A Crescendo of Zeal for Young Mariachis

Kevin Reynaga belts out Mexican love songs with the heartbreak of a grown man.

His lips quiver. His eyes squinch shut. He’s only 12, but a passion years ahead of his time thunders in his narrow chest for those few moments the mike is in his hand and the trumpets blare behind him.

Tonight, like most other school nights, Kevin and nine other kids are rehearsing for a weekend mariachi performance. They are part of a growing number of youth bands in Los Angeles that play mariachi, a music celebrating Mexican cowboy culture.

In a San Fernando backyard that smells of fresh laundry, the children stand in a crescent, tickling guitars, stroking violins, their melodies drowning out other nighttime sounds--the dogs barking, the neighbors chatting along chain-link fences, the thump-thump of cars booming hip-hop.

Tonight’s rehearsal, however routine, is an important one. Instead of performing at a wedding or the opening of a new Mexican restaurant or a quinceanera party--typical mariachi venues--Kevin’s group, called Cobras de Jalisco, will be playing at Disneyland, mainstream USA.

The group has been invited to participate in the park’s first youth mariachi showcase Sunday. And the significance of that event is not lost on a band that usually sticks to events within the Mexican American community.

“I’ve been practicing a lot for this one,” Kevin said. “Maybe we’ll come out on TV.”

Mariachi bands are flourishing, especially for young people, with more than 40 youth bands in Los Angeles compared to just a handful 10 years ago, said Everto Ruiz, a Chicano studies professor at Cal State Northridge. Many youths are hired professionally, which helps put a little money in their pockets.

The Cobras (which has the same meaning in English as Spanish) just cut their first CD--something many adult mariachi bands haven’t done.

Parents and teachers say that besides providing the camaraderie of a soccer team and some solid musical skills, mariachi touches something deeper.

“For kids from Mexico, this music gets them excited about who they are,” Ruiz said. “It impacts other parts of their life. They learn to have pride in themselves even when they don’t have the mariachi uniform on.”

At a rehearsal Monday night, music teacher Rudy Vasquez was the one wearing the proud grin on his face. Los Halcones, a mariachi band that he formed for students at San Fernando Junior High School, will also be performing at the Disneyland event.

The five-hour concert, which starts at noon in the Festival Arena, will feature eight bands, including groups from La Puente, South Gate and East Los Angeles. The concert is part of Disneyland’s efforts to celebrate National Hispanic Heritage Month. It is the culmination of a two-month competition in which 24 youth bands from Camarillo to Anaheim vied for the eight spots.

The Halcones--Spanish for falcons--still have some kinks to iron out.

At Monday’s rehearsal, the 20 members strike up a stirring version of “La Puno de Tierra,” (“A Mound of Dirt”). Toward the end of the song, one girl drags her bow across the strings of her violin, emitting an off-key squeak that sounds like fingernails on a chalk board. Everybody giggles.

“Girl, you got to Midas-ize,” Vasquez jokes. “Fix them brakes.”

A few minutes later, right before the band is about to fire up another number, 13-year-old Robert Diaz starts rejiggering his guitar strap.

“Hold on, hold on,” Robert yells to the teacher.

“Hey, guy, I’m not holding on for anybody. It’s a fine time to do that,” he responds.

Usually, Vasquez speaks in English to his students. But sometimes he barks out instructions in Spanish, the language of all the songs.

Which underscores another virtue of mariachi: language training. Many second- and third-generation Mexican American children who didn’t speak Spanish before joining a mariachi band have been turned on to the language through songs about horses, mountains and spurned cowboys.

The blend of Spanish music and English instruction also helps bridge the gap between new immigrants and their English-speaking classmates, two groups that often don’t mix, Vasquez said.

Mariachi music has always brought together the old and new. It was born about 1850 in the sugar cane fields of Jalisco state. Mestizo cowboys, themselves a Euro-Indian mix, took the rhythms of their native music and played them on Spanish-style instruments. Those ultimately evolved into signature mariachi instruments, such as the guitarron, a six-string bass guitar, and the vihuela, a mini-violin.

The distinctive mariachi get-up--the tight-fitting pants, short jacket, hat and boots--was inspired by what the mestizo cowboys wore around the ranch.

Parents of young mariachi players--the ages range from 7 to 18--can’t say enough good things about youth mariachi and how it helps celebrate an often-neglected culture. In East Los Angeles, mariachi is a bulwark against gangs, said Rebecca Martinez, mother of three teenage guitar-strumming triplets.

“My boys are so busy they don’t have time to go out in the street,” she said. “The mariachi kids are different than the others.”

But what do their friends think of them? Is being in a mariachi band considered, well, geeky?

Aaron Reynaga, 11, said it is a fair question to ask.

“But I think mariachi is considered pretty cool,” said Aaron, Kevin’s cousin and also a member of Cobras de Jalisco. “And it’s better than soccer, because you can make money.”

Most bands have a parent who plays manager, booking the group for weekends and setting rates--typically $200 an hour, a little less than the average adult group charges. That covers expenses, such as travel costs, music instruction and the outfits--which run $400 each. After all the expenses are paid, a little is left over for the players.

Kids, though, don’t see mariachi as a current or even future job. You don’t think like that when you’re 12 years old.

“I’m not sure what I want to be when I grow up,” Kevin said. “But I know that when you’re up on stage and playing with your friends and hearing people applaud, it’s fun.”