial radio, and the creative interventions of pioneering musicians. All these changes, the author shows, stimulated the rapid commercialization of the genre, which further galvanized calls for cultural preservation even as performance opportunities for commercial música típica conjuntos grew dramatically. The chapter closes with an examination of how música típica’s broad acceptance by Panama’s popular classes and its continued connection with the country’s interior led to its development as a form of popular musical nationalism that, by the end of the 1960s, found favor among the leaders of Panama’s left-wing revolutionary government.

Early Música Típica and Its Antecedents

Chapter 2 examines música típica’s antecedents in Panama’s Azuero peninsula during a period of great social change. Focusing on developments in areas of musical sound and all the practices that surround large rural dances called bailes, this chapter reveals how the evolution of this music was shaped by the peninsula’s geography, its evolving economic structure and labor relations, and, most of all, the musical preferences of performing musicians and their fans, the dancing baile-goers. In sharp contrast to the Panamanian folklorists’ romantic portrayals of their rural compatriots as untouched by modernization, this chapter outlines a history that makes clear that in terms of their musical interests and dance preferences, Azuerenses were not too dissimilar from their urban counterparts. Moreover, whether in terms of the social imperatives that led to the baile’s emergence as the foremost occasion for broad-based community participation or the seamless elision of themes of romantic love, nostalgia, and the pain of physical separation, this chapter shows that many of música típica’s most compelling, widely-embraced, and distinctive features were firmly established well before the sea changes brought about by the genre’s eventual commercialization.

Epilogue

The epilogue examines the events that unfolded when an unusual confluence of events placed a top música típica band on the stage of Canada’s premier salsa festival only weeks after the Panamanian soccer team had scored its first ever and only goal in a World Cup match. Describing the series of in-the-moment decisions that occurred during the course of the performance, the stage-side discussion of the musicians longing for a genuine change to the standard baile routine, and the response of Panamanian festival goers who were still high on the strong feelings of national pride produced by their small country’s entry into one of the world’s most important sporting events, the author shows that when it comes to its capacity to represent the nation, some of the reasons why música típica has not caught on widely outside the country, indeed, the significant barriers to international fame that it has historically encountered are, at the same time, the very features that for Panamanians makes música típica el baile del pueblo.

A Listener’s Guide to Música Típica

Chapter 4 familiarizes the reader with the musical details of música típica. It begins by examining the evolution of ensemble instrumentation and instrument roles over the final quarter of the twentieth century, noting important changes that include more frequent appearance of women as the lead vocalists and other novel practices brought about through the pioneering efforts of cumbia innovadores (innovators). This is followed by a detailed outline of the standard musical features of the genre, including instrument roles and the collection of interlocking patterns that make up the composite grooves that both musicians and dancers report are at the heart of música típica’s aesthetic appeal. This chapter concludes with an exploration of this music’s capacity to call up nationalist feelings while remaining, in the view of its practitioners, decidedly, indeed adamantly, nonpolitical.

A Professional’s Guide to Performing Música Típica

Chapter 5 brings us to the ethnographic present wherein the author surveys the many activities música típica musicians pursue in the course of providing popular entertainment. For the bandleader, these activities include the investment in reliable transportation, musical instruments, and powerful sound systems, and negotiations with local baile organizers. For the entire band, the demands of performance necessitate constant travel over considerable distances and playing through the night for the better part of a week, all while balancing personal life and maintaining cordial relationships with bandmates, the bandleader, and fans. Moving from a detailed description of a weekly tour to the intricate inner workings of a Panamanian baile, it is here that the author shows how the work involved in performing música típica also projects the band’s image as a group of either committed traditionalists or daring innovators at the same time that it reinforces the music’s enduring association with the country’s interior heartland.

Puente Del Mundo

The first chapter provides a synopsis of Panama’s history with emphasis on the development of nationalist sentiment and musical nationalism. The author opens this chapter by detailing the rise of nineteenth-century progressive liberalism and the construction of the Panama Canal, and then goes on to trace the growth of mid-twentieth century xenophobic sentiment directed not only toward US military personnel, but also toward Panamanians of African descent. The chapter goes on to examine Panama’s folkloric project as the author introduces what will become one of the central themes of the book: that what may seem to be an irreconcilable clash of values between modern-sounding música típica versus traditional lifeways celebrated by Panamanian intellectuals, in fact often turned out to be mutually reinforcing phenomena. This turn of events, the author argues, challenges rigid bottom-up/top-down analyses of cultural nationalism and reveals the complex realities of the musical and social lives of popular musicians. The chapter concludes with a review of the revolutionary populism of the 1960s.

Introduction

It was some time after I first met Panamanian vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Lucho de Sedas, in early 2005, that he began playing a custom designed Fender Stratocaster whenever he performed for audiences in Toronto. In contrast to the sleek B. C. Rich Gunslinger Assassin that had followed him from Panama, Lucho’s new electric guitar had emblazoned on its front the tricolored Panamanian flag. This new guitar would become a key part of his signature look, for it communicated his connection to and love of country. Indeed, for the highly diverse contingent of Hispanic Canadians that made up the audience for his music in his newly adopted land, the instrument was also the most striking if not principal reference to the musician’s nationality. This is because—as Lucho would remark to me on several occasions—Panamanian music is little known outside of Panama. This lack of familiarity with the music to which he had devoted his life was deeply felt by Lucho, who is not only a household name in his own country, but had risen to fame performing the most widely embraced form of popular music in Panama....