Conceptualizing Mariachi within Post Modern Music Education

Conceptualizing Mariachi as Postmodern Music Education José R. Torres-Ramos, PhD Student University of North Texas Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 2 Conceptualizing Mariachi as Postmodern Music Education Abstract Since the mid-1970s, formal mariachi learning through ensemble performance was initiated in universities and more recently public schools. Today the popularity of scholastic mariachi ensembles challenges a long history of modernism in music education. The positioning of mariachi ensembles in formal music instructional settings, can be framed as a Postmodern shift from traditional forms of music teaching. However, modernist practices within music education, most evident in western schools and universities, permeate persistent narratives that resist change and enforce the status quo. Mariachi’s traditional forms of transmission and performance practice are altered, as formal curriculums shift it from an oral tradition to written, marginalizing its defining socio-cultural, historical, and musical constructs, to conform with the dominant paradigm. This paper examines the development and challenges of formalized mariachi instruction conceptualized as postmodern music education. The politics of education, cultural representation, authenticity, are discussed within the binary position of modern/post modern thought. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 3 Introduction Mariachi is one of the many traditional folk music styles in Mexico, and has become a symbol of regional and national identity. Over the last twenty years, mariachi as an expressive music has risen as a symbol of Latino cultural identity and Mexican nationalism in the United States. This popularity has given rise to the establishment of mariachi ensembles within many university and secondary school music programs in the US. Mariachi learning in formalized settings parallels the growing interest in the last fifty years for alternative instrumental ensembles in public schools, which can be attributed in no small part to the major shifts in the cultural demographic make-up of the US and the burgeoning research in ethnomusicology.1 The use of mariachi ensembles for music education creates a space where competing ideologies and cultural narratives intersect drawing attention to the politics of cultural representation, ownership and authenticity. This intersection suggests an inconsistency in music education represented by a long history of modernist influence. “Modernist practices have permeated music education by means of strictly controlled pedagogical systems and ordered curricula reinforcing the dominance of a Western European Music Canon, resulting in the exclusion of ‘other’ music and community participation within the sphere of music learning.”2 This paper conceptualizes formal mariachi instruction through scholastic ensembles, as a Postmodern approach to music education. The analysis includes a discussion of conflicting metanarratives within modernist approaches to music learning and cultural acquisition contrasted by postmodern theory. Implications will be presented for contextualizing the study of mariachi including considerations for the socio-cultural aspects of learning. Utilizing a rich literature of research on modernist/postmodernist narratives within music education, I also draw upon my 1 2 Bernadette Colley, “Educating Teachers to Transform the Trilogy,” Journal of Music Teacher Education 19, no. 1 (2009): 56–67. David Lines, “Music Education, Modernism and Public Music Pedagogy,” (paper presented at the Music Education SIG, American Educational Research Association Conference, New York, March, 2008), para. 1. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 4 own experiences as a student, musician, teacher and practitioner of the mariachi tradition for the past 25 years both at the secondary and collegiate level. The goal of this paper is to bring awareness of a growing trend towards culturally responsive music teaching in order to further develop the formal study of mariachi learning and performance. Mariachi Scholarship Ethnomusicology and anthropology have produced the most extensive research on the mariachi tradition. Descriptive ethnographies, oral interviews and archival research have examined performance practices, transmission, historical development, instrumentation, and socio-cultural identity. Mark Fogelquist provided one of the first analyses in English, examining the manners of work, ambiance, and transmission framing the study around the musical characteristics of the son jaliscience,3 commonly accepted as the definitive song style.4 Steven Ray Pearlman did an excellent ethnography exploring the social relationships among mariachi groups in Los Angeles and the corollary socio-cultural and economic issues including song style, musical performance structure and content in performance.5 Candida Jácquez examined musical performance as a mode of cultural communication with multiple layers of social meaning, and how musical expression actively reflects the social engagement of Mexican descent communities, specifically within urban U.S. contexts.6 Donald Henriques analyzed the development of mariachi as an ensemble and a repertory between 1920 and 1942 with particular attention to relationships with the Mexican and U.S. radio, recording and film industries.7 Jesús Jauregui wrote one of the most comprehensive historical monographs to date, on the 3 4 5 6 A regional folk song type indigenous to the state of Jalisco Mark S.Fogelquist, “Rhythm and Form in the Contemporary Son Jaliscience.” (master’s thesis, University of California, Los Angeles, 1975). Steven Ray Pearlman, “Mariachi Music in Los Angeles,” PhD diss. University of California, Los Angeles, 1988. Candida F. Jacquez, “Cantando de Ayer (singing of yesterday): Performing History, Ethnic Identity, and Traditionalism in U.S. Based Urban Mariachi”. PhD diss., University of Michigan, 2000. 7 Donald Andrew Henriques, “Performing Nationalism: Mariachi, Media and the Transformation of a Tradition (1920-1942).” PhD diss. University of Texas at Austin, 2006. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 5 development of mariachi from the early 1850s to present, filled with photographs, archival documents, and illustrations offering comprehensive analysis of mariachi and its development from rural regional music to global icon.8 Mary-Lee Mulholland presented a sociological study illustrating the ways in which mariachi performance entangles with representations of gender, sexuality, race, region, and class producing a conceptualization of the Mexican ideal.9 Daniel Sheehy formulated a concise introduction into the world of mariachi music, using case studies of instrument makers, interviews with legendary musicians and briefly describing the historical development of mariachi in Mexico and its migration into United States culture.10 Russell Rodríguez illustrated the transformations of mariachi performance practice and transmission in new performance spaces in schools, universities and cultural centers, as a consequence of transnational migration.11 Lauryn Salazar, through archival and field-based research, examined early antecedents of mariachi music in California, the innovation of festivals, publishing, and education programs in the US, extrapolating their impact on the tradition as a whole.12 Rodríguez and Salazar’s work respectively, represents the strongest efforts to critically examine mariachi learning in the US, albeit from the area of ethnomusicology. Within the field of music education only four research studies with an explicit focus on mariachi instruction have been reported. Sylvia Clark presented a descriptive study of mariachi affirming its symbolism of Mexican culture in the US, citing language as a contributing factor.13 “The growing Hispanic population and the use of Spanish as the second most popular language in the United States seem to ensure 8 9 Jesús Jáuregui, El Mariachi: Símbolo Musical de México. Mexico City: Santillana, 2007. Mary-Lee Mulholland, “Excessive Mariachi: Performing Race, Sexuality and Regionalism in Jalisco, Mexico,” PhD diss. York University, 2007. 10 Daniel E. Sheehy, Mariachi music in America: Experiencing Music, Expressing Culture. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006. 11 Russell C. Rodríguez, “Cultural Production, Legitimation, and the Politics of Aesthetics: Mariachi Transmission, Practice, and Performance in the United States,” PhD diss. University of California Santa Cruz, 2006. 12 Lauryn Camille Salazar, “From Fiesta to Festival: Mariachi Music in California and the Southwestern United States,” (PhD diss. University of California Los Angeles, 2011). 13 Sylvia Clark, “Mariachi Music as a Symbol of Mexican Culture in the Unites States,” International Journal of Music Education 23, (2005): 227-237. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 6 that mariachi music will continue to become more important throughout the country …”14 She concluded that the establishment of mariachi programs in secondary schools indicated that ethnic music occupies an increasingly significant role in music education. Angela Morgan-Thornton similarly conducted a descriptive study on mariachi programs in the Southwestern United States, through interviews in order to extract content knowledge and report on status from the field.15 Carlos Abril completed a case study of one teacher’s use of mariachi as way to reach to Latino students.16 The study draws attention to the intersection of cultural politics of authenticity, ownership and transnationalism in the music classroom. One of the central issues is student resistance to acceptance of a “white” teacher, who did not speak Spanish, teaching a Mexican music tradition symbolic of ethnic and cultural identity. The most significant study from music education to date was reported by William Ricketts.17 The study gathered data on the status of mariachi programs analyzing pedagogical practices, content knowledge bases, and specific skill sets of selected mariachi instructors in K12 schools in Texas in order to ascertain the important determinants of effective mariachi instruction. All though the expanding body of literature represents a growing interest in mariachi scholarship within the academy, more is needed in light of the growth of US scholastic mariachi ensembles. This growing US mariachi tradition provokes conflicting narratives and inconsistencies within music education historically influenced by modernist tendencies. Historical Overview of Modernism 14 15 Clark, “Mariachi Music as a Symbol,” 235. Angela Michelle Morgan-Thornton, “A Study of Selected High School Mariachi Programs in the Southwest,” (master’s thesis, New Mexico State University, 2003). 16 Carlos R. Abril, “Responding to Culture in the Instrumental Music Programme: A Teacher’s Journey,” Music Education Research 11, no.1 (2009): 77-91. 17 William Kenneth Ricketts, “Mariachi as a Music Education Genre: A Study of Program Status, Pedagogical Practices, and Activities,” (PhD diss. Boston University, Boston, 2013). Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 7 Modernity, naming the period of history as well as its underlying belief-system, traces its origins back to the 18th Century European Enlightenment, maturing toward the end of the 19th century.18 The aims of modernity were “to develop objective science, universal morality and law, and autonomous art, according to their inner logic or internal structure.”19 Through the growth of secularism motivated by an omnipotent faith in science and industrialization, the leaders of Enlightenment set out to ‘modernize’ the world boosting productivity, prosperity, and social life through research and means-ends forms of organization. Modernization and its guiding belief system (modernity) increased Western productivity enormously, while dehumanizing employees through strict standardization of tasks, suppression of individual initiative, responsibility, strict supervision, long hours and rigorous production monitoring.20 Modernism was an aesthetic philosophical response to more traditional, classical and authoritarian forms of thinking, including the arts.21 Western art music in the 20th century embodied this philosophy by breaking with past musical conventions. The most recognized leader of this movement was Carl Schoenberg, who used atonality and Serialism to break with the previous conventions used during the Classical and Romantic periods.22 “The characteristic of a discipline to criticize itself ‘not in order to subvert it, but to entrench it more firmly in its area of competence’, sums up the modernist tendency to view fields of knowledge as linear progress, along with the promotion of the original and innovative.”23 Modernism was a reaction to the dichotomous tension between autonomy, referring to music in a complete self-contained system (formalism) and contingency, 18 19 20 21 22 23 Krishan Kumar, From Post-Industrial to Post-Modern Society. Oxford: Blackwell, 1995. David Harvey, The Condition of Postmodernity. Oxford: Blackwell, 1989, 9. David J. Elliott, Modernity, “Postmodernity and Music Education Philosophy,” Research Studies in Music Education 17, (2001): 32-41. Lines, “Music Education, Modernism,” para. 1. Ibid. Ibid. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 8 the embedding of forms of music within cultural, political or ideological contexts.24 David J. Elliott discusses how Western mass education through public schooling is a cornerstone of modernity and the modern nation state.25 “On one hand, schools and universities make cultural capital and economic success accessible and achievable for many. On the other hand, the public tends to assume that it is natural to educate all children in factory-like settings based on modernity’s worship of scientific-industrial constructs. These constructs include curricular ‘objectives’, standardized curricula, standardized achievement tests, teacher-centered methods, restricted instructional time and age-segregated or ability-segregated classes.”26 Many institutions of mass education mimic modernist bureaucratic institutions where standardization, centralization, mass production and mass consumption are the norm.27 During the Romantic period, the music of Richard Wagner represented the rise of cultural nationalism in Germany. Wagner explored the mix of cultural narratives, in contrast to the logical forms created by Hadyn and Mozart. His music can be viewed as modernist, informed by progressive and nationalist narratives.28 Ironically as Wagner’s compositions continued the move away from tonality, 20th century modernist composers led by Schoenberg and the Vienna school 24 25 Ibid. David, J. Elliott, “Philosophical Perspectives on Research,” in The New Handbook of Research on Music Teaching and Learning: A Project of the Music Educator’s National Conference, ed. Richard Colwell and Carol Richardson. (Oxford University Press, 2001), 85-104. 26 Ibid. 27 Andy Hargreaves, Changing Teachers, Changing Times: Teacher’s Work and Culture in the Postmodern Age. (New York: Teachers College Press, 1994). 28 Ibid. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 9 rejected his legacy. “Wagner’s immense popularity was seen as somewhat representing the aesthetic blandness of an increasing phenomenon of mass culture, and music was becoming perceived as trapped in the predetermined illustrative expectations of that audience.”29 Therefore as a consequence to music’s increasing popularity through commercial commodification, modernists became more elite and detached from the musical interests of the masses.30 Leading to a separation of classical music from mainstream popular music during the 20th century, “This detachment is still noticeable today and is played out in the differences between high-art music conservatoriums and general music education in state schools.”31 Music education tends to marginalize “other” musics by creating a means of institutional gatekeeping that encourages university teacher preparation programs and consequently their graduates, to continue to conceive and perpetrate practices that alienate the public.32 Thus self-perpetuated modernism influence continues preserving a musical canon of hierarchical repertoire encompassing a tradition emphasized by the evolution of a higher form of art33 and emphasizes the production of contemporary art-music marginalizing or excluding popular and commercial forms of music.34 Ironically 20th century modern music broke with classical conventions, however the two are joined through a promotion of elitism and ideological exclusion of contradictory music forms.35 Other music forms outside the influence of modernist views, including jazz, popular musicals, commercial rock, and Hollywood film music, appeared 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 Lines, “Music Education, Modernism,” para. 2. Ibid. Ibid, para. 5. Ibid. Bruno Nettl, Heartland Excursions: Ethnomusicological Reflections on Schools of Music. (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1995). Lines, “Music Education, Modernism,” para. 5. Ibid. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 10 anticipating the later emergence of interest in ethnic music,36 foreshadowing the popularity of mariachi. Postmodernist theory in music attempts to re-incorporate these marginalized music forms into accepted music learning. Postmodern Thought in Music Postmodernist theory in the arts, is openly interpreted.as the historical epoch, or that which followed modernism and secondly, the style which is an aesthetic response to modernism.37 “Postmodern musicology emerged in the 1980s from the thought that a ‘paradigm shift’38 was required in music due to a modernist ‘theoretical impasse’39 in the field.”40 Scott identifies eight main themes guiding postmodern musicology: (1) a concern with social, historical and political processes that inform music, (2) a concern with critical theory and musical hermeneutics, (3) an avoidance of modernist teleological assumptions of historical narratives, (e g the inevitability of atonality), (4) a readiness to engage in problematic issues of marginalization (eg issues of gender in music), subject positions and universality, (5) a readiness to contest the binary divide between classical and popular musics, (6) a readiness to study the music of different cultures and of extending such understandings beyond explicit cultural self-evaluation, (7) a readiness to consider that meanings are inter-textual and to examine a broad range 36 37 38 Ibid. Ibid, para. 5. Derek, Scott, “Postmodernism and Music,” in The Routledge Companion to Postmodernism, ed. Stuart Sim, (New York: Routledge, 2001), 134. 39 Ibid. 40 Lines, “Music Education, Modernism,” para. 11. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 11 of discourses to explain music, and (8) a readiness to respond to the multiplicity of music’s contemporary functions (eg mixed media).”41 Historically, music education is concerned with qualifying music and determining what is worthy of academic study. Postmodernism seeks new ways to understand music in order to teach music learning. The growing popularity of mariachi in secondary institutions and universities creates a catalyst for analysis and awareness. Historical and Socio-Cultural Performance Contexts An analysis of the etymology of the word mariachi places its origins in Central Mexico beginning around the middle of the 19th century, however its contemporary sphere of influence covers half the country to the west extending from the northernmost border of Sonora all the way down to the southern tip of Oaxaca.42 As Figure 1 shows, its highest area of activity andinfluence covers the regions composing Jalisco, Michocan, Nayarit, and Colima.43 Written accounts point to various regional instrumental folk ensembles that called themselves mariachi, each with both common and distinctive instrumentation. Music making was collective, informal, and generationally passed down through oral transmission. However, what was called mariachi during the 19th century vaguely resembled the romantic image of the singing cowboy created in the Mexican cinema nearly eighty years later. The contemporary image of mariachi was created and manufactured as part of a large-scale effort by the government for nation building and creating a legitimizing continuity with Mexico’s past to create a collective history and identity. It 41 42 43 Scott, “Postmodernism and Music,” 145-6. Jesús Jáuregui, El Mariachi: Símbolo Musical de México, (Mexico City: Santillana, 2007). Ibid. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 12 Figure 1 Regional mariachi activity in Mexico.44 was later institutionalized within the collective consciousness through Mexico’s golden age of radio and cinema. This commercialized image, strongly characterized by both visual and musical imagery, has been reconstructed within the US consciousness reflecting Mexican and Latino American sensibilities. “Mariachi has to be understood as a transnational product, which moves back and forth across the US-Mexico border, with or without a visa, as recordings, traditions, practices, and as people.”45 As such, the forms of transmission and performance practice have also become salient especially with its introduction to new spaces, although there is a common visual and musical aesthetic commonly performed by most mariachi musicians. 44 45 Ibid. Rodríguez, Cultural Production, Legitimation, 32. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 13 Although there is growing body literature for teaching mariachi, many are grounded in a Western art aesthetic that inadvertently reinforces modernist conceptual models.46 Developing a comprehensive approach to teaching mariachi requires understanding its traditional forms of transmission, the range of performance practices, and the socio-cultural aesthetics that clearly differentiate its pedagogy from that of the “trilogy of band, orchestra and choir …”47 Rodríguez summarizes the impetus for understanding: “Mariachi music is a cultural expression that historically has been reified as a public display of performative aesthetics that included music, song and dance in which both women and men participated with specific roles of dancers and musicians, respectively, in Mexico. With the commodification of this expression it had become framed as a performative expression practiced solely by Mexicano working-class males in Mexico and later in the United States …Today, mariachi has to be reframed to make sense of the participation of people that do not signify the Mexicano working-class male, or the ‘traditional’ practitioners.’”48 One way of contextualizing pedagogy for mariachi is through an analysis of the varying performance contexts utilized by mariachi musicians. Pearlman states that the differences in mariachi performance, “are primarily context dependent and in fact the interaction of all features of mariachi performance … delineate a continuum of performance styles, centering around three nodes … regarded as substyles [sic] of mariachi performance, and are referred to by mariachis as 46 See the following literature on teaching mariachi, James Gordon Bennett Jr., “A Guide for the Performance of Trumpet Mariachi Music in Schools.” (PhD diss. University of North Texas, 1979); William Gradante, ed. Foundations of Mariachi Education. (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Education; Published in partnership with MENC, 2008); Patricia W. Harpole, “Curricular Applications of Hispanic Music in the Southwestern United States.” (PhD diss., University of California, Los Angeles, 1980); Jeff Nevin, The Virtuoso Mariachi. (Maryland: University Press of America, 2002). 47 Bernadette Colley, “Educating Teachers to Transform the Trilogy,” Journal of Music Teacher Education 19, no. 1 (2009): 57. 48 Rodríguez, “Cultural Production, Legitimation”, 30. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 14 al talón, planta (and chamba), and ‘show.’”49 In mariachi performance practice, al 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. Planta refers to a regular standing performance venue usually a restaurant or bar. The style of work may be al talón or the restaurant may pay the group to provide entertainment at no cost to the clientele. There also may be a combination of base pay provided by the restaurant to the mariachi, supplemented by income generated al talón. Chamba literally means a job and/or gig as used in musician and vocational labor vernacular. Chambas are performances paid at a negotiated fee usually based on a minimum hourly rate, guaranteeing amount of compensation for each musician. Each one of these sub-styles as characterized by Pearlman, contains distinct and overlapping musical and cultural expectations by both the musician and audience participants. In the 25 years since Pearlman’s research was conducted, mariachi has proliferated throughout the US, entering new performance spaces and creating a “diversification of mariachi practitioners in terms of gender, ethnicity, and class.”50 This has resulted in a newer generation of mariachi musicians with more formal training and sensibilities. Many researchers have categorized performance context in regards to the physical spaces where mariachi groups perform. Rodríguez categorizes 3 types of mariachi ensemble – the working, show and school mariachi.51 A common characteristic and more pragmatic approach for curricular purposes would be to delineate context through the active or passive participation of the audience in determining repertoire to be performed by a particular ensemble. The audience-driven-repertoire context has 49 50 51 Pearlman, “Mariachi Music,” 244. Rodríguez, “Cultural Production, Legitimation”, 1. Ibid. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 15 historically influenced mariachi-working practice and performance space. This can be best categorized as the “al talón” or “show” approach to performance. The al talón context of performance utilizes “a repertoire established through audience requests.”52 The ability of the mariachi to successfully navigate requests by clients dominates the socio-cultural and musical aspects of this performance context. In short, working mariachi groups have a vast repertoire that is not formally rehearsed and whose performance is not influenced by technical virtuosity. Working mariachi ensembles utilize standardized arrangements of popular songs in order to meet consumer needs, while simultaneously continuing to acquire new repertoire to satisfy the saliency of popular music fashion. As Pearlman describes: “Customer satisfaction is maintained in part by the ability to perform all songs requested, in part by the personal attention given them by the ensemble. Even when a song is requested that is not universally known, or which has no model or standard arrangement, the use of formulaic structures enables performance as long as one of the musicians knows the lyrics.”53 The al talón context usually occurs in a restaurant venue where the mariachi works under an agreement to play for patrons. However, most traditional groups usually consisting of Mexican born musicians work specifically in an audience-driven-repertoire context, regardless of the physical space, hence, my reductionism. The al talón performance context requires a different set of music skills, not emphasized in traditional Western ways of learning music, including ear playing, improvisation and transposition. The majority of mariachi groups both in Mexico and 52 53 Ibid, 30. Pearlman, “Mariachi Music,” 248. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 16 the United States perform some variant of this al talón context. This draws attention to the expectations of consumers of mariachi music, particularly among Mexicans and first generation immigrant populations. The socio-cultural aspects of this performance context, including the music skill-set utilized, is very often overlooked in formal classroom mariachi instruction by teachers trained under the Western aesthetic in music education, many of whom have very little experience or understanding of this framework. This oversight fuels a larger critique of formal mariachi instruction by traditional professional practitioners who feel that the repertoire driven context is the true representation of the art form and as such, should be a central focus of formal classroom curriculum. Further complicating this issue, are the institutional bureaucracy of school administrators and music teachers from the “trilogy” who, both unintentionally but in most cases intentionally, undermine any teaching approach that violates the status quo in order to reinforce the Western view of music learning. In contrast the “show” mariachi is more indicative of the Western ideal performance context usually positioned within the setting of a concert hall or theater evoking the more subdued aesthetic. As with a classical music performance, the audience is passive and the mariachi is given liberty to play repertoire of their own choosing rather than taking requests. The performance focuses on more technical and virtuosic “show” pieces. Because the show mariachi is not bound by active audience participation, musicians in this sub-style have a smaller repertoire developing technical instrumental and vocal virtuosity, both as individuals and as an ensemble. Show groups tend to perform more “specialty and novelty arrangements” showcasing the musical strengths of the musicians. Correspondingly, a musical arranger, usually a musician within the ensemble, creates written arrangements, and in some cases original compositions, elevating the perceived prestige and legitimacy of a particular mariachi creating an elitist Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 17 hierarchy not common among working groups, but representative of the modernist metanarratives in Western music culture. The use of elaborate written arrangements also shifts the traditional mode of transmission from oral to written. As I have argued, performance context is not limited to physical space. A show mariachi, in addition to formal theater and concert hall venues, performs in all types of settings from backyard parties to weddings and quinceañeras.54 What makes the “show”, so to speak, is the subdued and passive audience consuming a performance that focuses on a high level of technical music skills and is dramatically more entertaining. That is not to say that the audience is totally passive. There may be requests from the audience, but the show mariachi is assumes no serious obligation to satisfy the expectation. While on the other hand, the working mariachi has a very tenuous relationship with the client where performance impetus is driven by audience requests, and cultural expectation. Failure to navigate this expectation can result in a loss of clientele and a de-valuing of professional credibility. The al talón mariachi rarely performs in a theater, however they still approach the performance aesthetic from the perspective of audience determined repertoire. This is true even if the group is being hired on a flat fee per hour versus by the song request. The defining characteristic of this group is the audience determination of repertoire. A deeper understanding of the practical complexities of mariachi performance and the inherent musical skills needed to navigate the variable contexts is gained by looking at the differences between performance contexts. Teaching mariachi requires a music teacher who can be “culturally responsive … to find the ideal balance between the musical and socio-cultural dimensions of teaching.”55 Teaching Mariachi: Conflicting Narratives In Mexico, mariachi ensembles are predominantly vocational. One learns to perform in a 54 55 The traditional celebration in many Latino cultures of young woman’s 15th birthday considered her entrance to young adulthood. Abril, “Responding to Culture,” 89. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 18 mariachi in the same way one might learn a trade such as plumbing or carpentry. As such the majority of mariachi ensembles are groups working in the al talón context. Learning to sing or play an instrument is still through a “musical skills/concept,”56 however it is closely tied to the socio-cultural context of repertoire knowledge. The emphasis is not always on developing technical mastery, but on developing sufficient competency, to contribute to the collective musical goals, both instrumentally and vocally. In many cases, a musician will be more competent in one or the other. Violinists and trumpeters are expected to maintain a familiarity and competence with more than one melodic part, allowing for interchange when substitute and/or pick-up musicians are needed. Additionally musicians will pick-up a secondary instrument within the ensemble. If you play in the armonía57 section, it is almost a certainty that you will have some facility with one or more these instruments. Learning another instrument is based on practicality, as a result of the performance context. Because the ensemble is small, any absence by a group member may have an adverse effect on the group’s ability to work, particularly when group members rely on a collective vocal repertoire maximizing the ability to take requests. Ear playing and memorization are the foundational skills for mariachi performance. Transposition skills and improvisation of “formulaic structures” are essential to meet the expectations of the al talon context. A comprehensive study of all the musical, cultural and socio-economic complexities of this style of work, is beyond the scope of this paper, suffice to say that the typical majority of traditional working class Mexicanos performing mariachi possess this socio-cultural orientation. The number of consumers of mariachi music with a similar context-orientation is significant both in Mexico and the US, although smaller. Learning and transmitting mariachi music in a working context relies heavily on a musician’s ability to 56 57 Ibid, 89. The armonía encompasses specifically the vihuela and guitar players, however in certain contexts includes the guitarrón and harp as well. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 19 acquire and use skills normally marginalized in traditional Western music education. “Broadly conceived, European-driven music making and musical training (especially in school environments) tends to emphasize analytical symbolic decoding of notation as its primary ultimate goal, whereas music traditions from other parts of the world allow for “aurality,” “orality,” and kinesthesia to predominate musical skill transmission.”58 US Mariachi instruction, particularly in Texas, teaches mariachi from a Western orientation. The highest concentration of mariachi activity in secondary schools in Texas is located in the Rio Grande Valley, San Antonio, El Paso, and the Dallas/Fort Worth metro area. Houston, which has the third largest population of Hispanics in the United States, has a large professional market of mariachi musicians, however the development student ensembles has been limited to a handful of schools. Austin, Corpus Christi, Laredo, Del Rio, San Angelo, and Odessa have mariachi student ensembles in a few schools. Among institutions of higher education, The University of Texas system offers mariachi as a university sponsored ensemble on four of their campuses, Austin San Antonio, Brownsville, and Pan American. Texas A & M offers mariachi in College Station, San Antonio and Kingsville. The University of North Texas, Texas Tech, Texas State and Our Lady of the Lake University offer mariachi ensemble courses as well, not to mention the community colleges including Alamo, Del Mar, and Southwest Texas Jr. College in Uvalde. Most mariachi ensemble courses do not count for credit towards a music degree or teaching certification. Texas State and Our Lady of the Lake University are exceptions, both offering music degrees with specializations in mariachi. However, full-time tenure-track faculty with scholarly experience in mariachi, do not teach the courses. Many mariachi teachers are not formally certified or even posses a post-secondary 58 Colley, “Educating Teachers,” 63. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 20 degree. However, a majority of Texas mariachi teachers are certified through music education programs, that “as gatekeepers to the profession … generally reserve admittance to students whose training in Western art music qualifies them to continue such pursuits.”59 “Given that music teacher education programs by and large still reside in (or operate in partnership with) schools of music modeled after the 19th-century European conservatory,”60 pre-service teachers do not receive a “culturally based”61 orientation to teaching music. As such, the performance context to teach mariachi is that of the “show mariachi”. Students learn limited repertoire through written arrangements, focusing on “music skills/concepts”, and memorization through repetition. Playing by ear, improvisation, and transposition are generally not conceived as important. Curriculum for the most part centers on preparation for competitive events that recognize student achievement by rank order, (1st, 2nd or 3rd place) including awards for best violins, trumpets and/or vocals etc. The intensive focus on competition mimics the high stakes testing culture in the core areas of education and excludes the socio-cultural diversity of ethnic folk music. The modernist music hierarchy is re-imagined reinforcing ideas of elitism, marginalization and exclusion. The socio-cultural importance of mariachi performance context is ignored, with the show mariachi appropriated, at the exclusion of the working conext, to better align the Western philosophy of music education. The opportunity is lost for students to learn a more comprehensive understanding of culture and its role in music. The recently organized Texas Association of Music Educators (TAME) provides a case study within the movement to formalize mariachi instruction in Texas, highlighting a number of issues raised in this article. As an officer of the Executive Committee, I have observed that to 59 60 61 Abril, “Responding to Culture,” 88. Colley, “Educating Teachers,” 67 Abril, “Responding to Culture,” 89 Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 21 date the sole function of the organization is developing competitive events utilizing the Texas Music Educators Association (TMEA) and the University Interscholastic League (UIL) as an organizational model and path for credibility and legitimization within the existing state framework for music education. Discussions have included the creation of a Prescribed Music List, as is used by the University Interscholastic League (UIL) in order to standardize repertoire, presumably utilizing written notated arrangements, and establishing certified adjudicators, from the ranks of state certified music teachers who teach mariachi. While on the surface, these appear as sound and valid pursuits, they also reaffirm modernist hegemonic structures and ideology. The argument to assimilate to the existing paradigm for purposes of legitimization marginalizes and excludes the historical socio-cultural contexts of mariachi performance, framing it firmly within the Western tradition, reinforcing the modernist metanarratives of music education. Positioning mariachi ensembles in formal music learning environments provides an opportunity to develop and institute diverse teaching practices based “on aesthetic, educational, cultural, or artistic grounds.”62 This opportunity is missed when the curricular focus is on assimilation and achieving perceived legitimacy. Summary, Interpretation, and Implications Mariachi music in the last 25 years has risen in popularity in secondary schools, colleges and universities. “Although alternative ensemble practices are gaining currency in the field, teacher education programs – still driven by the National Association of Schools of Music (NASM) guidelines – are slow to respond to this growing trend among professionals in the field.”63 Formal mariachi instruction in US schools draws attention to the tension between modernist domination of music education and a postmodern philosophical paradigm shift. This 62 63 Colley, “Educating Teachers,” 57. Colley, “Educating Teachers,” 67 Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 22 includes teaching approaches that are culturally responsive. “Culturally responsive teaching is a concept that has brought awareness of the need for teachers to be sensitive and responsive to the cultures of their students.”64 Among mariachi teachers, issues of ownership, insider/outsider status, and cultural legitimacy further complicate many of these issues. As more and more mariachi students in secondary schools graduate, the need for updating university music programs becomes more and more apparent. Clements and Campbell found that some undergraduate music students felt a vast disconnection between what they were studying at the university (Western classical) and their other musical worlds (popular musics).65 Some undergraduates reported feeling tension and ‘outright hostility’ from professors when discussing their ‘other’ musical interests.66 An increasing population of pre-service teachers desiring to teach mariachi, or “other” music forms, may in some instances not receive the requisite orientation and training to be culturally responsive. Consequently, they may inadvertently reaffirm practices reflective of a modernist hegemony and a system of cultural appropriation, marginalization and exclusion within music education. Institutionalized mariachi instruction can be conceptualized as a Postmodern shift in paradigm for teaching music to a more diverse and inclusive cultural approach. From the vantage of mariachi pedagogy and further scholarship, formal instruction should include the “show mariachi”, but also a diversity performance spaces so that the socio-cultural references are not stripped from the tradition. Postmodern though informs a diverse view of the mariachi tradition in all its manifestations. Mariachi ensembles become an environment where tolerance, respect for diversity and de-stabilization of elitism and exclusion within the music discipline can be 64 65 Abril, “Responding to Culture,” 79. Ann C. Clements, and Patricia Shehan Campbell. "Rap, Rock, Race, and Rhythm: Music and More in a Methods Class." The Mountain Lake Reader (2006) 66 Ibid, 18. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 23 taught. The growing research on ethnicity, gender, and cultural identity enrich the complexities of how mariachi is transmitted in formal spaces. More research in this area is needed to further develop mariachi pedagogy. Analyzing and replicating music teaching and learning as it happens naturally is imperative particularly with the advent of music technology, production, and dissemination. A Postmodern music education will incorporate diverse ensembles with diverse approaches to music learning and knowing. Mariachi ensembles in the formal music program, provides the space for this continued development. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 24 Bibliography Abril, Carlos R., “Responding to Culture in the Instrumental Music Programme: A Teacher’s Journey,” Music Education Research 11, no.1 (2009): 77-91. Bennett, James Gordon Jr., “A Guide for the Performance of Trumpet Mariachi Music in Schools.” PhD diss. University of North Texas, 1979. Butler, Abby, Vicki R. Lind and Constance L. McKoy, “Equity and Access in Music Education: Conceptualizing Culture as Barriers to and Supports for Music Learning,” Music Education Research 9, no. 2 (2007): 241-253. Clark, Sylvia, “Mariachi Music as a Symbol of Mexican Culture in the Unites States,” International Journal of Music Education 23, (2005): 227-237. Clements, Ann C., and Patricia Shehan Campbell. "Rap, rock, race, and rhythm: Music and more in a methods class." The Mountain Lake Reader (2006): 16-22. Colley, Bernadette, “Educating Teachers to Transform the Trilogy,” Journal of Music Teacher Education 19, no. 1 (2009): 56–67. Elliott, David, J., “Modernity, Postmodernity and Music Education Philosophy,” Research Studies in Music Education 17, (2001): 32-41. Elliott, David, J., “Philosophical Perspectives on Research.” In The New Handbook of Research on Music Teaching and Learning: A Project of the Music Educator’s National Conference, edited by Richard Colwell and Carol Richardson, 85-104. Oxford University Press, 2001. Fogelquist, Mark. S., “Rhythm and Form in the Contemporary Son Jaliscience.” master’s thesis, University of California, Los Angeles, 1975. Gradante, William ed. Foundations of Mariachi Education. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 25 Education; Published in partnership with MENC, 2008. Harpole, Patricia W., “Curricular Applications of Hispanic Music in the Southwestern United States.” PhD diss., University of California, Los Angeles, 1980. Harvey, David, The Condition of Postmodernity. Oxford: Blackwell, 1989. Hargreaves, Andy, Changing Teachers, Changing Times: Teacher’s Work and Culture in the Postmodern Age. New York: Teachers College Press, 1994. Henriques, Donald Andrew, “Performing Nationalism: Mariachi, Media and the Transformation of a Tradition (1920-1942).” PhD diss. University of Texas at Austin, 2006. Lines, David, “Music Education, Modernism and Public Music Pedagogy,” Paper presented at the Music Education SIG, American Educational Research Association Conference, New York, March, 2008. Jacquez, Candida F., “Cantando de Ayer (singing of yesterday): Performing History, Ethnic Identity, and Traditionalism in U.S. Based Urban Mariachi”. PhD diss., University of Michigan, 2000. Jáuregui, Jesús, El Mariachi: Símbolo Musical de México. Mexico City: Santillana, 2007. Kumar, Krishan, From Post-Industrial to Post-Modern Society. Oxford: Blackwell, 1995. Miller, Ronald E., “Dismantling Student Competition,” Education Digest 60, no. 7 (1995): 4. Morgan-Thornton, Angela Michelle, “A Study of Selected High School Mariachi Programs in the Southwest,” Master’s thesis, New Mexico State University, 2003. Mulholland, Mary-Lee, “Excessive Mariachi: Performing Race, Sexuality and Regionalism in Jalisco, Mexico,” PhD diss. York University, 2007. Nettl, Bruno, Heartland Excursions: Ethnomusicological Reflections on Schools of Music. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1995. Conceptualizing Mariachi p. 26 Nevin, Jeff, The Virtuoso Mariachi. Maryland: University Press of America, 2002. Pearlman, Steven Ray, “Mariachi Music in Los Angeles,” PhD diss. University of California, Los Angeles, 1988. Ricketts, William Kenneth, “Mariachi as a Music Education Genre: A Study of Program Status, Pedagogical Practices, and Activities,” PhD diss. Boston University, Boston, 2013. Rodríguez, Russell C., “Cultural Production, Legitimation, and the Politics of Aesthetics: Mariachi Transmission, Practice, and Performance in the United States,” PhD diss. University of California Santa Cruz, 2006. Salazar, Lauryn Camille, “From Fiesta to Festival: Mariachi Music in California and the Southwestern United States,” PhD diss. University of California Los Angeles, 2011. Scott, Derek, “Postmodernism and Music,” In The Routledge Companion to Postmodernism, edited by. Stuart Sim, 134-146. New York: Routledge, 2001. Sheehy, Daniel E., Mariachi music in America: Experiencing Music, Expressing Culture. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006. Thompson, Kathy, “A Critical Discourse Analysis of World Music as the `Other' in Education,” Research Studies in Music Education 19, (2002):14-21.