TIJUANA’S ROMANTIC MUSIC MASTERS : LOS ALABASTRINOS’ ROMANTIC SOUND

It’s a Saturday night at the lavish new Fiesta Americana Hotel, two 21- and 23-story towers of glass, steel, luxury and splendor.

This is where high-rolling Mexicans and foreigners stay when they’re in Tijuana, and it’s as far removed from the wailing sirens, diesel-spitting buses and pitiful beggars on the grimy street below as the Waldorf Astoria is from the South Bronx.

Yet the sorry state of the masses is not altogether overlooked at the Fiesta Americana. Instead of envying the rich, the impoverished Mexican people have traditionally sought relief from their woes through romance and song.

And every weekend night in the second-floor Caballo Negro (Black Horse) lounge, rich hotel guests are reminded of this very important aspect of Mexican culture by Los Alabastrinos, a group of five men in pastel-green tuxedos who sing and play the romantic music of Old Mexico.

Their songs--ballads and smooth salsa, cha-cha and cumbia dance tunes--are almost entirely about love. The most popular numbers range from the longtime gringo-pleaser, “Cuando Caliente el Sol” (“When the Sun Warms Up”) to equally poignant, though less familiar, Latin love songs like “Motivos” (“Reasons”) and “Cuando Sali de Cuba” (“When I Left Cuba”).

Their melodies are alternately joyous and somber, upbeat and reflective. Their horns pierce the soul while their guitars caress the heart. Their three-part harmonies rise and fall with the emotional highs and lows of the words they sing.

And Los Alabastrinos’ very existence is a slap in the face of Tijuana’s rapidly changing night life.

All over town, flashy discotheques have replaced sleazy strip joints. Veteran nightclub singers like Genny Silva have changed their repertoires from Mexican standards to the American Top 40.

But aside from updating their set with newer ballads by Latin singers Roberto Carlos and Jose Jose--and even a Spanish version of “New York, New York”--Los Alabastrinos have stuck with tradition.

Most of the songs they perform today are the same ones they played 27 years ago, when they formed as a trio at the long-gone Frenchy’s piano bar on Avenida Revolucion.

“Romantic music is a tradition in Mexico, and at least in this country, romanticism is going to be around forever,” said Oscar Martinez, the band’s bassist and one of two original members.

“That’s why we’ve lasted so long, playing the same music. When you are young, you grow up with the music your friends listen to: heavy music, like rock ‘n’ roll.

“But as you mature, you mellow with age, and then you go back to the classics.”

And sticking with the classics has proven quite successful for Los Alabastrinos, Martinez said.

Over the course of nearly three decades, they’ve played virtually every club that’s been a part of Tijuana’s night life history, including the Capri, Caesar’s, Palacia Azteca, and the Jai-Alai Club before it became the Tia Juana Tilly’s disco.

They’ve toured throughout Mexico several times, appearing in top nightclubs and hotel lounges in Mexico City, Acapulco, Nogales and Guadalajara. They’ve also played clubs in San Diego and San Francisco.

And they’ve even taken time out to record more albums than Martinez can even recollect, most recently a 25th anniversary “best of” collection that came out in 1984.

“But Tijuana is where we started, and that’s why we keep coming back,” Martinez said, laughing. “Here, we get all the older Latinos, most of them from Tijuana and some from San Diego and Chula Vista.

“At the Fiesta Americana, we also get a lot of tourists, but most of the people are regulars who see us all the time. We’ve played around Tijuana for three generations, and they all know us: We started with the grandfathers, then the grandfathers brought the fathers, and now the fathers are bringing the sons.”

Indeed, the crowd at Caballo Negro on a recent Saturday night consisted mostly of older Mexican couples, with a few American tourists.

While Los Alabastrinos was playing the songs of their youth, listeners were sitting at their tables, holding hands and drinking cerveza . Other, bolder couples were out on the dance floor, swaying about in slow-dance embraces.

And doing both throughout the evening was Paul Poling, a guest at the Fiesta Americana on his first-ever visit to Tijuana.

“We heard about the band from our friends in San Diego,” said Poling, a visitor from Sonoma, Calif. “And we’ll be back--I know we will.

“I love the traditional old Mexican music. It’s different, it’s romantic, and most of all, it’s fun.”

Up on stage, Oscar Martinez was smiling, as though he had overheard.