Music of Mexico


The music of Mexico reflects the nation's culture, shaped by various influences, genres, and performance styles. European, Indigenous, and African traditions have contributed uniquely to its musical identity. Since the 19th century, music has served as a form of national expression.
In the 21st century, Mexico has ranked as the world's tenth-largest recorded music market and the largest in the Spanish-speaking world, according to IFPI's 2024 and 2002 reports.

History

The foundation of Mexican music comes from its indigenous sounds and heritage. The original inhabitants of the land used drums, flutes, rattles, conches as trumpets and their voices to make music and dances. This ancient music is still played in some parts of Mexico. However, much of the traditional contemporary music of Mexico was written during and after the Spanish colonial period, using many Old World influenced instruments. Many traditional instruments, such as the Mexican vihuela used in Mariachi music, were adapted from their old-world predecessors and are now considered very Mexican.
There existed regional and local musical traditions in the colonial period and earlier, but national music began to develop in the nineteenth century, often with patriotic themes of national defense and against foreign invaders. Conservative general and president Antonio López de Santa Anna brought Catalan musician Jaime Nunó from nearby Cuba to create a network of military bands on a national scale. He composed the music for the Mexican national anthem. During the French Intervention in Mexico, which placed Maximilian of Habsburg on the throne of the French empire in Mexico, many musicians accompanied his entourage and he established the National Conservatory of Music in 1866.
Liberal President Benito Juárez saw the need to create military bands. Village brass bands proliferated in the late nineteenth century, with concerts in town squares, often on a central kiosk. During the Porfiriato, musical styles expanded, with Mexican national music, cosmopolitan music brought by foreign elites, and European regional music such as polkas, mazurkas, and waltzes, as well as opera overtures. Musicians had access to and used sheet music. In some indigenous regions, new music and bands helped bring a level of unity. In Oaxaca, a waltz, "Dios nunca muere" became the state's anthem.
A variety of musical styles from elsewhere were incorporated into Mexican popular music in the nineteenth century. Music, dance, and poetry flourished during the Porfiriato. Mexico's National Conservatory of Music was strongly influenced by Italian masters, who gave way to French influence at the turn of the twentieth century.
Following the Revolution, Venustiano Carranza, leader of the winning Constitutionalist faction of the Revolution, mandated that the National Conservatory "recover the national" in its musical education, abandoning rather than privileging foreign music. Younger Mexican composers emerged, including Carlos Chávez, Silvestre Revueltas, and Luis Sandi, who developed Mexican "art music." Chávez was a prolific composer and one who embraced creating Mexican orchestral music drawing on revolutionary corridos, and composed an Aztec-themed ballet. He became the director of the National Conservatory of Music, which became affiliated with the Ministry of Education. Revueltas composed music for the emerging Mexican cinema, and Sandi created choral works, creating music for civic events, as well as incorporating indigenous music from the Yaqui and Maya regions in his compositions. Chávez is seen as the driving force behind the split between Mexican art music and traditional styles, privileging art music. However, traditional or folkloric music continues to be popular, and the Ballet Folklórico de México, established in 1952, performs regularly at Bellas Artes.

Traditional folk music

Northern Mexican folk music

Northern traditional music or Norteño was highly influenced by immigrants from Germany, Poland, and Czechia to northern Mexico and the southwestern United States in the mid 1800s, the instruments and musical styles of the Central European immigrants were adopted to Mexican folk music, the accordion becoming especially popular and is still frequently used. There are many styles of northern mexican folk music, among the most popular being Ranchera, Corrido, Huapango, Chotís, Polka, Redova, Cumbia and Banda. Norteño folk music is some of the most popular music in and out of Mexico, with Corridos and Rancheras being specifically popular in Chile, Colombia, United States, Central America and Spain.

Genres

  • Corrido: Corrido music is a popular narrative song of poetry form, a ballad. Various themes are featured in Mexican corridos, and corrido lyrics are often old legends about a famed criminal or hero in the rural frontier areas of Mexico. There are also corridos about women, and corridos telling love stories.
  • Ranchera: Ranchera music, whose term derives from ranch, usually has a rhythm in 2/4, 3/4 or 4/4, with songs typically in a major key. Generally the most appreciated and important exponent of this genre is considered José Alfredo Jiménez.
  • Banda: Banda music was made with the imitation of military bands that were imported during the Second Mexican Empire, headed by emperor Maximilian I of Mexico in the 1860s. Polish and German immigrants established themselves in the state of Sinaloa. It was further popularized during the Mexican Revolution when local authorities and states formed their own bands to play in the town squares. Revolutionary leaders like Pancho Villa, also took wind bands with them wherever they went. Banda has to this day remained popular throughout the central and northern states. It has, however, diversified into different styles due to regions, instruments and modernization. Today people associate banda with Sinaloense. Although banda music is played by many bands from different parts of Mexico, its original roots are in Sinaloa, made popular by bands from Sinaloa.

    Central Mexican folk music

The folklore in central Mexico retains strong spanish Influence which can be seen in the amount of colonial cities in this region like Guanajuato, San Miguel de Allende and Zacatecas and also the instruments utilized in the folk music such as guitars, violins and vihuelas. The most iconic figure from central Mexico is the Mexican charro, a kind of horseman originated in Jalisco in the early 1900s. In Central Mexico, The most characteristic style of folk music is Mariachi, a style which is played by a group consisting of five or more musicians who wear charro suits and play various instruments such as the violin, the vihuela, guitar, a guitarrón and a trumpet with lyricism usually being about love, betrayal, death, politics, revolutionary heroes and country life.

Genres

  • Mariachi: Mariachi is an ensemble that consists of guitarrón, vihuela, guitar, violins and trumpets. Between 1940 and 1960 mariachi and rancheras originated in the western states of the country. This folk ensemble performs ranchera, son de mariachi, huapango de mariachi, polka, corrido, and other musical forms. It originated in the southern part of the state of Jalisco during the 19th century. The city of Guadalajara in Jalisco is known as the "Capital of Mariachi". The style is now popular throughout Mexico and the Southwestern United States, and is considered representative of Mexican music and culture.
  • Tamborazo Zacatecano: Tamborazo Zacatecano is a banda style traditionally played by two trumpets, two saxophones, and the al bass drum. Tamborazo is closely related to traditional brass Banda. However, Tamborazo uses saxophones instead of clarinets. Another difference from banda is that Tamborazo uses its drum consistently, as opposed to banda which distributes the use of the other instruments throughout a song. Tamborazo originated in Villanueva in the state of Zacatecas.

    Southern Mexican folk music

The south of Mexico is often characterized by a strong mixture of different cultures since this region has some of the most important port cities of the country like Veracruz and Acapulco which functioned as an entry way for immigrants from Europe, Africa, The Middle East, South America, the Caribbean and Asia. Some of the most known folk music in southern Mexico are Son Jarocho from Veracruz, Chilena from the Costa Chica regions in Guerrero and Oaxaca, Jarana Yucateca from the Yucatan Peninsula, Bolero from Yucatan and Veracruz and Abajeño from Michoacán.

Genres

  • Son Jarocho: Son Jarocho music comes from the Veracruz area, and is distinguished by a strong African influence. International acclaim has been limited, including the major hit La Bamba. The most legendary performer is Graciana Silva, whose releases on Discos Corason made inroads in Europe. Southern Veracruz is home to a distinct style of Jarochos that is characteristically lacking a harp, is played exclusively by requinto or jarana guitars, and is exemplified by the popular modern band Mono Blanco.
  • Chilena: Chilena is a musical genre from the Costa Chica region, an area along the Pacific Ocean between the Mexican states of Oaxaca and Guerrero, although its influence extends to other nearby regions. It originated from the Chilean cueca, hence its name, a dance that was carried by Chilean sailors in 1821 and then by Chilean immigrants between 1848 and 1855, during the height of the California gold rush.

    Popular music of folk roots

Grupera

Grupera is a genre of Mexican popular music. It is influenced by the styles of cumbia, norteño, and ranchera, and reached the height of its popularity in the 1980s, especially in rural areas.
The music has roots in the rock groups of the 1960s but today generally consists of five or fewer musicians using electric guitars, keyboards and drums. Artists in this genre include Los Yonics, Los Temerarios, Los Bukis, La Mafia, Ana Bárbara, Alicia Villarreal, Mariana Seoane, Grupo Bryndis, Los Freddy's, Lidia Ávila, Los Caminantes, Los Humildes, La Migra, Liberación, Pegasso, and Grupo Mojado. The music increased in popularity in the 1990s and became commercially viable, and is now recognized in some Latin music awards ceremonies such as Lo Nuestro and the Latin Grammy Awards.
The original wave of Mexican rock bands got their start mostly with Spanish covers of popular English rock songs. After this initial stage they moved on to include in their repertoire traditional ranchera songs, in addition to cumbia, and ballads. Thus the 1970s saw the rise of a number of grupera bands that specialized in slow ballads and songs that up to that point had only been sung with mariachi. Among these we can include Los Muecas, Los Freddys, Los Babys, etc.