Description
Book SynopsisBetween Norteño and Tejano Conjunto analyzes the origin, evolution, and dissemination of the norteño and tejano conjunto. This group represents a marginalized local identity that was transformed primarily into an identity of the northeast. It then gave way to the whole of northern México and the American Southwest, and was later assimilated internationally as a mainstream genre. This book provides a long-term historic vision of conjunto and the various musical forms it uses, such as polka, corrido, or canción (song), and, more recently, bolero and cumbia, as well as its transformations and contributions to other musical cultures.
Trade ReviewDíaz-Santana Garza is part of a wave of scholars who incorporate their lived experience in their scholarship…. The author provides a history of conjunto, the multiple musical forms the genre incorporates, and its influence in shaping other musical cultures. The author also argues that transnational music of accordion and bajo sexto have become powerful symbols of Mexican and Chicano identity, displacing mariachi music, thanks to demand from Mexican migrants. The author visited ten archives across Mexico and Texas, and his primary research sources include newspapers, songs, and interviews he conducted in southern Texas towns and large urban centers in Mexico. Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty and professionals; general readers.
* Choice Reviews *
"Borders often incite transgression. The musical expressions studied by Luis Díaz Santana Garza are an example of how popular culture in border regions breaks down barriers and fragments conventional identities. Music on the border causes strange, complex and fascinating phenomena that are studied in great detail in this book. The reader will be amazed at the wealth that the border between Nuevo León and Texas harbors and generates in its popular musical expressions."
-- Roger Bartra, Emeritus Researcher, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
"Under a multidisciplinary approach -which combines cultural history, cultural studies and music studies, with musicological analysis-, Díaz-Santana Garza offers a binational perspective of the emergence and evolution of this music that helps to explain the phenomenon of musical norteñización that Mexico is currently experiencing. The rigor is remarkable, as well as the variety of its sources: oral and documentary (printed, recorded). The clarity and solidity of the arguments used to critically construct the history around these musical cultures, goes beyond the strictly musical framework and brings us closer to the areas of contemporary culture."
-- Jose Juan Olvera Gudiño, Center for Research and Higher Studies in Social Anthropology
"This is the first comprehensive study of the relationship between norteño and conjunto music that truly takes into consideration both sides of the border. It will be of interest to a wide range of readers to include not only conjunto and norteño fans, but also scholars from disciplines such as musicology, folklore, media studies, popular culture, history, literature, sociology and cultural anthropology."
-- Juan Carlos Ramírez-Pimienta, San Diego State University
Table of ContentsTable of Contents
Chapter I Border Territory: Nuevo León and Texas from Colonial Times to the 19th Century
Chapter II Precursors to Conjunto: Culture, Migration and Border Identity
Chapter III The First Epoch of Conjunto: The Instruments, Musical Forms and the Media
Chapter IV Conjunto: From Subaltern Mexican Culture to American Cultural Treasure
Chapter V Transformation and Recent Trends in Conjunto
