Approaches to Mariachi Instruction: The Show Mariachi and Working Mariachi Performance Paradigms
José Raul Torres-Ramos, Moore’s School of Music, University of Houston, Houston, TX
I have spent much time pondering the challenges in teaching mariachi. I am very fortunate to have taught all levels in public school and in a university music department. It has allowed me to see different perspectives on the transmission of music, and mariachi in particular. Personally, mariachi music has motivated me to pursue education and research inquiry at the highest levels. The genre has the potential to attract many students to formal music study or higher education, especially those who might not otherwise be inclined to pursue this path. As a commercial music form, it has detriments as well as benefits. The job of teachers is to show students the differences, promoting the benefits.
As with all growth, there are obstacles and two in particular that continue to hinder the ongoing development of mariachi in music education. The first obstacle is the idea that mariachi is not worthy of serious study. Because very little pedagogical research has been done in the field, other music professionals have not viewed mariachi as a legitimate tool for music education. Those who seek to validate mariachi music by structuring a curriculum based on existing instructional paradigms unintentionally contribute to a shift in the traditional way mariachi has been transmitted. The resulting shift causes a disparity between the institutionalized versions of mariachi versus the more traditional forms. The second obstacle is the disagreement between our own communities of mariachi teachers, who struggle with a common approach to mariachi transmission. Some of this disagreement stems from the ongoing “politics of aesthetics,”1 which are based on notions of sound, style, authenticity, credibility, insider/outsider status, and institutional administrative practices and procedures. Although at some future point I would like to develop a more detailed discussion of these obstacles, in this article I would like to offer a perspective on mariachi performance practices and ideas for furthering the development of its transmission within public schools.
First of all, I want to acknowledge Mack Ruíz and my fellow colleagues on the MENC (now NAfME) National Advisory Committee on Mariachi.2 Mack has brought together an extremely talented and dedicated mix of youth and experience that has energized and shaped many of my ideas and opinions. The committee is poised to make significant and longstanding contributions for mariachi in music education. I am excited and humbled to be in their company. Our main goal is to provide guidance on the current status of mariachi education and offer some short- and long-term goals towards its continued development. The information presented here reflects my research interests as a mariachi musician, teacher, and doctoral student in music education.
Mariachi and Music Education
All educators want to give students a strong music foundation which includes any or all of the following: the tools and skills to pursue higher education in music or another discipline if they so choose, a professional career in performance that may or may not require advanced training, and a frame of reference for appreciating music and its contributions to society. Mariachi is a productive contributor to these goals. In many instances it also attracts many students who would not otherwise be interested in serious music study that consequently may lead them to other opportunities not previously conceived. Many musicians and aficionados are attracted to mariachi for many reasons. It communicates raw emotional energy much like many commercial music forms. It utilizes high-energy rhythmic patterns coupled with the sensual sounds of string instrument and fiery brass tied together by the gentle but firm bass tones of the guitarrón in a swirl of voices singing in romantic Spanish. That is the seduction of mariachi and many of us have fallen for its charm.
Mariachi History
The development of what is today called mariachi, as most teachers know, dates to the middle of the 19th century in rural Central Mexico. For the first fifty years, mariachi was simply one of the many rural folk music traditions of Mexico with no ties to nation or commodity. As the social currents of the early twentieth century emerged before, during, and after the Mexican Revolution, the bases of regionalism began to erode in the country. The 1910 Mexican Revolution brought greater freedom and economic opportunity to working-class people. In the decades following, intellectuals such as Dr. Rubén M. Campos and Gabriel Saldivar championed the importance of Indian rural mestizo cultures. Government educational programs promoted expressions and created a select canon of songs and dances from different regions to be taught in all the nation’s schools. The rapid growth of electronic media in Mexico around 1930 invaded all but the most remote populations through radio, recordings, films, and eventually television. A few regional music genres, including mariachi, gained a foothold in the media. In doing so, mariachi and other regional music had to convert themselves into professionalized commodities to appeal to a broad audience, beyond their traditional regional one. What came to be known as Modern Mariachi developed an image that today includes a standardized style of dress, repertoire, instrumentation, and an ongoing development of musical repertoire, which in the recent decade is influenced more and more by American cultural tastes. Today’s modern mariachi tradition, as contextually framed by Dan Sheehy and Jesús Jáuregui, consists mainly of two economic musical paradigms3 – the Working Mariachi and the Show Mariachi. They are characterized in most cases by their respective client expectations, which determine their approach to performance preparation.
Working Mariachi
The Working Mariachi in many ways exemplifies the stereotypes of mariachi performance. Because of this, it is difficult to see their valuable and pivotal contributions to the development of mariachi musicians. They strive to possess large amounts of repertoire both instrumentally and vocally. They are skilled at transposition and improvisation on the fly. If they don’t know a piece, they will improvise a version so successfully that sometimes, through the power of spontaneity, it is more entertaining than the original. This is done in the name of pleasing the client to earn a living. Because their trade is day to day, six nights a week and sometimes, but not always, exists in seedy venues, they may not always be the best dressed or even uniformly so. In some instances, groups may not have a formal organized structure and can consist of pick-up musicians. Their preparation for this type of work is individualized and in apprenticeship under a more experienced musician or group. Many of these groups don’t rehearse together; however, in most cases the elements of teamwork are present during the performance, albeit not at the same level as a regularly rehearsed ensemble. Subtle and overt communication is essential, especially in instances of improvised performance, where half or fewer of the musicians know a particular piece, with some relegated to following those that do. Although ensemble rehearsal is not common in this paradigm, many of the musicians I have interacted with in informal discussions express the desire to rehearse more as a group. Due to the number days in the week and long, late hours, most working musicians value their free time for family or day-to-day life pursuits. This does not mean these musicians don’t practice. On the contrary, many are continually honing their skills, especially with the ever-changing landscape of mariachi repertoire. In the Working Mariachi paradigm, musicians’ worth is measured by their skills of memorization and retention. Musicians who are walking cancioneros,4 meaning they know literally hundreds of lyrics or can improvise vocally, are paid the most respect in the Working Mariachi paradigm. Likewise are musicians who “know their talón,”5 meaning they can instrumentally play a large amount of repertoire. Most Working Mariachi groups will inadvertently and preferably choose a minimal player or singer who can successfully navigate large amounts of repertoire over a virtuoso vocalist or instrumentalist who only knows a minimal number of songs. Similarly the uniformity, and what many charros6 call “respect” for the traje de charro,7 also can give way to the daily grind. Many times musicians in the Working Mariachi don’t wear the finest uniform or pay much attention to its professional visual aesthetics. This is a generalization, and with respect to all musicians working, there are many who do take care with their visual appearance. But because the expectations and atmosphere are different for the Working groups, uniformity and high standards of visual image are secondary to the musical expectations of the clients.
Show Mariachi
The other part of the tradition are the Show Mariachi. These are the groups with the most visibility who have enjoyed the most commercial success for a significant period of time. Mariachi Vargas, Camperos, Sol de Mexico, Cobre, and America are the top echelon of “Virtuoso Mariachi” as coined by Jeff Nevin.8 Following close behind them are a multitude of groups from Internacional Guadalajara, Nuevo Tecalitlán, Reyna de Los Angeles, Mujer 2000, and so forth. There are still more groups who have enjoyed substantial regional commercial success using the Show Mariachi paradigm. The Show or Virtuoso Mariachi (I will use both terms interchangeably) normally perform in formal concert or comparable venues, using sound and lighting amplification. Their performances might not last longer than two hours at most versus the Working groups who will put in four to six hours per entrada.9 Their repertoire is highly specialized, as it will be performed in large concert halls and arenas. The arrangements are flashy and showcase the vocal and musical virtuosity of each member. The costumes will be of the highest quality with vibrant colors, and each member of the group is expected to heed structured guidelines for personal hygiene, and in some instances weight requirements, in order to preserve the stage image. These are the “Hollywood stars” of the mariachi industry, and patrons will pay upwards of $100 per ticket depending on the venue. The shows have become more elaborate as world-renowned symphony orchestras are featured accompanying professional mariachi groups. A new venue was introduced to showcase the virtuoso groups when mariachi conferences started to sprout up all over the United States in the early 80s. The movement led to the Encuentro Internacional de Mariachi y Charrería10 in Guadalajara, which during its peak years featured a weeklong series of gala concerts with Vargas, America, and Camperos accompanied by La Orquesta Filarmónica de Jalisco11 featuring top Mexican artists such as Angeles Ochoa, Aida Cuevas, and Marco Antonio Muñiz. Following a design established in 2009, the 2010 San José Mariachi Conference in California presented a gala concert with elaborate choreographed staging, multimedia audio and video presentations, and dramatized scenes using professional actors. Dan Guerrero, Hollywood television producer and director, produced the concert. This illustrates how the quality and level of expectation for the artists and mariachi performing in these venues continues to grow. As Sheehy, Nevin, and Jáuregui summarize in their respective work, show groups work with a much smaller amount of repertoire and master it to the point of virtuosity. The concerts pay substantially better, which affords groups more time in between performances to rehearse and continuously develop high levels of skill. These are the groups that represent the full potential of mariachi performance and rightly so. Many of these groups also benefit from the mariachi conferences that allow them a platform to influence students and teachers alike. Mariachi conferences have motivated a whole new generation of mariachi performers who continue to push the envelope of the idiom and challenge existing notions of validity and legitimacy of mariachi education. However, the show groups represent only the top one to five percent of the mariachi tradition as a whole.12 The vast majority of the tradition is made up of working groups who very rarely perform in the venues headlined by Mariachi Vargas de Tecalitlán.
Disparities in Current Mariachi Instruction
What I have observed is that much of the instructional approach for teaching mariachi utilizes the paradigm of the Show groups. Students learn a small amount of repertoire and rehearse it until achieving a high level of performance. I don’t know any music teacher who would think this is bad, and I’m sure we can all agree with the idea of performing music with a high degree of skill. However, I believe some very important opportunities to teach cultural and pedagogical objectives are being missed. Effectively teaching these objectives would take mariachi to a higher comprehensive level of art and music education. These are integral components of mariachi performance that shouldn’t be ignored or considered degrading and not worthy of teaching. Some teachers will find this difficult if they do not have experience with this type of playing and/or how to teach it. They may be unfamiliar with el arte de seguir,13 improvising, embellishing or transposing within the world of mariachi. As a young college student, my fondest memories of the Tucson International Mariachi Conference were during the final session at the end of each day when all the participants would rehearse together. Nati Cano, director of Los Camperos, would wrap the session directing the students to play standard songs from the mariachi repertoire. He would say, “Now we are going to play like mariachis. If you don’t know the song, follow the person next to you.” Students who didn’t know every song or knew it in only one key had to utilize all the aforementioned techniques. Since mariachi is as much a visual and dramatic art as it is a musical one, el arte de seguir is akin to an actor who forgets a line and must improvise to preserve the “fourth wall.”14 A mariachi musician in the face of ignorance of a musical piece sometimes preserves the integrity of the staged performance by following his or her fellow musicians. This may sound simple on the surface, but it is not quite improvisation because the piece or parts of it may or may not be known by other musicians, and yet one must execute it without the use of written music or a conductor for guidance. It is a cross between sight-reading, improvisation, transposition, and arranging all in your head. It is an accepted technique among professional mariachi musicians, and there is an art to it. Jazz musicians have been doing it for years. Actors also embellish lines in a spontaneous interpretation that in some cases the writer or director never considered. In Tucson I realized an important part of the work that a mariachi does and how much importance a Show musician like Nati Cano placed on it. I also realized that my mariachi teachers had not introduced me to this type of instruction.
The fact is that the very musicians who play with Mariachi Vargas, Camperos, Sol de Mexico, and America, as well as their musical leaders, have all built their playing chops working chambas15 or playing talón and learning el arte de seguir. With the Working groups, they learned the basic rudiments of their craft performing under the guidance of master mariachi taloneros.16 After this period of apprenticeship, like any other minor league player, they then either get scouted by a major league group or seek out their own opportunity. It is with the Show group that they learn the details of precision teamwork, rehearsal, and performance. However, they always rely on their foundation of skills learned in the Working groups. Generally Show Mariachis will have a set playlist to be performed in a concert. Vary rarely if at all will they deviate from this as it might jeopardize the musical integrity or quality of a performance. This is opposite from a Working group, who normally play what is requested or solicit requests from the audience. Nati Cano, director of Los Camperos has on occasion changed the music line-up for a concert minutes before the musicians take the stage. He does this in most cases because he feels a particular audience may have different tastes, and he is the consummate entertainer seeking to satisfy the patrons. I believe he also considers his group a mariachi in every sense of the word, meaning changes and requests are part of the job description whether in the Hollywood Bowl or at a cantina. He has gone as far as to take requests from the stage, goading audiences to “pick a song you’d like for us to play.” It seems that Nati likes to showcase the Working abilities of his musicians, and it is an impressive sight to see. A student out of high school or college taught through the Show paradigm would be at a disadvantage in this situation. Yet this situation will be replayed every night at La Fonda, Cielito Lindo, or a little pueblo in San Miguel el Alto.17 Working skills are used by mariachi performers in Show groups to be fully virtuosic.
Comprehensive Approach to Teaching Mariachi
For this reason, teachers should include the paradigm of the Show group as only one part of the instructional approach to mariachi performance. The central approach should be to teach practical musical skills. Rote learning, transposition, and improvisation are key ingredients to playing mariachi, which in turn spur the creative spontaneity, which is a huge characteristic of the music of Latin America. In tandem with a strong foundation of theory, notation, sight-reading, vocal study, and instrument pedagogy, mariachi will be a strong tool for teaching music. We should not focus solely on competitive events that promote material values and don’t teach the art form at its basic intrinsic level. We need a comprehensive understanding of mariachi so students that want to work professionally have the skills to compete. If they can do that, they will be able to perform with any university group and will always have a job. The world of western art music revolves around the written word, whose conversation is guided by the hand of a conductor. Mariachi is an oral tradition revolving around the spoken word and requires a subtle yet musically overt communication between all the musicians operating in tandem to actively initiate and self-guide the conversation. To consider mariachi a serious discipline of study is to understand that Working groups utilize the essential skills for training a student to play mariachi. Students with only good Show skills can find themselves lost when they go to a working gig. Similar to a vocation, mariachi can give students the tools to pursue a professional career that may or may not require advanced training. I consider myself an educated professional with multiple college degrees, and yet part of my livelihood comes from the income I get playing chambas at night and on the weekends. Without practical skills, I know I wouldn’t be invited to play with these groups. I might get invited to play with a Show group but since those positions require more rehearsal prep, musicians who can commit to the time needed usually occupy them. The income from playing mariachi is substantial in comparison to the time it takes. Many a college student has paid for school by gigging. My current research seeks a method for teaching this approach to mariachi performance in a formal classroom setting. The Show Mariachi paradigm is still very useful and an integral part to promoting the music and culture. However, students also need an awareness and respect for working musicians because the tools they utilize for the job are the foundation for which virtuoso groups are built.
El Idioma del Mariachi
One very practical approach to further pedagogy instruction is to teach mariachi bilingually. Spanish is the language of our art. Students often go to conferences not knowing the terminology necessary to learn their craft from master musicians who don’t possess the resources for translation. Los bajones, remates, sobones, caballitos, contratiempos, picados, y la bola de términos mariacheros deberíamos de enseñar.18 This approach will raise the instructional level of mariachi and establish more acceptance for its legitimacy. Changing mariachi instruction to suit Western European paradigms has been one approach for gaining acceptance. However mariachi cannot be placed in the instructional box of choir, band, and/or orchestra. Mariachi encompasses all of the fine arts to the extent that it cannot be limited to just one area. It is strings, winds, voices, drama, and visual arts all melded with the folk themes of rural Mexico. Comprehensive mariachi education teaches good music rudiments. The future of teaching mariachi is to incorporate a broader understanding of how those rudiments are performed through a Working group paradigm, and developing a correlating curriculum will provide the framework to raise the instructional level of mariachi to comprehensive virtuosity while staying true to its rural roots.
Sources:
Bell, Elizabeth S. (2008). Theories of Performance. Los Angeles: Sage.
Jáuregui, Jesús. (1990). El Mariachi. Mexico: Banpais.
Jáuregui, Jesús. (2007). El Mariachi: Símbolo Musical de México. Mexico: Santillana.
Nevin, Jeff. (2002). The Virtuoso Mariachi. Maryland: University Press of America.
Rodríguez, Russell. (2010). Politics of Aesthetics: Mariachi Music in the United States. In N. Cantú ® M. Fránquiz (Eds.), Inside the Latio Experience. (pp. 193-209). New York: Palgrave.
Sands, Kathleen Mullen. (1993). Charrería Mexicana: An Equestrian Folk Tradition. Tucson: The University of Arizona Press.
Sheehy, Daniel. (1999). Popular Mexican Musical Traditions: The Mariachi of West Mexico and the Conjunto Jarocho of Vera Cruz. In J.M. Schechtor (Ed.), Music in Latin American Culture. (pp. 131-154). New York: Schirmer Books.
Sheehy, Daniel E. (2006). Mariachi Music in America: Experiencing Music, Expressing Culture. New York: Oxford University Press.
Torres-Ramos, José Raul. (2011). Mariachi: An Invented Tradition. (Unpublished master’s paper). University of Texas San Antonio, San Antonio, TX.
Tucson International Mariachi Conference. (2004). Student Booklet. Tucson, AZ.
Notes
1. Rodríguez, (2010).
2. The MENC National Advisory Committee on Mariachi was formed in 2006 as a result of an MENC Summit on Mariachi held in 2004. The committee’s purpose is to work with mariachi proponents to widen the music’s exposure and foster support for common music education goals. Current members as of 2010, include Mack Ruíz, National Chair and professional musician with Mariachi Cobre; William Gradante, Ph.D., Immediate Past Chair and Mariachi Director, Forth Worth ISD; John Contreras, Mariachi Director, Tucson USD; Eric J. López, Ph.D., New Mexico State University, Wendy Imelda Martínez, Mariachi Director, Ysleta ISD; Alberto Rangel, Mariachi Director, Tucson USD; and José Raul Torres Ramos, Doctoral Student, Music Education, University of Houston.
3. A paradigm is a pattern or model.
4. Cancioneros literally are songbooks. Mariachi musicians use the term for a person who has a huge repertoire of memorized lyrics. This is an important skill held in high regard among the Working Mariachi musicians.
5. Talón is literally the heel of a shoe. In mariachi performance practice, talón refers to musicians soliciting song requests from patrons for a tip or fee, usually in a bar or restaurant venue. The practice plays a central role to the income generated by Working Mariachi groups. “Know their talón” refers to musicians experienced instrumentally and vocally in this particular style of working.
6. A charro is generally known as the Mexican version of a cowboy. Mariachi musicians are not charros; however, the musicians, in particular Mexican nationals, refer to themselves by this term.
7. The traje de charro literally means cowboy suit. It is the style of dress infused to the tradition resulting from the processes of commercialization. It has come to be the accepted costume dress of the modern mariachi. Due to its strong cultural and historical symbolism, the costume has reached global icon status as a visual representation of Mexicanidad (all things Mexican).
8. Nevin, (2002).
9. Entrada literally means entrance. Among Working Mariachi musicians it refers to the start of a work shift varying over multiple consequential or respective hours.
10. The Encuentro Internacional de Mariachi y Charrería is an approximately two-week long Mariachi Festival and Conference held each September in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico.
11. The Jalisco Philharmonic Orchestra
12. This percentage is my own estimate.
13. El arte de seguir means the “art of following.”
14. The fourth wall is the imaginary “wall” at the front of the stage in a traditional three-walled box set in a proscenium theatre, through which the audience sees the action in the world of the play, creating an imaginary boundary between any fictional work and its audience. Speaking directly to or otherwise acknowledging the audience through the camera in a film or television program, or through this imaginary wall in a play, is referred to as “breaking the fourth wall” and is considered a technique of Meta fiction, as it deconstructs the boundaries normally set up by works of fiction.
15. Chambas literally means a job(s) and/or gig(s) as referred to by musicians.
16. Taloneros refers to musicians who regularly work talón.
17. La Fonda in downtown Los Angeles was a restaurant previously owned by Nati Cano and until recently the home base of Mariachi Los Camperos. Cielito Lindo, a restaurant in South El Monte, CA, is the base of operations for Mariachi Sol de Mexico de José L. Hernández. San Miguel el Alto is a town in Jalisco, Mexico, and used randomly to emphasize a point.
18. Bajón literally means down beat. Remate literally means to top or end. In mariachi it is a musical phrase played to end a song, connect longer phrases or verses, and at the end of an introduction. Sobón is slur technique used primarily in sones, and regularly in the ranchera romántica, valseada, and the bolero. Caballito literally means little horse. In mariachi it is a strumming technique used in Jalisco sones. Contratiempo literally means against time. In mariachi it is an eighth-note strumming pattern emphasizing down strums on the upbeat and up strums on the downbeat. Picado is a staccato bowing at the frog of the bow and the staccato tonguing technique for trumpets. “...la bola de términos mariacheros deberíamos de enseñar” means literally the ball (Spanish slang) of mariachi terms should be taught.