Contents. List of Illustrations Acknowledgments

7KH,QHYLWDEOH%DQGVWDQG 7KH6WDWH%DQGRI2D[DFDDQGWKH3ROLWLFVRI6RXQG &KDUOHV9+HDWK &RS\ULJKWHGPDWHULDO Contents List of Illustrations ...
Author: Austin Wade
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Contents

List of Illustrations

ix

Acknowledgments

xi

Introduction

1

1. Closing the Colonial Past

12

2. Nineteenth-Century Invasions and Influences 23 3. Inception, Institutionalization, and Venue

34

4. The bme during the Porfiriato and the Mexican Revolution 56 5. Mestizaje, Musical Pedagogy, and the Socialist State 6. Municipal Control to Innes’s Reign

96

7. From Political Proselytizer to Economic Engine Conclusion: Gauging the Political Tool

80

118

136

Appendix 1. bme Directors 147 Appendix 2. Oaxaca Military and National Guard Units, 1846 and 1848 149 Appendix 3. bme Dependencies 151

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Appendix 4. Extraordinary Performances, 1966 (Partial) Notes

153

157

Glossary of Song and Dance Forms 195 Bibliography Index

197

209

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Introduction

But of Oaxaca I shall say no more, but conclude that it is of so temperate an air, so abounding in fruits, and all provision requisite for man’s life . . . that no place I so much desired to live in whilst I was in those parts as in Oaxaca. Thomas Gage, The English-American

According to the announcer who introduced the evening’s performance, the night of 16 October 2005 was a “historic” one for the Banda de Música del Estado de Oaxaca (Music Band of the State of Oaxaca, bme).1 For the first time in its 137-year history, the bme would be accompanying a world-renowned, classically trained baritone. The audience filled the beautifully restored Teatro Macedonio Alcalá, a late nineteenth-century theater built during that period’s Liberal state-building architectural project, influenced by a distinct gaze toward belle époque France. (See fig. 1.) The musicians took the stage in their vaguely bureaucratic-looking uniforms—blue suits, white shirts, and blue ties—and bowed deferentially as their director, Eliseo Martínez García, dressed in a tuxedo, ascended the podium. The program began with the overture from Gioachino Rossini’s opera La gazza ladra (The Thieving Magpie). The performance acquired a distinctly Oaxacan flavor when Carlos Sánchez, a native of the Mexican state of Querétaro, 1 %X\WKHERRN

The Inevitable Bandstand The State Band of Oaxaca and the Politics of Sound Charles V. Heath

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Fig. 1. Teatro Macedonio Alcalá. Oaxaca de Juárez, Oaxaca, Mexico. Photograph by Ulises Estrada. Licensed under Creative Commons, 2014.

performed the “Canción Mixteca” (“Mixteca Song”), a deeply nostalgic ballad eulogizing the state’s northern Mixteca region. (See fig. 2.) Notwithstanding the song’s regional sentiments, Oaxacans from throughout the state have made it their own. Its lyrics speak to the powerful sentiment of patria chica, a quasi-patriotic allegiance to one’s region or hometown: How far I am from the place Where I was born; Immense nostalgia 2

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Invades my thoughts And seeing me lost and sad like a leaf in the wind I wish to cry, I wish to cry from grief.2 The audience was rapt: some sang along under their breath; others shed a few tears. An extended standing ovation, whistles, and shouts of “Bravo, bravissimo” followed the song. Sánchez himself seemed moved by the audience’s reaction. The bme acquitted itself beautifully, accompanying the baritone as he continued with a Spanish pop song, a waltz, and Bizet’s “Toreador Song” from the opera Carmen. Sánchez’s performance concluded with “Granada” by the famed Mexican composer Agustín Lara. Following intermission, the bme performed selections from Tchaikovsky’s ballet The Nutcracker and closed the performance with the Russian composer’s 1812 Overture. The 1812 Overture, one of the world’s most recognizable works of musical nationalism (the composition includes a theme from a Tsarist anthem), celebrates the Russian victory over Napoleon’s forces. The triumphant coda, which is both bellicose and celebratory, includes cannon fire and bell ringing, which the theater’s crew resoundingly replicated. The casual music lover in attendance that evening was likely unaware of the totality of events and influences that had resulted in such an eclectic program, while those Oaxacans who were familiar with their own history knew that the Banda de Música del Estado de Oaxaca was merely fulfilling a more than century-old charter. That conclusion, however, belies complexities that merit further investigation and raises the question, “How did the bme arrive at this point?” The theater’s modern acoustics and architectural design recall the state’s modernizing project. The bme’s instrumental makeup reveals influences from abroad that include musical instruments both predating and derived from the Industrial Revolution. The band’s repertoire draws on Eurocentric, national, and regional music and compositions. The songs’ themes range from bombastic Introduction

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Fig. 2. “Canción Mixteca” sheet music cover. Archivo General del Ejecutivo Poder del Estado de Oaxaca.

nationalism to sentimental regional nostalgia. Even the bme’s uniforms allude to a state-sponsored civil project and are worthy of consideration. The bme, a civil organ nearly as old as the modern state of Oaxaca itself, provides a lens through which to examine 4

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broader questions about the histories of Mexico and Oaxaca, and its distinctly hybrid musical tradition permits a glimpse into the forces at work in the consolidation of a modern political state.3 Music performed by a state band is a political tool. The present work examines the bme ’s role as a part of the array of popular political culture that the state government of Oaxaca employs in an attempt to bring unity and order to its domain. Over the course of its 146-year history, the bme has performed each of these functions. Its music has a variety of functions: it may provide order and cadence to military maneuvers; it may create a spiritual sense of community, as it does when it accompanies a religious function; it may be used to teach political culture or proselytize for a civic religion; and often it simply entertains. Originally a National Guard band, the bme once accompanied military forces as they trained and fought. The bme performs at saints’ feast days and at national festivals, propagating beliefs both sacred and secular. The state government has also, at times, asked the bme to educate its once largely illiterate population in the ways of liberal democracy. Finally, in order to provide respite from life’s burdens, the government has also asked the bme to perform at strictly diversionary functions such as serenatas (serenades) and dominicales (Sunday matinees). The state government of Oaxaca has conceived all of these roles for the bme in order to unify, educate, and entertain the diverse and fragmented elements within the state of Oaxaca. The bme ’s history therefore mirrors the historical trajectory of both Oaxaca and the nation of Mexico, from the mystical pre-Hispanic era to the military-spiritual Spanish colony, from a militarized and fractured young nation subject to foreign threats and influence to a consolidated post-Revolutionary quasi-socialist state, and from a predominantly Catholic entity to an ostensibly secular one. Oaxaca: An Accidental State The isolated pockets found among the mountain ranges of Oaxaca contain one of the most culturally diverse regions in the world. (See map 1.) Oaxaca is home to sixteen indigenous language and Introduction

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G u l f of M e x i co

MEXICO

A EBL PU VE RA P

C

R

U

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Z

OA

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AL PA

Concepción Pápalo

PA

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CENTRAL VALLEYS

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Oaxaca de Juárez

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CHIA

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Juchitán de Zaragoza

Miahuatlán de Porfirio Díaz

G u l f of Teh u a n te p e c

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Map 1. Seven regions of Oaxaca. Erin Greb Cartography.

ethnic groups that are as diverse as the geography surrounding them.4 (See map 2.) The predominant groups are the Zapotecs and Mixtecs, Mesoamerican peoples with rich histories that long predate the Spanish invasion.5 Among these groups, even greater diversity inheres. For example, the Zapotec language consists of at least sixteen identifiable and mutually unintelligible dialects; a Serrano (highlander) Zapotec is therefore unable to communicate with an Isthmus Zapotec in his ancestral language. The arrival of the Spaniards gave rise to a rich and complex hybrid culture.6 However, music almost immediately served if not to unify the participants of the encounter, then at least to join them in ritual. (See fig. 3.) The region’s diversity, when coupled with extractive Spanish colonial economic projects, further aggravated the uneasy and unequal social situation and resulted in eruptive rebellions. Furthermore, the overlaid Spanish administrative jurisdictions, loosely based upon preexisting indigenous ones, created 6

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G u l f of M e x i co

MEXICO

Nah

uatl

Popoloca

Na hua tl

A EBL PU VE RA

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AS

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o tec za Ma o c Chinanteco ate I x c Cuicateco

Chocho

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Triqui Zapoteco Huave

Zapoteco

Mixteco

CHIA

ER R R GUE

Mixteco

Chatino Chontal

PAC I F I C O C E A N

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25

50 miles

Map 2. Indigenous languages and ethnic groups of Oaxaca. Erin Greb Cartography.

in Oaxaca “the most complicated [geographical] jurisdiction” in Nueva España (New Spain); it contained several noncontiguous segments, including the broad, mountain-ringed valley of Oaxaca, and extended to the northern continental divide in the Papaloapan region, and as far south as the Pacific Ocean.7 After the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés received the valley of Oaxaca as his own marquisate, a confusing chain of events followed, resulting in a “patchwork of small jurisdictions and outlying subject villages” that prevailed through the colonial period.8 The establishment of the Catholic Church in Oaxaca further complicated the pattern with new civil and ecclesiastical jurisdictions.9 This colonial heritage persists today, and the multiplicity of municipalities simultaneously works for and against political unity in the state. While governmental power in Mexico theoretically resides at the municipal level, a vertically integrated system put in place by one particular political party in fact controls the Introduction

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Fig. 3. Observance of a saint’s feast day. Courtesy of Mexican Pictorial Manuscript Collection, the Latin American Library, Tulane University.

diffusion of power to the municipal level.10 The result is an “accidental state,” a complex mosaic of countless tesserae that the modern state must somehow unify.11 Civil Religion, Nationalism, and Political Culture Civil religion is the idea of a transcendent universal religion of the nation.12 Where other institutions such as religion and the economy embody their social associations in churches and businesses respectively, civil religion claims no identifiable social group short of the entire nation itself. The shared common characteristics expressed through civil-religious beliefs, symbols, and rituals imbue all civil life with a religious dimension.13 Political leaders may attach social and political meaning to events such as commemorations, national holidays, and public festivals; and they may manipulate national heroes and events in an attempt to instill sentiments of patriotism, loyalty, and unity.14 In Mexico, the government and intellectuals alike advocated that the components of civil religion 8

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be promoted in order to forge unity within the diverse nation and inspire loyalty to the government. Music accompanied most civilreligious manifestations in Mexico. Civil religion furthers the idea of national identity. In the nineteenth century, nationalism, the principal ideology of new modern nation-states, arose from Romantic notions of sentiment and identity. Nationalism, unlike liberalism or communism, does not reflect any formal doctrine; instead, it assumes varied forms—such as attitudes, texts, practices, and images—that are included in a broad range of phenomena, including music.15 At the time of the Spanish invasion of Mexico, music fulfilled multiple purposes for both conqueror and native. For each group, music could be bellicose, violent, and noisy when used to signal attacks. Music could provide order amid the chaos of battle or provoke disorder among the opponent. For both the Spanish and the native Mesoamericans, military conquest included a strong sacred component, and religious music, both incantatory and proselytizing, offered spiritual reward and release from temporal chaos. Military and sacred music also propagated each group’s imperial aspirations. Finally, music for both peoples could be celebratory and entertaining, providing respite from quotidian hardship and labor. The same musicians often fulfilled these multiple musical functions: military, sacred, and diversionary. They were familiar with the various musical forms and passed easily between the different realms of musical production. New musical practices and forms arose as the two cultures mixed. The bme reflects the military, spiritual, and diversionary heritage of the musical forms present at the Spanish invasion, as well as the hybrid musical forms that have arisen across nearly five centuries. Organization of This Book Chapter 1 examines military and ecclesiastical musical practices in colonial Oaxaca, as well as musical practices during the transitional period to Mexican independence, which was achieved in Introduction

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1821. Military musicians performed liminal roles, passing back and forth between functions that were military and civilian, sacred and secular. With independence came the inception of Mexican civil religion and patriotic festivals. Chapter 2 examines the Oaxacan role in responding to the political chaos that characterized the half-century following independence. Out of the ignominies of multiple foreign invasions (beginning in the present work with the U.S. invasion of Mexico in 1846), as well as civil war and the French Intervention of 1860, the first heroes of Oaxaca’s civil pantheon arose, inspiring celebratory songs for the growing nationalist repertoire. The foreign invasions also introduced new and unforeseen influences to the already hybrid Mexican band form. Chapter 3 begins with the founding of the bme in 1868 and follows the band as it became institutionalized within the War Department, added a professional director, and grew increasingly involved in the propagation of Mexican civil religion. The chapter also examines the reconfiguration of the plaza in Oaxaca and its adaptation as a site of musical production, including the addition of the bme ’s most important venue, the kiosk. Chapter 4 recounts the band’s history during Porfirio Díaz’s thirty-four-year presidency (a period known as the Porfiriato, 1876–1910) and the Mexican Revolution (1910–1917). The gradual civilianization of a once–National Guard band began during the period; during that time, the bme became an increasingly important tool for successive governors. The chapter also examines the band’s increased visibility not only throughout the state of Oaxaca but also nationally. The period also included the beginning of the tenure of its longest-reigning director. Chapter 5 examines the new pedagogical role of the bme within the post-Revolutionary era of roughly 1917 to 1929. The chapter examines the effects upon the bme of the new “socialist” ideology that prevailed in Mexico and the government’s project to valorize indigenous and mestizo cultures.

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Chapter 6 recounts the passing of the band to municipal control in 1937 and the proliferation of municipal bands created to fill performance requirements for the expanding civil-religious calendar to which the Revolution had contributed. After ten years, the band reverted to state control, and another long-term director arrived to leave his mark on the organization. Chapter 7 examines the bme’s transformation into a statesponsored cultural organization responsible for assisting in the marketing of Oaxaca as a tourist destination during the second half of the twentieth century. It also explores the bme’s role in Oaxaca’s biggest annual music and dance performance, the Guelaguetza, and attempts to detail the quotidian and mundane aspects of life within the bme . The Conclusion rounds out the present work by examining the last military and ecclesiastical vestiges of the bme and summarizing the effectiveness of music as a political tool in the hands of the state of Oaxaca. Since its creation in the nineteenth century, the “accidental” state of Oaxaca has presented its government with a difficult task: how to bring political unity to one of the world’s most diverse regions. Oaxaca is, geographically and demographically speaking, an accidental state that requires a unifying force to cobble it together and make it politically viable. One result of its diversity is the violent nature of Oaxaca’s trajectory toward a consolidated modern state. Music can bring forth order from the “noise” of violence. Noise, according to Jacques Attali, is violence, or the disruption or disaggregation of any social process, and music holds the power to sublimate violence to a created order, especially through political integration.16 Music can also provide social cohesion amid dizzying diversity. The bme has been charged with that task for more than a century, but the question remains: how effective is music as a political tool?

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