MEXICO: Mexico folk supergroup gives master class for next generation of mariachis

Record ID: 190380

  • Title: MEXICO: Mexico folk supergroup gives master class for next generation of mariachis
  • Date: 29th November 2013
  • Summary: MEXICO CITY, MEXICO (NOVEMBER 28, 2013) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF MARIACHIS PERFORMING AUDIENCE APPLAUDING VARIOUS OF MARIACHI PERFORMANCE
  • Embargoed: 14th December 2013 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Mexico
  • Country: Mexico
  • Topics: Arts
  • Reuters ID: LVA9TMN4AUZCO7RC3R4XZMGDPBIC
  • Story Text: One of Mexico's oldest and most famous mariachi ensembles delighted students in Mexico City's newly-inaugurated mariachi school on Thursday (November 27), imparting decades of experience on a new generation of musicians for Mexico's UNESCO-listed folk music.
    Members of Vargas de Tecalitlan put students of the "Ollin Yoliztli" Mariachi School in Plaza Garibaldi through their paces, with master classes that included violin, trumpet, vihuela, harp and other traditional mariachi instruments -- including, of course, the guitar.
    The Vargas de Tecalitlan ensemble was originally founded in 1898 and the group have appeared in hundreds of films and performed alongside Mexican greats such as Luis Miguel.
    With an estimated 100 years of cumulative mariachi experience in their ensemble, Vargas de Tecalitlan are now giving back to Mexico's rich mariachi music scene.

    "What we the Mariachi Vargas are doing is supporting our colleagues who now have the opportunity to study at another higher level then we did. So it is something that should be welcomed," said band member, Federico Torres.
    Having performed all over the world for the past 115 years, Vargas de Tecalitlan's musical expertise is a coup for one of Mexico's newest mariachi schools.

    "They (Vargas de Tacalitlan) are an institution, with their recordings, their performance, they have taught mariachi music in another setting and now they are here in the Mariachi School, in a formal space, monitoring the passing down of the musical education of the mariachis," said teacher at the mariachi school, Leticia Soto.
    Students are taught the history of mariachi music, theory, technique and repertoire during a three-year academic study course at the school, graduating as a professional technicians in musical education.
    As well as training musicians, the academy also hopes to serve as a documentation centre for the rescue and preservation of antique mariachi music records and recordings, including themes which are no longer popular, but are richly musical.
    Mariachi student Abigail Espinosa said it was important that high-calibre performers such as Vargas de Tacalitlan support the next generation of mariachis.

    "It's important that this calibre of Mariachi people come because it is a great motivation for us, makes you think big, and feel that you can go further than you thought you could reach," she said.
    In 2011, the U.N educational and cultural agency, UNESCO, added mariachi music to its intangible cultural heritage list. Even if more modern Mexican musical genres have surpassed mariachi in popularity on its native soil, the form-fitting suits and wide-brimmed sombreros unique to the mariachis remain on show at Garibaldi, famous as the capital's home of mariachi.
    The thousands of tourists who visit Mexico City's Plaza Garibaldi -- where strolling bands with violins, trumpets and guitars are a feature of the streetscape -- each year, both local and foreign, have helped build a global audience for musicians.
    But many mariachi band members in the plaza have no professional training - and their lack of musicianship can sometimes be a little hard on the ear of captive tourists. The school hopes to change that and make Mexico once again the king of the mariachis.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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