Lesson 13

Border Music

Objective: Students will understand historical and cultural factors expressed in the Tejano musical form.  Students will analyze lyrics and instrumentation critically to arrive at insights about the form.

NCSS Standards Met By This Lesson: I, III, IV, and IX. 

Introduction: This lesson allows students to learn more about the culture and music of the border.  By studying the music of the border--primarily Tejano music--students will also gain an appreciation of the history of the region.

Materials/Preparation: There are several ways to teach this lesson.  Take a look at some of these resources and choose which ones will be useful for your class. The teacher might want to print some of the short essays for the class to read and respond to--there's even an option of using a 60-minute PBS video to introduce the subject.  One thing is for certain: the teacher will have to round up three or four tape-deck/CD players and some Tejano music . Fortunately, this is not too difficult in the borderlands area, as fellow teachers, administrators, friends, family, neighbors, students and others are likely to have a truckload of CDs and tapes which they will no doubt will enthusiastically offer the classroom.

Essays available on the Internet:

"What is Tejano Music?" by Martin Leal
http://www.ondanet.com/tejano/B-Tej/btej98-01.html

The Evolution of Tejano Music
http://www.ondanet.com/tejano/tejhistory.html

The Tex-Mex Sound--Accordions
http://www.accordions.com/index/art/tex_mex.shtml

Lyrics to Selena songs (has option for translation into English)
http://members.tripod.com/tilesia/lyrics.html

"Narco Pop's Bloody Polkas" by noted border writer Sam Quinones.
http://web.mit.edu/aaelenes/www/sinaloa/narco/narcocorrido3.html

Corrido 'El Campesino'--theme song of the Farm Workers Association.
http://www.sfsu.edu/~cecipp/cesar_chavez/corrido.htm

Also, a one-hour video on Tejano music is available: "Songs of the Homeland".
http://www.ondanet.com/tejano/songofhome.html

Some recommended music:

Selena, Amor Prohibido or Greatest Hits
Texas Tornadoes
Flaco Jimenez
Richie Valens
Little Joe and La Familia
Los Tigres del Norte
Graciela Beltran
Lola Beltran
Los Lobos, Will the Wolf Survive?
Carlos Santana
Chalino
Los Panchos
Tito Puente

Instruction/Practice:
The approach can either
1) a survey of the music & its history;
2) an in-depth study of a certain group or sound;
3) several group studies on a particular band or aspect of the music.

In this lesson, we'll favor the group approach.  However, for a start the class must learn a few basics.

Part 1 -- Large Group Instruction: Lecture-Discussion

Questions:

A) "What is Tejano music?"
Have students write their own definitions first, then have class synthesize a common definition.

Some useful quotes:
"A Tejano is a Texan who is of Mexican ancestry.  Tejano music is what we make of it, not what it makes of us.  It defines us, because we define it. Tejano music is not generic because we are not generic." --Martin Leal

"As long as they put out beer-drinking songs, love songs, tear-jerking songs, and old dancing songs, there will continue to be Tejano music, because Tejano is the music of the heart." --Martin Leal

B) In what way or ways is Tejano music similar to country-and-western?
A lot of people don't think of the two forms as alike, but they share many similarities.

C) How "old" is Tejano music?
For some Tejano may seem like a recent phenomenon, but it is a deeply-rooted tradition.

Some useful quotes:
"Believe it or not, it all began in the middle of the nineteenth century in Germany.  Yes, the diatonic accordion, the main instrument of Tex-Mex Music, was created by Freidrich Buschman, whose fellow country-men emigrated to the state of Texas, around 1890, to work the fields, and the construction of railroad lines in Northern Mexico.  During lunch-breaks, the recent arrivals played waltzes and polkas, while Mexican-Americans, better known as Chicanos, listened to the fanastic resonance.  Little by little, locals began making the small-buttoned instrument their own, and in time, the mazurkas became 'corridos', from the Valley of Texas, to Nuevo Laredo."--from "The Tex-Mex Sound," Instituto Cultural Mexicano

"Every time an old song comes on the radio as a new release and my mother (she is 70) is with me, she makes the same comment: "Que cancion tan nueva" (What a New Song).  She then proceeds to let me know that she was a young girl that she was a young girl when she heard it and then sings it to prove it." --Martin Leal

D) What is a "corrido"?
Here it might help to play a few samples, some traditional songs from "Los Tigres del Norte" and other Norteño groups.

With helpful guiding definitions and some Tex-Mex music history on the board, groups are now ready to work.

Part 2 -- Small-Group Work

Give each group (of about 3, maybe 4 students) a selection of songs to work with, about three per group.  Students then listen to the selections, and make notes on aspects of the songs, such as:
1) In what way is this a traditional Tejano song, according to our class definition;
2) In what ways does this song bend or go outside of the tradition;
3) What is the song about?
4) What stylistic/musical/vocal features of the selection stand out for you?

Be sure to distribute such songs as "Fotos y Recuerdos" (the students may have to be informed that the tune is a Pretenders' song from 1983, "Back on the Chain Gang" -- here Selena takes a punk/new wave edgy rocker and turns it into a sweet cumbia)--taking tunes from popular U.S. songs is commonly done in Tejano music.  In what way is this common to all forms of music?

Try also, Selena's "Technocumbia" which brings in reggae, hiphop, rock, and other musical influences. The title itself suggests that this song is more than a cumbia--it's a technocumbia.  Also consider some of Selena's "crossover" pop music in English--do any of these songs retain any elements of Tejano music?

For another group, be sure to give some selections from Los Lobos' How Will the Wolf Survive?  In these songs, traditional Mexican/Tejano music forms more a base than a center, with other rock and pop elements mixed in.  Is this still Tejano music?

For yet another group, consider a selection of songs in English by the Texas Tornadoes.  Is this still Tejano or an attempt to crossover to U.S. country-and-western or does it matter?  Have this group consider the close relationship between Tejano and country-and-western.

For still another group, have them listen to songs by traditional Mexican Norteņo music groups such as Los Tigres Del Norte.  In what way is Norteņo music like Tejano music? In what ways is it different?

Closure: Have each group present and teach one song from their sample.  The group should develop a couple of questions to ask the class and be able to make two or three clear insights into what the song has to teach about the rich and varied heritage of Tejano music.

Extensions:
1) Have the class listen as a group to a selection of songs.  What musical elements can be traced to certain historical/ethnic phenomena?  For example, can students hear the waltz or polka in some of these songs?  Old melodies?  German influence?  Why the change to the synthesizer/organ?  (Disco influence.) Which is "more authentic", the accordion or the synthesizer?

2) Encourage music-minded students to consider researching Tejano music for final project.

3) Tejano music is not the only music of the border.  The teacher might want to consider having a few groups of students do other kinds of studies.  For example, there is a Juárez radio station, 106.7 FM, which plays "Rock en español" and also rock in English. "Rock en español" is a huge phenomenon in its own right and could be mixed in with the Tejano music lesson as another alternative or counterpoint to Tejano, or could be the subject of a Border Project.

4) Another aspect of border music is "narco-corridos," the ballads that champion the exploits of Mexican drug traffickers. An internet essay is provided above. The music is rarely heard on radio and difficult to find in conventional record stores, yet it is a very popular form of music in the American Southwest and Mexico.  If examples of narco-corridos can be found, they might be included in this lesson.  Also, a group researching drug trafficking for either the Border Forum or the Border Project can either include this in their findings, or make it the center of a research project.

Updated October 11, 2004.