This month San Francisco will play host to Jaraneros from across the continent, whose music represents old and new takes on a sound with roots deeply embedded in Mexican history. The Mission’s own historic Brava Theater will be the setting for San Francisco’s first annual Son Jarocho Festival, starting Aug. 16.
Son Jarocho is an Afro-Mestizo musical tradition that has been passed down from generation to generation in Veracruz, Mexico for the past three centuries. According to many, it is the oldest style of music that Mexico calls its own.
The roots of this music are planted firmly in the tri-cultural heritage of Veracruz, which encompasses Indigenous, African and Spanish inheritances. Because of its proximity to the Caribbean Sea, Veracruz was a wealthy and important port for commerce and slave trade during the colonial era. This resulted in a strong African influence on the region’s cultural growth, not unlike many of the neighboring Caribbean islands. The Son Jarocho music is a testament to its diverse history.
Camilo Landau, producer of the San Francisco Son Jarocho Festival, says that the Bay Area has always had a community of people who would come out to enjoy Son Jarocho bands, but he dreamed of creating an event big enough to bring out people from all walks of the community.
“I’d like the traditional to be represented here, but also show some of the directions that this music has taken; its evolution here in the U.S.,” Landau said.
The lineup includes bands ranging from the traditional to the experimental. Los Cojolites will be traveling from Veracruz to represent the original music they were raised with. Sistema Bomb, a local Bay Area band, identifies as electro-Jarocho, while Quetzal, from East LA, is a rock band deeply steeped in Jarocho tradition.
But what is a regional style of music when recreated outside of its region? Filmmakers Marco Villalobos and Daffodil Altan spent over a year living in Southeast Veracruz bearing witness to the effects of modern influences on Jarocho music.
Their documentary “Beyond la Bamba (aka Son Siglos),” a work in progress that will be presented at the festival, follows the stories of “three young Afro-Mestizos descendants of Son Jarocho, as they balance their modern desires with their conviction to preserve and elevate their culture on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border.”
According to Villalobos, the theater is a relatively new setting for the traditional Jaraneros. “Son Jarocho happens wherever there is a tarima [platform for the dancer]. A Fandango is a community coming together around the heartbeat of its people. He explained, “Before, you picked up a jarana [the instrument used] at a Fandango and listened and learned until you’d eventually become part of your family’s group … It’s a truly inter-generational experience.”
“When this music is re-interpreted by city people, what comes out is standard music, whereas what matters is the organic element itself,” Villalobos said. “The nuances, the shifting accents while telling these stories is what counts. You can hear in it a graceful roundness, a sense of spontaneity. City music is more technical and square.”
Because of this distinction, many Jaraneros from Veracruz consider themselves purists and reject more modern interpretations of their songs.
But Landau is one of the many who believe that these new rock-infused styles represent the natural progression that music takes as the environment surrounding it shifts with time.
“Yes, it is a very traditional music, but it’s quite possible that the music itself formed from a fusion of different cultures… and this [new music] is just another iterance of that,” he said. “Chicanos and Mexican Americans in Los Angeles are playing the music that stems out of their own mixed-cultural surroundings.”
However, most listeners in the U.S. lack the context in which to place these new bands. One of the concerns highlighted in the film “Beyond La Bamba” is that the music being played in Veracruz will either stay there or be transformed.
“What’s happening to their music as it becomes more popular and appropriated in other places is in some ways positive because it shows how a sensation so rural and specific can also be universal…” said Altan. “What we’re trying to do with this documentary is let them tell their own story through their music so that people know where it comes from. We’re not the ones telling the story; it’s not ours to tell.”
But for the musicians themselves, no matter the region, history is not to be taken lightly. Members of the band Quetzal studied in Veracruz with masters of Jarocho and their jaranas are from there. The Jaranera families of Veracruz are often the ones to make their own instruments, and they teach their children to do so as well. “So many of these people, aside from being musicians, are luthiers as well,” Landau said.
“Even if you didn’t make your own jarana,” Villalobos pointed out, “You know who made it. The width of the body, the shape of the bridge … are all stamps of certain Jaranera families.”
One thing that is certain is that the best way to understand these traditions is to watch them play out in person.
“During the Fandangos, people will improvise new verses and add on parts of the story to the well-known songs. There’s improvisation and playfulness that happens there that is really unique,” said Landau.
This festival should appeal to a much wider audience than those already familiar with Son Jarocho traditions, Villalobos said. “Those who understand Spanish will hear poetry, those who don’t will feel it.”
For more information about the festival, visit http://www.SFSJF.com
To donate to the Kickstarter campaign, visit: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/383880200/san-francisco-son-jarocho-festival
For more information about the film, visit http://www.flywitnessfilms.com