Indita del rio grande
The piece accompanying this paper is called Indita del rio grande. It is part of the indita genre of Spanish New Mexican music and is performed by the singer Edwin Berry. It was made in Tomé, New Mexico in 1971. Although many Spanish New Mexicans have historically wanted to suppress the mixings of Indians with Spaniards, this history is perceivable in the indita genre. Thus, it is closely associated with the interwoven, mestizo culture of New Mexico (Romero 2002:56). The songs often feature a juxtaposition of Spanish words with indigenous rhythmic motifs which signifies this relationship (Romero 2002:65). Additionally, the refrain of an indita sometimes contain vocables (syllables that don’t have a meaning in the language)
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which are common in many Native North American musics (Loeffler 1999:25). Though what classifies a song as an indita is widely discussed, some identifying factors stick out.
Songs are sometimes identified as inditas because they contain the word “indita” in the title or lyrics, but this is not always the case. Additionally, a characteristic of inditas are the references to the landscape or the environment of New Mexico. Indita del rio grande is a great example of this. Literally translated as “the woman of the rio grande”, it is about the disastrous flood that happened in Tomé in 1884. The flood was devastating almost wiping out the entire town (Levine and Chace 1999: 99). This story is conveyed in the piece, as the narrator describes the people leaving for higher ground and searching for shelter. It is a perfect example of an indita that documents historical events related to the …show more content…
landscape. In transcribing this piece, I made a lot of decisions on how to represent it in staff notation. Initially, I heard the piece in the key of F and subsequently tried to notate it this way. However, as I discovered many pitches falling below the western pitches I assigned to them, it was clear that the song was much better represented in “E”. Aside from tonal choices, I made more decisions in terms of rhythm and meter. The meter shifts from verse to chorus and I notated this by putting the verses in 9/8 and the chorus in 6/8. Additionally, there is a two beat pickup at the beginning of the piece. Berry also takes large pauses throughout the piece and these are notated with caesura. Additionally, he holds the ends of the verse/refrains by holding the last note longer than the durational value. This is notated by a fermata. The form of the song (verse--refrain) is constant throughout the piece. Berry also remains consistent in melody throughout the various verses and refrains, though there is a ritardando at the end and his rhythmic durations shift slightly throughout the song. I speculate that this is impacted by the need to fit syllables into the melody but, only further exploration would prove this to be true. There are a lot of instances of rhythmic indeterminacy in this piece.
For example, in the fifth and ninth measures I chose to use a dotted eighth note, attempting to represent what Berry performs. However, this is in no way a full depiction of what he does. This type of indeterminacy occurs throughout the transcription, because Berry’s rhythmic choices are not confined exactly to these durational values. What I have transcribed is a purely prescriptive and generalized depiction of my interpretation of the piece. Consequently, if an observer wanted to understand the depth and complexity of Berry’s performance they would need to listen to the
recording. I did not find any concordances to this song in any of the resources provided. This could be because the song is about the specific place of Tomé and since it’s so regionally specific maybe it isn’t performed in other parts of New Mexico. Aside from this, I can’t think of any other reasons as to why there would not be a concordance in the Robb, Loeffler, or Juan B. Real collections. The answer to this question could be hidden in the deeper history of this song and would require further research.
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1Maritza Romero, Selena Perez: Queen of Tejano Music (New York: Power Kids Press, 1997) page 9 paragraph 2.
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Ragland, Cathy. Música Norteña: Mexican Migrants Creating a Nation between Nations. Philadelphia, PA: Temple UP, 2009. Print.
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Najarro.Adela. "Angles in the Kitchen:Latino Poets and the Search for Identity." Adela Najarro's Website. 24 Oct. 2002. 16. Sept. 2003
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