Los Cojolites
The Grand Tour
For my final post, Iʼll leave you with this audio flipbook that sums up my year. In previous posts, I tried to explore the diversity of Mexican music by zooming in on individual sounds and people. I wanted to compare a variety of styles (Mariachi, Son Jarocho, Danzón, Villancicos, La Chilena, Son Huasteco, and Tropical were just a few that I got hooked on), while also considering how this music has been affected by emerging issues in Mexico, like emigration, urbanization, and the cultural gap between generations.
This audio flipbook takes a wider view. I hope it lives up to its name—Itʼs a “grand tour” of the School of Mexican Music, classroom by classroom, genre by genre. For the musician in me, traveling from one “room” of Mexican music to another over the course of this year was an awe-inspiring lesson in new sounds. But more importantly, it gave me a taste of the complexity of Mexican history. And every day, Iʼm happy to report, that history is still being sung and played out by young people who want to live in a 21st century Mexico that doesnʼt forget where it came from.
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Back to the Ranch
When the band of young Mexican musicians Los Cojolites first started giving lessons a decade ago, their goal was simply to get their neighbors to turn off their TVs and play local music together again. Los Cojolites played Son Jarocho—the traditional music of their hometown in Southern Veracruz—at a time when it was going through a bizarre renaissance in other parts of the country. It had exploded in Mexico’s urban centers and college campuses, and even secured a spot on the “world music” stage abroad, yet it was about to fizzle in its own birthplace.
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