Mariachi Has Them Playing Different Tune

Diana Godinez has been standing for nearly two hours. The 10th-grader’s violin bow whips dutifully through the air as she runs through her part of “Toro Coquito” for the dozenth time.

The guitars across from her lay the sonic groundwork for the violins’ syncopated counterpoint and the trumpets’ bright blasts. An hour after the final school bell, the powerful sounds of 16 students ricochet off the green walls of the Rancho High School band room and spill out the door.

Godinez, 15, is one of 1,100 students learning the Mexican folk music of mariachi in classes taught by Clark County public schools. The 3-year-old program, which has doubled in size since its inception, has seven full-time teachers instructing students in guitar and violin at 10 middle and high schools.

The program, embraced by students and the school district, is the largest of its kind nationwide. But it also drew criticism late last year from taxpayer groups that saw it as an example of wasteful government spending: Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Senate minority leader, helped secure $25,000 for the program in this year’s $388-billion federal budget.

Taxpayers for Common Sense, a budget watchdog group based in Washington, singled out the program for criticism.

“Every dollar going to mariachi music is a dollar that’s not going to some other national priority,” said Steve Ellis, the group’s vice president for programs. The mariachi classes are among 12,000 local efforts designated for special federal funding that totals about $15 billion.

Supporters of the mariachi program dismiss the critics. They say the program has the power to keep at-risk students -- many of whom are Latino -- engaged in school.

Javier Trujillo, project coordinator for mariachi instruction in the Clark County School District, said $25,000 was “the average price to keep a juvenile in the prison system per year. Now you apply that same amount of money to education -- you’re impacting thousands of student lives.”

The district, with 281,000 students, is the nation’s fifth-largest. Mariachi classes are concentrated in North Las Vegas schools, which are predominantly Latino, though the program is not exclusive to those students.

The key to the success of the program is the “marriage of schools and community,” said John Mahlmann, executive director of the National Assn. for Music Education. “It’s a terrible shame to have a dividing line of what happens in school and what happens at home.”

Although there are hundreds of smaller mariachi programs around the country, Clark County’s is notable for its rigorous academic requirements and standardized curriculum.

The program gained the support of the music educators’ group, which hopes to use Clark County’s template to establish mariachi courses and other specialized music programs elsewhere.

“What it really does is it gives kids a connection to their culture,” said Milana Winter, principal of Jim Bridger Middle School in North Las Vegas, where mariachi classes are in their second year. Since the program began, Winter has noticed a jump in parent participation at school events.

“Parents feel more welcome at school when there’s something” familiar, Winter said. She estimates that about one-fifth of Bridger parents speak English.

Edsel Lemus, a sophomore at Rancho High, said his parents thought it was “cool” that he practiced every day with Gabriel Cadena’s advanced mariachi class. When his parents showed up at one of his concerts, he said, “it was the first time they ever supported me. They said they were proud -- that felt good.”

“I’m not on the streets trying to do bad things,” said Lemus, who plays the vihuela, a guitar-shaped lute. Lemus and nine of his friends formed their own mariachi group, Mariachi Aguila. Wearing matching black windbreakers, they’ve played $400-an-hour gigs.

Cadena, a first-year teacher, has struggled to help his mariachi students excel in other subjects.

“All these kids want to do is go to the band room and practice,” Cadena said. He requires his advanced ensemble of 20 to earn grades of B or better on their report cards. Not only have several students boosted their grades, but the performers stay after school every day -- voluntarily -- to practice an extra hour or three.

Their enthusiasm stems from the excitement of the music, Cadena said.

Mariachi “gets all the juices running in the body,” he said after an afternoon spent leading a lively practice session.

Support from across the school district has helped the program grow. Clark County Supt. Carlos Garcia calls the program “fabulous” and expects it to expand to more schools next year. There are tentative plans to offer a Mexican folk dancing program next year.

“There are not that many opportunities for at-risk Hispanic kids to be successful,” Cadena said.

“It’s good to see a lot of these kids involved in something; if they weren’t in mariachi, they wouldn’t be in anything.”

The class is preparing for a performance next month at the American String Teachers Assn. Conference in Reno. For many students, traveling to the show will mean their first time on an airplane.

The music -- and a sense of belonging -- keeps sophomore violinist Godinez at school long after the sixth-period bell has chimed.

Mariachi, Godinez says, is “the language that I speak.”