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Epilogue Whose National Music? T his book has explored different repertoires of Ecuadorian and nonEcuadorian music which at some point have been considered (or labeled) música nacional. In analyzing the ideology of mestizaje as a nation-building discourse in Ecuador, I have examined música nacional as a metaphor for Ecuadorian national identity. I have suggested that the types of music that upper-middle- and lower-class Ecuadorians include or exclude in the notion of música nacional reveal how they envision the ethnic configuration of the mestizo nation. A central argument of this book has been that upper-class Ecuadorians (white-mestizos) do not acknowledge the indigenous heritage of their mestizo identity, which is symbolically observed in the stereotypes and derogatory labels they use to refer to the music produced and consumed by indigenous people and lower-class mestizos. They identify chichera and rocolera music with drunkenness and the music of cholos, longos, and underclass venues, while associating the term música nacional with uppermiddle -class, educated, respectable Ecuadorians. These music labels function as a mechanism of “Othering” through which the upper-middle-class mestizos construct and perpetuate social hierarchies separating themselves from the popular classes. These labels are used to emphasize a supposed lack of moral and artistic values of lower-class mestizo music and reveal the ethnic , social, and racial tensions among mestizos, which is not a homogeneous group as the ideology of mestizaje seems to portray. I have shown elite and working-class perceptions of música nacional through the analysis of two musical genres that are considered to embody a sense of Ecuadorianness—the pasillo and the sanjuanito. They generate different meanings for different people depending on the song repertoire, who the singers and listeners are, and the social contexts in which they are performed. 212 | Epilogue For upper-middle-class Ecuadorians, the notion of música nacional excludes genres associated with the indigenous and Afro-Ecuadorian population. They identify with the pasillos, albazos, and pasacalles of the 1920s to 1950s, and they scorn the commercial sanjuanitos and pasillos of the 1970s due to their lyrics, association with drunkenness, and the ethnic groups these genres represent. By contrast, the notion of música nacional for the popular classes includes rocolera and chichera music, first because these repertoires are part of their everyday life and have shaped their sense of Ecuadorianness since childhood , but most importantly, because they are performed by national artists who express the sentiments of “el pueblo” (the people) and share with them a common social profile. It is worth noting that while the popular classes regard elite música nacional as antigua (old), they do not reject it. Thus, while the popular classes imagine a heterogeneous community by considering different styles of Ecuadorian music as música nacional (including the elite música nacional), the upper-middle classes exclude the popular classes from their “imagined community” by ignoring or stigmatizing their musical activities with labels such as chichera and rocolera. (Appendix B.) To examine the ideas that the popular classes have of música nacional, in 2002 I visited the Centro Histórico of Quito and interviewed street vendors who sell pirated CDs. As the music providers for the low-income sector, they know their customers’ musical preferences as well as the labels they apply to their favorite styles. Several times I approached street vendors with the excuse that friends of mine who lived in Madrid were nostalgic for Ecuador and had asked me to send them CDs of Ecuadorian music, and I would ask the vendors for suggestions. Many recommended that I send CDs of música nacional, especially sanjuanito recordings, because this happy and danceable music would raise their spirits. Although I used the term “Ecuadorian music” in my question, most vendors employed the term “música nacional” in their answers. Some asked me if I was looking for música nacional antigua or música nacional bailable, distinguishing through the use of these terms the elite pasillos from chichera music and underscoring the difference I observe in the usage of the term among Ecuadorians. Most vendors did not have CDs of elite pasillos because, according to them, “that music did not sell well.” At EPM concerts, the responses to my questions about música nacional were quite similar. I asked people in attendance what kind of music we were hearing when a tecnocumbia or a chichera singer was performing on stage. Many people replied that it was m...

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