From Tejano to Tango: Latin American Popular Music (review)

Working from the premise that popular music must be studied from an interdisciplinary perspective, Walter Aaron Clark has edited an impressive collection of twelve essays by music scholars and social scientists from the United States and Latin America. The essays cover topics ranging from the use of the popular gaucho image to construct an Argentine musical identity in the early 1900s to United States participation in the Macarena dance craze of the 1990s. Each contribution presents precise definitions of styles, genres, and concepts, while providing detailed cultural and historical background on the repertories and performing artists discussed. As a whole, the collection articulates central issues in the study of popular music and demonstrates a wide variety of analytical methods and approaches to interpretation.

The book is presented in three sections; the first part features essays on politics and identity in Nicaragua and Argentina. In "The Popularized Gaucho Image as a Source of Argentine Classical Music, 1880- 1920," Deborah Schwartz-Kates examines the tradición gauchesca and its popularization in urban performance contexts such as the circo criollo (native circus) and sainete nacional (national theater). She illustrates the ways in which early twentieth-century Argentine composers drew upon urbanized gauchesca genres, especially the milonga, to create a new national musical identity. María Susana Azzi explores "The Tango, Peronism, and Astor Piazzolla during the 1940s and '50s," arguing that what became known as nuevo tango (new tango) could only have developed in the kind of populist political environment Perón constructed. "Socially Conscious Music Forming the Social Conscience: Nicaraguan Música Testimonial and the Creation of a Revolutionary Moment" by T. M. Scruggs describes Nicaraguan political music during the twentieth century, including the corrido (1930s), son nica (1940s), and volcanto (1980s). Focusing on the singer/songwriter Carlos Mejía Godoy, who played a prominent role in Nicaraguan political music during the 1970s, Scruggs demonstrates the power of song in testifying to the people's "deepest-felt aspirations for a more just and liberated life" (p. 65). Pablo Semán and Pablo Vila's "Rock Chabón: The Contemporary National Rock of Argentina" discusses a genre that developed in the 1990s among socially and economically marginalized youth in Argentina. They outline the role of musical practice in constructing identity, concluding that "Musical performativity ... is a type of discourse that, through a process of repetition and its inscription on the body, has the capacity to produce what it signifies" (pp. 90-91).

The second part of the book addresses locality and interlocality in Cuba and North America. One of the strongest articles in the collection, John Koegel's "Crossing Borders: Mexicana, Tejana, and Chicana Musicians in the United States and Mexico," surveys twentieth-century singers such as Las Hermanas Padilla, Lydia Mendoza, Laura Canales, Selena Quintanilla, and many others. Koegel delineates their distinctive musical styles and performance practices, and considers song lyrics with reference to gender issues. "A Chicano in a Cuban Band: Okan Ise and Songo in Los Angeles," by Javier Barrales Pacheco, defines songo, a genre of Cuban dance music that became popular in the United States during the 1980s, and describes his transcultural experiences as a member of a Cuban band. Two other particularly interesting chapters are "The Bolero Romántico: From Cuban Dance to International Popular Song" by George Torres and "Give Your Body Joy, Macarena: Aspects of U.S. Participation in the 'Latin' Dance Craze of the 1990s" by Melinda Russell. Torres provides a detailed history of the bolero and discusses the origin of the Mexican trío romántico, which became the primary medium for bolero romántico songs in the 1940s and 1950s. Russell treats the reception of the Macarena as a "Latin" dance and scrutinizes the reasons for its success, such as the simplicity of its steps, its ideal of...