Latin American Folk Music: Victor Jara

For Martin Luther King Day, I thought it would be appropriate to dedicate the second post in the Latin American folk music series to Victor Jara, the most ardently progressive and politically active of the artists I will profile.

2. Victor Jara - Te Recuerdo Amanda

Victor Jara's story is as tragic as it is inspiring. Victor was born rural Chile to a family of poor peasants. His father, Manuel, was an alcoholic and brutally abused his mother, Amanda. Manuel left the house in search of work when Victor was young, and in the years when Manuel was absent, Victor enjoyed a relatively happy life and learned to sing and play guitar under the instruction of his mother. Amanda died when Victor was 15.


After pursuing a meandering path through the seminary, and then the army, Victor finally found his calling in the arts, returning to his hometown of Loquen to study theatre performance and direction. During this time, he also developed his music and in doing so befriended Violeta Parra, a budding folk singer and artist in her own right (who in fact wrote Gracias a la Vida, the song Mercedes Sosa can be seen performing in my last post) and the owner of a local cafe where Victor found work.

Victor released his first self-titled album in 1966, and soon became one of the pillars of the Chilean Nueva Canción movement--music characterized by its blend of folk and rock, and, most importantly, its politically progressive lyrics. Victor was a staunch supporter of Salvador Allende, and often gave concerts in support of Allende and his Popular Union party. Jara was also quite prolific, putting out one album in every one of his eight years as a musician.

Victor's fortunes reversed with the Augusto Pinochet's 1973 military coup, an action that was backed, if not explicitly supported, by the CIA and the Nixon Administration. Victor was one of the first individuals rounded up by government soldiers and was detained, along with many other students and political activists, in the Estadio Chile (a soccer stadium). He was publicly beaten and tortured; at one point, his captors broke both of his hands and taunted him to play them a song on the guitar. Defiant, he sang a protest song instead. Soon after he was shot, killed, and buried in a mass grave.

Victor Jara's music and legacy has lived on, and today he to a powerful cultural figure to many Latin Americans, particularly in Chile. Much of the credit is due to his widow, Joan Jara, who was able to smuggle his recordings out of the country after his death, and who later published a biography of her husband.

Sadly, Victor's music is hard to get in the United States. Many of his albums are unavailable, even on Amazon, and I'm unfamiliar with those that are. Thank God for YouTube:



The song Victor is singing is Te Recuerdo Amanda. It is about Victor's mother, Amanda. Every day, no matter how hard it was raining, or how far it was, Amanda would run to the factory where her husband worked to visit him for just five minutes--the length of his workbreak. The song is about how happy she looked walking back, the rain in her hair.

Te recuerdo Amanda
la calle mojada
corriendo a la fábrica
donde trabajaba Manuel.
La sonrisa ancha
la lluvia en el pelo
no importaba nada
ibas a encontrarte con él
con él, con él, con él
son cinco minutos
la vida es eterna
en cinco minutos
suena la sirena
de vuelta al trabajo
y tú caminando
lo iluminas todo
los cinco minutos
te hacen florecer.

I remember you, Amanda
the wet street
running to the factory
where Manuel worked
A broad smile
the rain in your hair
nothing else mattered
you were going to be with him
with him, with him, with him
It's five minutes
life is eternal
in five minutes
The alarm sounds
back to work
and you, walking
you illuminate everything
those five minutes
make you blossom.

What makes the song particularly poignant is that it is not a realistic depiction of Victor's family or childhood. It could be his childhood as he wishes to remember it. It could also be his vision of an ideal that he never had. It ends in a familiar way, though: one day, Manuel goes to work, and never comes back. There is a vague reference in the music to "muchos no volvieron"--many didn't return--which seems to suggest that Manuel--or rather, the Manuel in the song--was somehow killed in a protest or strike.

As for how to get a hold of his recordings, your best shot is Amazon, but the pickings are slim. I have a recording of Te Recuerdo Amanda myself that (A) is much better than the video, and (B) I would be willing to, ahem, share with you if you so desire. Please let me know if you do.