(Sp. República del Perú).
Country in South American. It is situated on the Pacific western seaboard and covers an area of 1,285,216 km2, bordered by Ecuador, Colombia, Brazil, Bolivia and Chile. The country declared independence from Spain in 1821 and achieved full independence in 1824. The legal existence of Amerindian communities was recognized in the constitution after 1920. The population of 25·66 million (2000 estimate) is predominantly Amerindian and mestizo, and the original Inca language of Quechua is spoken by c16·5% as the second official language, Spanish being the first. Aymara is spoken by some 3%, mainly in the Southern Andes.
II. Traditional and popular music
GERARD BÉHAGUE (I), THOMAS TURINO (II).
Peru, the administrative centre of practically all Spanish South America from the Spanish conquest (1526) until the 18th century, occupied with Mexico the most important place in the Spanish colonial empire. During the colonial period Lima (the ‘City of Kings’) and Cuzco, the city of the Incas, developed an active cultural life. At Cuzco music was cultivated at the cathedral and the Seminario de S Antonio Abad (founded 1598), where polyphonic music and instrument playing were taught. The music archive of the seminary contains a rich collection of post-1600 colonial manuscripts of Spanish and Peruvian works, including a large number of polyphonic villancicos, tonadas, jácaras, liturgical works with and without ascription, and dramatic works such as loas, comedias and sainetes. There is evidence that as early as 1553 the first and second books of Morales’s masses (Rome, 1544) were in use at Cuzco, with other volumes of motets and Magnificat settings. Gutierre Fernández Hidalgo (c1547–1623), the most substantial composer in 16th-century South America, held the post of maestro de capilla at Cuzco for a few years before moving permanently to Sucre in Bolivia.
Missionary work was keenly pursued in Peru, as in the other Spanish colonies. The Franciscan Juan Pérez Bocanegra included in his Ritual formulario e institución de curas (Lima, 1631) a four-part polyphonic piece titled Hanacpachap cussicuinin, to a text in the Quechua language, to be sung ‘in processions when entering the church’; it is the earliest example of polyphony printed in the New World. Fray Gregorio Dezuola (de Zuola) (d 1709), active at the convent of S Francisco in Cuzco, left a book known as the Dezuola Manuscript, which contains 17 songs, mostly polyphonic, with Spanish texts (with the exception of a ‘Credo romano’). Only two items of the collection have been ascribed; one to Francisco Correa de Arauxo, the other to Tomás de Herrera, who was appointed organist of Cuzco Cathedral in 1611. Herrera’s piece is a short song, Hijos de Eva tributarios, for two altos and tenor, and is the earliest known example of vernacular polyphony in Peru.
Lima, the capital of the viceroyalty of Peru, developed a musical life unequalled by any other South American city. The cathedral (consecrated 1572) employed many well-paid singers and instrumentalists and attracted several famous maestros de capilla. The post was created in 1612 and its responsibilities included conducting the orchestra and the choir, the composition of works for all occasions, the teaching of polyphony, financial administration and acting as intermediary between the archbishop, the chapter and the musicians. Tomás de Torrejón y Velasco was maestro de capilla from 1676 to 1728, and his works (extant at Lima and Cuzco) were performed throughout Spanish America. His fame also rests on his opera La púrpura de la rosa (1701, libretto by Calderón de la Barca), the first produced in the New World, which indicates the extent of the maestro de capilla’s involvement in the whole musical life of the city. His successor, the Italian-born Roque Ceruti, who went to Peru primarily as the director and conductor of the viceroy’s private chapel and orchestra, exerted a decisive influence by introducing the bel canto style. Another Italian musician associated with Lima Cathedral, Andrés Bolognesi, active at the turn of the 19th century, was responsible for organizing and developing local opera.
The first native Peruvian composer of church music was José de Orejón y Aparicio, considered the most talented Peruvian musician of his time. He was appointed organist of the cathedral in 1742, and in 1760 he succeeded Ceruti as the acting choirmaster. Among his many works his Passion for Good Friday for double chorus and orchestra and a solo cantata Mariposa de sus rayos reveal his inventive treatment of melody and harmony. Extant works of Juan Beltrán, Melchor Tapia and Bonifacio Llaque, all cathedral musicians, indicate that church music declined at Lima during the early 19th century.
The splendour of colonial musical life had no counterpart in the years of the struggle for independence (1820–80), during which operas and salon music predominated. Church music continued to be written in a secularized Romantic style, as can be seen in some works by José Bernardo Alcedo (1788–1878), composer of the Peruvian national anthem.
At the end of the 19th century Peruvian composers, who had become more technically competent, began to turn to Peruvian folklore for inspiration. Immigrant musicians were the first to treat Peruvian subjects in works written within the Romantic tradition, such as the successful opera Atahualpa (1875) by the Italian Carlo Enrico Pasta (1817–98) and the Rapsodia peruana by Claudio Rebagliati (1843–1909). This Romantic nationalism was adopted by José María Valle Riestra (1859–1925), educated in London, Paris and Berlin, in his opera Ollanta (1900), and by Luis Duncker Lavalle (1874–1922), who wrote piano pieces in a semi-popular style inspired by the most characteristic mestizo folk-music genres. The various generations of early 20th-century composers developed musical nationalism within concurrent European styles. Music of the Quechua-speaking Indians, which is pentatonic and displays distinctive rhythmic features, became a source of national identity. The Amerindian style is found in varying degrees in the works of Daniel Alomía Robles (1871–1942), Manuel Aguirre (1863–1951), Luis Pacheco de Céspedes (b 1895), Carlos Sánchez Málaga (1904–95) and many others. Theodoro Valcárcel (1900–42), the most prolific and imaginative Peruvian composer of his generation, at first adopted an impressionistic style and later evolved a refined form of nationalism.
With the arrival in Peru in the 1920s and 30s of the European composers and musicologists Andrés Sas (1900–67) and Rudolf Holzmann (1910–92), Peruvian art music was revitalized. Sas and Holzmann taught practically all the Peruvian musicians of that generation, and made available in Peru a much-needed solid academic training. Holzmann promoted the study of contemporary composition techniques and aesthetic attitudes, particularly the music of the Second Viennese School and of Hindemith. As the head of the musicological service of the National School of Folk Music and Dance in Lima, Holzmann encouraged research into colonial music and was active in the study of Peruvian folk and traditional music. Sas concentrated his studies on the indigenous music of his adopted country and specialized in Peruvian pre-Columbian and colonial music.
An awareness of contemporary international currents appears in the works of younger composers such as Enrique Iturriaga (b 1918), Celso Garrido-Lecca (b 1926), Francisco Bernado Pulgar Vidal (b 1929), Enrique Pinilla (1927–89) and Alejandro Núñez Allauca (b 1931) in their use of atonal expressionism, neo-classicism or serialism. Iturriaga has become a leading figure in modern Peruvian composition; he has gradually turned from large nationalist works to dodecaphony. The outstanding figures of the Peruvian avant garde include César Bolaños (b 1931), Edgar Valcárcel (b 1932), José Malsio (b 1924), Leopoldo La Rosa (b 1931) and Pozzi Escot (b 1931). Most of those named have had links with foreign music institutions: Bolaños and Valcárcel have been Fellows of the Di Tella Institute of Buenos Aires; Garrido-Lecca spent two years at the Columbia–Princeton Electronic Music Center, USA; Pozzi Escot has taught for several years at the New England Conservatory of Music and at Wheaton College, USA; Pinilla studied at the Hochschule für Musik in Berlin, and Iturriaga received lessons in Paris from Arthur Honegger. In the late 1970s and 80s a number of younger composers emerged on the Peruvian scene revealing a dynamic, eclectic production. The most notable figures at that time were Walter Casas Napán (b 1939), Pedro Seiji Asato (b 1940), Teófilo Alvarez (b 1944), Douglas Tarnawiecki (b 1948), Luis David Aguilar (b 1950) and José Carols Campos (b 1957).
See also Lima.
StevensonRB
C. Raygada: ‘Panorama musical del Perú’, Boletín latino-americano de música, ii (1936), 169–214
C. Sanchez Málaga: ‘La música en el Perú’, Nuestra música, ii (1947), 72–7
C. Arróspide de la Flor and R. Holzmann: ‘Catálogo de los manuscritos de música existentes en el Archivo Arzobispal de Lima’, Cuaderno de estudio, iii/7 (1949), 36–49; enlarged in StevensonRB, 114–30
R. Barbacci: ‘Apuntes para un diccionario biográfico musical peruano’, Fénix, no.6 (1949), 414–510
R. Vargas Ugarte: ‘Un archivo de música colonial en la ciudad del Cuzco’, Mar del Sur, v/26 (1953), 1–10
C. Raygada: ‘Guía musical del Perú’, Fénix, no.12 (1956–7), 3–77; no.13 (1963), 1–82; no.14 (1964), 3–95
R. Stevenson: ‘Opera Beginnings in the New World’, MQ, xlv (1959), 8–25
R. Stevenson: The Music of Peru: Aboriginal and Viceroyal Epochs (Washington DC, 1960)
C. Vega: ‘Un códice peruano colonial del siglo XVII’, RMC, nos.79–82 (1962), 54–93
E. Pinilla: ‘Informe sobre la música en el Perú’, Historia del Perú, ix, ed. J. Mejía Baca (Lima, 1980), 363–77
E. Iturriaga and J.C. Estenssoro: ‘Emancipación y República: siglo XIX’, La música en el Perú (Lima, 1985), 103–24
E. Pinilla: ‘La música en el siglo XX’, La música en el Perú (Lima, 1985), 125–213
J. Quezada: ‘La música en el virreinato’, La música en el Perú (Lima, 1985), 65–102
J.C. Estenssoro: Música y sociedad coloniales: Lima 1680–1830 (Lima, 1989)
The varieties of traditional and popular music in Peru correlate with different social groups and regions. The musics of indigenous communities and of mestizos of the Andean highlands represent the two most prominent style complexes. Criollos (creoles, i.e. American-born of Spanish descent, generally of European heritage), Afro-Peruvians on the Pacific coast and lowland indigenous groups in the Amazonian rain forest perform different styles. The audiences for recent urban-popular genres tend to cross regional boundaries but are still often delineated by ethnicity and class.
1. Documentation and collections.
6. Coastal ‘criollo’and Afro-Peruvian music.
7. Music of highland migrants in cities.
Peru, §II: Traditional and polular music
Information about pre-Columbian Peruvian music comes from 16th- and 17th-century chronicles, church documents and archaeological instruments and iconography (see Inca music). The archaeological record is strongest for pre-Columbian coastal cultures. Museum collections in Lima (e.g. Museo Nacional de la Cultura Peruana), North America and Europe house instruments and ceramics that depict instruments or musical activities. The most important sources for highland music and dance in the pre-conquest and early colonial periods include the chronicles of Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala who discusses indigenous music, dances and festivals and provides illustrations and song texts; Guaman Poma also makes mention of, or illustrates, early colonial musical practices and instruments.
Don Baltasar Jaime Martínez Campañón y Bujanda documented and provided illustrations of costumed dances, harp and violin in Trujillo on the north coast for the second half of the 18th century. There are a few scattered references to highland and coastal music in travellers’ accounts during the 18th and 19th centuries, but indigenous and mestizo music is poorly documented for this period. Victor Guzmán Cáceres and Daniel Alomía Robles collected criollo, mestizo and indigenous music in the early 20th century but their material remains largely unpublished. The Harcourts worked in Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia between 1912 and 1924 and produced the first major study of Andean music and instruments (1925). In more recent years a number of substantial general studies and printed collections of pre-Columbian, indigenous, mestizo, and criollo music and song texts have been published (e.g. see Stevenson, robert murrell).
The Harcourts made early cylinder recordings, 168 of which were published in transcription (1925). 190 field recordings made by Isabel Aretz in 1942 are housed in the Instituto Interamericano de Etnomusicología y Folklore (Caracas). There is a collection of Andean music in the Archives of Traditional Music at Indiana University. Sound, photo and video documentation of traditional Peruvian music and dance is now centred at the Archivo de Música Tradicional Andina at the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú in Lima (catalogue, 1995); archive recordings are being reissued on the US based Smithsonian Folkways label.
Peru, §II: Traditional and polular music
Wind, drums, and ideophones were the only instruments used in the Peruvian highlands and on the coast before the arrival of the Spanish in 1532 (fig.1); there is little information about pre-Columbian music of the Peruvian Amazon. Many of the prominent types of pre-Columbian instruments were still used in performance in the late 20th century, although terminology, tunings and materials of construction have sometimes changed.
There is archaeological evidence for vertical notched flutes for the coast and highlands (see fig.1(b)). Now known as Kena, as well as by other local names, end-blown notched flutes were known in the highlands as pinkullu (also pincollo, pingollo) in the pre-Columbian period. Archaeological ceramic whistles, ocarinas and whistle jars indicate that the technology for duct flutes existed before the Spanish conquest, yet there is no early evidence for pre-Columbian vertical duct flutes. One of the most common indigenous instruments, end-blown duct flutes (often called pinkullu or pinkillu) may have been modelled on the European recorder during the colonial period. An extant example of a transverse flute with two finger-holes from coastal Moche culture has been found.
Archaeological panpipes from the coast, especially from Nasca culture (see fig.1(a)), have been studied by a number of scholars. Findings indicate that high-pitched tunings were favoured, that single-row instruments were predominant, that intervals both smaller and larger than European semitones were included, and that panpipes were sometimes played in consort with two sizes tuned in octaves. The 16th-century chronicler Garcilaso describes panpipe performance in the southern Peruvian-Bolivian highlands involving double-row interlocking practice, with different parts (tiple, tenor, contralto, contrabajo) suggesting that different sized panpipes may have been played in consort to create parallel polyphony as in the late 20th century. Panpipes were called antara, and siku (or sico).
Trumpets were the other main pre-Columbian wind instruments. Curved and straight trumpets without stops were made of ceramic, metal and conch shells, while conch-shell trumpets are depicted as important in Inca culture by Guaman Poma. Ceramic single-headed drums have been found on the coast. Drawings by Guaman Poma show a variety of different sized double-headed drums. Interestingly, he shows women playing both large and small double-headed drums. In the late 1990s the small double-headed tinya is the only instrument played by indigenous women in the Peruvian Andes. Leg rattles are also depicted by Guaman Poma.
From chroniclers’ and early missionaries’ accounts it is clear that in Inca society music was associated with monthly festivals, and was closely bound to indigenous religion and agriculture. Garcilaso suggests that masked dances were indigenous to Cuzco.
Peru, §II: Traditional and polular music
Quechua, the language of the Inca empire and a lingua franca favoured by early colonial missionaries, is spoken throughout most of the Peruvian sierra and among highland migrants in coastal cities. In Peru, Aymara (the second most prominent Andean Amerindian language) is largely restricted to the departamento of Puno: in the province of Huancané on the northwest side of Lake Titicaca and in Chucuito province on the south side, with both Quechua- and Amyara-speaking communities in the province of Puno located between Huancané and Chucuito. Academics and state institutions have used ‘Quechua’ and ‘Aymara’ as cultural categories for convenience; indigenous groups have sometimes strategically used these concepts as the basis of political ethnic groupings. Notions of a Quechua or Aymara culture or ‘nation’, however, tend to be alien to the discourse of rural villagers who more frequently define their identities in specific community and regional terms. The main generalizable musical difference between Quechua- and Aymara-speaking communities is that vocal music is usually central in the former and relatively unimportant in the latter. Otherwise, indigenous Andean music is best understood in regional terms.
Spanning regional and ethnolinguistic differences, certain aesthetic preferences, musical practices and stylistic features are common to indigenous Andean music. The music tends to involve short sections of between two and four phrases which are repeated in various ways: AABB, AABBCC, ABAB. There is often a good deal of motivic repetition between sections and a single, short piece will often be repeated for a long time during festivals. Scales vary from three to seven notes according to region, and to genre within the same region, but often include an initial minor 3rd. Melodic shape tends to be either undulating or descending, or both. There is a preference for dense timbres involving complex overtone structures and for relatively wide intonational variation for any given pitch. There is also a preference for dense, overlapping textures within the overall approaches of wide unison, heterophony and parallel polyphony for group performance. High tessitura in vocal, wind and string music is favoured, with all flutes except panpipes being overblown and young women being the preferred singers. Most indigenous music is in duple metre and involves syncopated rhythms. A prototypical Andean rhythmic feel, basic to genres such as the Huayno, carnavale, hyalas, kh’ajelo and others, subtly fluctuates between a quaver and two semi-quavers figure and a quaver triplet. With the exception of the small double-headed tinya drum, indigenous instrumental performance is restricted to males.
In the Lake Titicaca region of Puno, various panpipe styles are heard during the dry season (April to October). The double-row sikuri style is prominently performed by community ensembles ranging from 12 to over 50 players for public festival dancing and weddings. As with most panpipe traditions in this region, sikuri performances involve paired musicians performing their individual panpipe rows in interlocking fashion. Communities and micro-regions in the Lake Titicaca area use specific types of consorts with panpipes cut to different sizes to render parallel polyphony. A common style diffused from the Aymara district of Conima after the 1920s involves nine panpipe sizes (three groups of three) tuned in parallel 3rds, 5ths and octaves. Other consort styles render parallel 4ths, 5ths, and octaves or simply parallel octaves. A variable number of panpipe players accompany the group with large double-headed drums (bombos or wankara); the rhythms played are modelled on the rhythms of a given melody. As common for much of the music in the southern area, sikuri music is standardly in AABBCC form in duple metre and involves a good deal of syncopation. Several scales are used; six- and seven-note series with a minor 3rd and flattened 7th are common. Among Aymara communities on the north shore of Lake Titicaca, several single-row panpipe styles are still occasionally performed, as are the huge double-row chiriguano panpipes in three parallel octaves without drums during May in Huancané. In the province of Lampa, Quechua communities perform double-row ayarachis panpipes in parallel octaves accompanied by thin caja drums. Both Aymara and Quechua communities south of the lake in Puno, Monquegua and Tacna perform the sikumoreno style. The double-row sikumoreno panpipes are cut to produce two or three parallel octaves. With their faster tempos, Western snare and base drum accompaniment, and more staccato blowing technique, sikumoreno ensembles have a more sprightly quality than most other panpipe styles. In the same region, notched end-blown flutes are also played to accompany specific festival dances during the dry season. Known by a variety of dance-specific names such as chokela or pulipuli, these cane flutes are approximately 55 cm in length and have six top finger-holes and a thumb-hole. They are played in unison in large ensembles with or without drum accompaniment, with the flutes typically overblown to produce the high ranges preferred by indigenous Andeans.
The pinkillu (or pinkullu) and tarka, two end-blown duct flutes, are the primary indigenous instruments played during rainy season festivals in the Titicaca region. Performed in unison to accompany circle dances, pinkillu music is in AABBCC form with a six- or seven-note scale. Some six to 20 pinkullu players are accompanied by almost an equal number of large, deep sounding, indigenous snare drums (cajas). Tarkas are carved wooden duct flutes with six finger-holes and a mouthpiece fashioned to split the octave partially and produce a reedy sound. Performed in consorts of between two and four different sizes in parallel 4ths, 5ths, and octaves, they are accompanied by Western snare and bass drums which play syncopated patterns mirroring the given melody. Tarka music in AABBCC form is typically pentatonic.
The other instrumental ensembles of the southern region include 10 to 15 transverse cane or wooden flutes cut for parallel 4ths, 5ths and octaves. The transverse flutes are supported by snare and bass drums to accompany specific costumed dances at any time of year. Valveless animal horn or metal trumpets (pututus) are played during the Carnival season in Puno, usually as drones within a flute ensemble or as noise makers during celebration. Charango, a small guitar variant with five duple or triple courses, are used by young indigenous men to perform the kh’ajelo genre for courting in the Titicaca area. A number of charangos will be performed in unison for dancing, the young men forming half a circle facing the young women who sing in responsorial fashion to the men. Beginning in the 19th century, brass bands have become increasingly important in indigenous communities throughout Peru.
The non-specialized, communal-participatory character of music-making in the Titicaca region has influenced musical form. Music is primarily learnt by playing within public festival performance. There may be a ‘rehearsal’ the night before a festival but this is usually a session for composing new pieces and is attended only by the most dedicated community musicians. Many community members only join the group during the festival. Motivic repetition, long repetition of any given piece (a piece lasting a minute is typically repeated 20 to 30 times), and stock genre formulae help people to rapidly learn the new compositions during performance. An ensemble’s new compositions are stressed in Aymara communities in Puno as well as in Quechua communites in other regions such as Ayacucho. Elsewhere, the same music may be used annually as an index of a particular event.
Indigenous music in northern Puno and the departments of Cuzco, Apurimac, north-eastern Arequipa, Ayacucho, Huancavelica and parts of Junín form another musical area. Here panpipe performance is rare. Several large end-blown notched or duct flutes are played solo or in unison for agricultural ceremonies with or without drum accompaniment during the rainy season. A long wooden pinkullu (a duct flute approximately 1·5 metres long) is played for agricultural and livestock rituals in Arequipa with tinya (small drum) and in southern Cuzco without drum accompaniment. In southern Cuzco this same large pinkullu is played during the ritual battles that take place between communities during the rainy season. Smaller pinkullo and tinya are played in pipe-and-tabor fashion to accompany communal agriculture work in Junín (fig.2). Informal, solo performance of the smaller kena (notched flute, approximately 36 cm long) is common in this region and in northern Peru, and kenas have been incorporated into festival dance ensembles comprising violins or mandolins, harp, accordion and drums for performance at any time of year. Ensembles comprising one to three transverse wooden or cane flutes playing six- or seven-note descending melodies in unison with snare and bass drums are common for festival dancing throughout the year in Cuzco and Apurimac. In Cuzco village headmen play conch-shell trumpets to herald their presence to district authorities during festivals. Long valveless, side-blown wooden or cane trumpets (1·5 to 3 metres in length or more, e.g. clarín, llungur) are played for agricultural ceremonies in Junín and Huancavelica as well as in locations in northern Peru such as Cajamarca. In Apurimac, Ayacucho, Huancavelica and Junín, circular cow-horn trumpets (wakrapuku) are performed during village bullfights. In Junín, one or two wakrapuku are used in combination with tinya, violin and female singing in tritones for the marking of cattle during the feast of St James (25 July).
Music for strings is highly developed and more widespread than music for indigenous wind instruments in this musical area. Diffused to Andean peoples early in the colonial period by missionaries, the diatonic harp and violin are primary instruments performed solo, used together in duos, or as parts of larger ensembles to accompany singing and dance (fig.3). In keeping with indigenous aesthetics, the violin is heavily bowed, creating a dense sound, and often played in its higher ranges with slides and other ornaments. In Ayacucho and Huancavelica harp-violin duos are used to accompany the famous scissors dance (danzaq), a highly-specialized, esoteric tradition. Solo and group charango performance, primarily by young indigenous men for courting, is found in pockets throughout this musical area. Indigenous charango performance involves the strumming of single-line melodies, sometimes punctuated by two-finger chords, against the backdrop of open thin metal strings, producing the dense buzzy sound favoured by indigenous Andeans.
From the departments of Ancash and Huanuco to the north, string and brass bands are prominent. Pipe-and-tabor performance with pinkullu or a single-row panpipe (e.g. antara) is more common than in southern Peru. In Cajamarca, the antara is a single-row panpipe tuned to pentatonic scale for the solo performance of mestizo genres like the huayno and triste in informal contexts. Several kenas performed with snare drum and cymbals are a typical festival dance ensemble in the northern department of Lambayeque. Pinkullus or side-blown flutes performed with drums or other instruments are also used for dancing in the north, and various types of indigenous trumpets are played in festivals and work-related rituals and parties. In general, however, mestizo ensembles and genres, or urban-popular styles like salsa and chicha, are the mainstay in northern Peru.
Quechua songs are sung within, and in reference to, a wide variety of occasions including agricultural labour and rituals for livestock, the building of homes and roof-raising parties, for life-cycle events including ‘first haircutting’ for children, courting, child-rearing, weddings, funerals and wakes and for the whole gamut of festival religious and dance occasions. Like the music itself, Quechua song texts tend to involve relatively short lines and a high degree of repetition within and across strophes, often with only subtle paradigmatic substitutions made from one line to another. Depending on context, the length of strophes can be quite flexible within a single song performance. The texts are often highly metaphoric using nature imagery, or will include concrete mention of specific activities and social roles for the given context. While both men and women sing, women, and especially young women, are the favoured vocalists because of the preference for high vocal ranges. Singing style typically involves forceful nasal-throat singing, although in private contexts women also sing in a soft, high, delicate style. Women often use ornamental falsetto glides, especially to punctuate the end of lines and sections. Unison and heterophonic singing among groups of women or men is typical; responsorial singing between men and women also commonly takes place in courting and on festival occasions such as Carnival where sexual relations are paramount. In such contexts male-female song duels, including playful taunts and insults, emerge.
Peru, §II: Traditional and polular music
There are several small indigenous societies in the Amazon region of Peru who speak languages related to the Tupi-Carib, Panoan, Arawakan and Jívaro families: to date relatively little detailed ethnomusicological research has been done among these groups. Extant information suggests that, like Amazonian societies elsewhere, communal singing and dancing represent central musical activities with instrumental accompaniment varying between specific societies, and purely instrumental music being less common. Drums, panpipes, vertical flutes, trumpets and rattles have been reported for a number of groups. Within the same small-scale society there is often a wide variety of vocal genres and styles ranging from the soft, non-metred, melismatic singing of laments to forceful group chanting with regular, repetitive rhythms. Among the societies studied, unison and heterophonic singing are most common. Scales tend to vary widely. In contrast to highland peoples, songs often play an important role in curing procedures among indigenous Amazonian groups. Songs are vehicles for the telling of myths and history as well as being related to life-cycle events and subsistence activities. Music is also commonly used by shamans in combination with hallucinogens to transcend mundane experience.
Peru, §II: Traditional and polular music
The music is associated with Peruvians who are identified or self-identify as mestizo may be characterized as incorporating more Iberian elements relative to highland indigenous performers. This situation is obscured by the facts that indigenous music, dance and ceremony also variously incorporate European elements, and that ethnic identities in Peru are highly context-sensitive and fluid. A few mestizo musical traits may be generalized for highland Peru. These include strophic song forms, the use of parallel 3rds and 6ths, an emphasis on European string and wind instruments and in certain genres the use of hemiola moving between 3/4 and 6/8 metres. While intensive and extensive repetition is favoured by indigenous musicians, mestizos tend to favour a higher level of musical contrast, e.g. juxtaposing pieces in different metres within a medley. As compared with indigenous performers, mestizos also typically prefer more moderate pitch ranges and greater textural-timbral clarity. As in indigenous communities, mestizo song texts may be in the indigenous language or Spanish, or both, although there will be a higher percentage of Spanish texts among mestizos relative to the indigenous population. Whereas indigenous genres are highly context-specific, major mestizo genres such as the huayno (wayno, wayño), the marinera, the yaraví, marches and hymns are widely diffused and musically identifiable across regions.
The huayno is the most important highland mestizo song-dance genre. Huaynos are in a moderate-to-quick simple duple metre, often with an extra beat at major cadences. The rhythmic underpinning, a subtle yet constant shifting between a quaver and two semiquaver movement and a quaver triplet, is a hallmark feature. Musical forms such as AABB and ABAB are common. Within sections, antecedent phrases typically end on a cadence in the relative major and the final section on a cadence in the relative minor chord with rather static harmonies, involving III, VI, V and i chords, accompanying four-, six-, seven-, or most commonly five-note melodies. Huaynos often end with a musically distinct and more animated fuga section. According to mestizo composers such as Julio Benavente Díaz from Cuzco, the huayno is the genre of choice for expressing deeply-felt sentiments and important ideas. The strophic texts cover an extremely wide range of topics including humorous or joking themes, topical and overtly political songs, happy and sad love songs, songs about work, songs of leave-taking or celebrating specific locations, songs about death or the loss of one’s parents. Text lines frequently do not rhyme.
The huayno is a couple or group dance which, depending on the region, involves fast rhythmic footwork (e.g. Cuzco to Junín) or a softer forward shuffle step (Puno). The upper body position is relatively erect and static; couples and groups in line or circle formations may hold hands or dance independently holding handkerchiefs or yarn cords with pompoms. The dancing typically becomes more animated in the fuga section. The genre is performed in the full range of mestizo musical contexts from family celebrations and drinking parties to public Catholic festivals and stage presentations. Indigenous people in southern Peru often use the term huayno generically for song; indigenous people also perform the specific huayno genre described here. Within specific regions other terms such as carnavales, kh’ajelo (Puno), huayllachas (Arequipa), huaylas (Junín), and kashua (Cajamarca) are used both by mestizo and indigenous musicians to refer to what are closely allied musical variants of the huayno.
The Marinera is the second most prominent mestizo song-dance genre in Peru. It is related stylistically to the cueca of Chile and Bolivia, and the zamba of Argentina; it was known in Lima as the zamacueca in the early 19th century. While some historians have suggested Hispanic roots for the dance, others suggest Afro-Peruvian derivation; 19th-century commentators often associated it with Afro-Peruvians. Performed in moderate tempo, marineras are in 6/8 metre and feature hemiola rhythms. The entire form (e.g. AABBCCBB) is usually repeated twice (called la primera (the first) and la segunda (the second)) with a quick break in between. Like the huayno, the marinera typically juxtaposes phrases in the relative major and minor keys with the final cadence on the minor. The texts are typically restricted to light romantic themes. The marinera is a graceful couple dance in which the dancers wave a pañuelo (handkerchief) in one hand. Three regional choreographic variants, from the highlands, Lima and the north coast, are distinguished by Peruvians. As with the huayno, the marinera is danced in the full range of public festivals and private social gatherings in the north and in the southern sierra. In northern regions such as Lambayeque, the marinera is a particularly prominent genre.
During the 18th century the yaraví was a widespread popular genre with a relatively broad thematic-emotional scope and lyrics occasionally in Quechua. In the contemporary period, yaraví refers to a slow, lyrical, romantic song genre with strophic Spanish texts treating sad or sombre topics such as unrequited love, and separation from home and family. The term yaraví was perhaps derived from a pre-Columbian generic designation for song and poetry, harawi, but by 1754 it had already come to signify cancion triste (sad song). Typically written in 3/4 metre, the music alternates between 3/4 and 6/8 rhythms (sesquialtera) but sometimes also includes dramatic retardandos at cadences such that the sense of pulse and metre become obscured. Like other mestizo genres the yaraví juxtaposes the relative major and minor keys. Yaravís are performed at serious moments on social occasions, and may be performed instrumentally in religious contexts (e.g. in religious processions).
Unlike these widespread genres and the ubiquitous brass bands, mestizo ensemble types are often region-specific, as are solo instrumental styles. Large string ensembles, known as estudiantinas, are closely associated with Puno but historically have had a presence in urban Cuzco, Ayacucho and elsewhere. They comprise a guitar section (between two and five) that supplies a prominent bass line as well as harmonic accompaniment; one or two charangos providing strummed chordal accompaniment; and several mandolins, violins and often kenas as the principal melody instruments. In addition to performing the generalized mestizo song types, in Puno estudiantinas also play arranged versions of local indigenous panpipe and flute music. Popularized within the romantic-nationalist indigenista movement in the early 20th century, estudiantinas typically perform in theatre and other stage settings. In Cuzco, a local style of orquesta providing music for public festival dancing comprises harp, accordion, between one and three violins, two kenas and bass drum. In the Apurimac, Ayacucho, Huancavelica area, ensembles comprising guitars and mandolins, or harps and violins, are common as are other string combinations and the inclusion of kenas. The festival dance orquesta of Junín combines numerous saxophones and clarinets with the ensemble core of harp and violin. A ‘typical’ festival dance orchestra of Lanbayeque comprises several kenas, snare and bass drums and cymbals. In Cajamarca, ensembles combining violins, snare and bass drums, or guitars, violins, kenas and percussion are frequently heard. A plethora of ad hoc instrumental combinations is found throughout Peru.
In Cuzco, Apurimac, Ayacucho and to the north, regionalized solo harp traditions are important: in northern Peru, as in Ecuador, a second musician will sometimes beat percussion parts on the harp. Prominent solo mestizo charango styles, which juxtapose strummed-chordal and plucked-melodic sections, are regionally centred on Ayacucho, Cuzco, Arequipa and Puno. A solo guitar style combining classical guitar technique with local musical elements is associated with Ayacucho. Important practitioners of this style, such as Raúl García Zarate, play bass lines derived from Ayacuchan harp performance, the melody in parallel 3rds on the higher strings with prominent vibrato and extended bass runs between musical phrases and sections.
Large public festivals to celebrate the feast day of a town’s patron saint are the single most important type of occasion for mestizo music and dance throughout most of highland Peru. Locally specific as well as widely diffused dance-drama traditions are a central component of most patronal fiestas. Derived from colonial autos sacramentales (religious conversion plays), European Carnival dances and perhaps pre-existing indigenous dances, dance–dramas involve a troupe of masked and often costumed performers whose festival presentation enacts or alludes to historical, topical or mythical characters and happenings. Widespread dance–dramas often parody or characterize ‘outsiders’ such as jungle Indians, Spaniards, blacks or supernatural beings such as devils. Central and southern Peru remain a stronghold for spirited dance drama performance.
Peru, §II: Traditional and polular music
In Peru, the term criollo implies Iberian–Peruvian cultural orientation and heritage; criollo culture is most strongly associated with Lima and the coast, as well as sometimes with élites in provincial cities. From the colonial period through to the late 20th century, the music associated with criollo culture was largely derived from cosmopolitan and European sources, including European classical and urban-popular styles and military band music. Theatre music, especially the zarzuela (music drama), was important for diffusing European styles. The marinera Limeña was an early distinctive criollo popular form and at the end of the 19th century this genre, along with the waltz and the polka, was the mainstay of popular criollo music. Among these, the vals criollo (waltz) emerged as the most important in the early 20th century, and came to be almost synonymous with música criolla after the mid-20th century.
The vals criollo was influenced by the jota and the mazurka, the three genres becoming popular in Lima in the mid-19th century. Largely rejected by the upper classes, during the first three decades of the 20th century the vals criollo was the primary genre among the criollo working class and poor. Used for dancing, waltzes were common to drinking parties and family celebrations. They were performed variably with guitar, laúd or bandúrria (fig.4) to support the singing of texts which commented on working-class life and personal experience, often involving themes of conflict, suffering, loneliness and unrequited love. According to Stein (1982), they projected the world view of pessimism and fatalism of their proletariat composers. The grass roots performance of the vals declined in the mid-1920s due to the new influence of the mass media and foreign styles such as the tango, Mexican rancheras and North American forms such as the fox-trot. After the 1950s the vals criollo shed its working-class associations and was nostalgically adopted as the musical emblem for Limeña criollo culture in general. An important style change was the addition of the Afro-Peruvian cajón (wooden-box drum played with the hands) (Romero, 1985). Although of particular significance in the Lima context, the vals criollo is also performed throughout Peru.
While música criolla has incorporated Afro-Peruvian elements such as the cajón and certain rhythmic features, Romero (1985) suggests that the small Afro-Peruvian minority was basically assimilated into criollo culture. Afro-Peruvian and white criollo musicians had been mutually influencing each other for some time; the black performance of the coastal marinera in the 19th century is one example. After the turn of the 20th century, Afro-Peruvian communities ceased to perform distinct black genres such as the alcatraz, the penalivio, the ingá and the agua’e nieve, among others. Beginning in the 1950s, however, an Afro-Peruvian revivalist movement inspired the formation of folkloric troupes that performed styles presented as black traditions.
Peru, §II: Traditional and polular music
Once considered the bastion of criollo culture, Lima underwent a major transformation in the decades following World War II, due to highland migration. Waves of highlanders from different states created a market for commercial recordings and shows featuring various regional styles; the huayno was the primary genre within this phenomenon. Live performances were held on weekends in coliseos (stadiums or large tents), and radio programmes dedicated to regional huayno music emerged in the 1950s. A star system of highland performers was created with the emphasis on specific styles mirroring the size of the migrant population from that region at given points in time. Music from Junín, Ancash, Huancavelica, Cuzco and Ayacucho was the first to be recorded. Stars such as El Picaflor de los Andes from Junín and La Pastorita Huaracina from Ancash dressed in stylized regional costumes, sang songs from and about home and were backed by ‘typical orchestras’ of their area to appeal to these specific migrant populations. Their performances blended indices of regional identity with elements of ‘urban sophistication’ such as singing with wide vocal vibrato and tight instrumental arrangements.
The commercial sphere of Andean music was paralleled and supported by regional migrant clubs in the capital. Regional clubs existed in Lima from the early 20th century but increased tremendously in number after the 1950s. They organized patronal fiestas in the city, often including the dance groups and ensemble types that performed in their home towns. The clubs also held smaller parties and dances, engaging recording artists from their regions or playing commercial recordings of huaynos as well as other popular international styles such as Colombian cumbia. The clubs from certain regions became the basis for organizing highland-style ensembles: e.g. Puno regional clubs formed panpipe groups in the city. By the early 1980s the last of the commercial coliseos had disappeared and the clubs had effectively taken over the organization of highland musical events in Lima. These trends were reproduced in other Peruvian cities.
In the 1960s a new form of pan-highland migrant music known as chicha or cumbia Andina began to emerge in Lima. At first appealing to the teenage and young adult children of highland migrants, chicha is a fusion of the melodic structure of huaynos with the rhythm of Colombian cumbia performed with electric instruments (guitars, bass and keyboards), trap set, and Caribbean percussion (timbales, guïro, cow-bell). Actual huaynos are sometimes set to cumbia rhythm; more often chicha songs are new compositions. The majority of texts are about romantic love, often unrequited, but chicha songs also speak to the struggles and aspirations of the working- and lower-class children of highland migrants in cities. Major national chicha stars such as Los Shapis and Grupo Alegría had great mass appeal in the 1980s. The style remained vital in the 1990s as the emblem for a new Peruvian identity fusing images of Andean roots, modernity and urbanity.
Peru, §II: Traditional and polular music
D. Gonzáles Holguin: Vocabulario de la lengua general de todos el Perú llamada lengua Qquichua o del Inca (Lima, 1608)
R. and M. Harcourt: La musique des Incas et ses survivances (Paris, 1925, rev. 2/1957 by S.L. Moreno as La música de los Incas)
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F. Guaman Poma de Ayala: Nueva corónica y buen gobierno (Paris, 1936/R)
I. Garcilaso de la Vega: Comentarios reales de los Incas (Buenos Aires, 1945)
P. Verger: Fiestas y danzas en el Cuzco y en los Andes (Buenos Aires, 1945)
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R. Holzmann, ed: Panorama de la música tradicional del Perú (Lima, 1966)
C. Pagaza Galdo: Cancionero andinio sur (Lima, 1967)
R. Stevenson: Music in Aztec and Inca Territory (Berkeley and London, 1968/R)
T.D. Lucas: ‘Songs of the Shipibo of the Upper Amazon’, Yearbook for Inter-American Musical Research, vii (1971), 59–67
R.J. Smith: The Art of Festival as Exemplified by the Fiesta to the Patroness of Otuzco: la Virgen de la Puerta (Lawrence, KS, 1975)
J.M. Arguedas: Señores e indios (Buenos Aires, 1976)
A. Rossel: Arqueología sur del Perú (Lima, 1977)
C. Santa Cruz: El waltz y el valse criollo (Lima, 1977)
R.C. Smith: ‘Deliverance from Chaos for a Song: a Social and Religious Interpretation of the Ritual Performance of Amuesha Music’ (diss., Cornell U., 1977)
Mapa de los instrumentos musicales de uso popular en el Peru, ed. Instituto Nacional de Cultura (Lima, 1978)
D.R. Bernal: La múliza (Lima, 1978)
J. Haeberli: ‘Twelve Nasca Panpipes: a Study’, EthM, xxiii (1979), 57–73
J. Schechter: ‘The Inca Cantar Histórico: a Lexico-Historical Elaboration on Two Cultural Themes’, EthM, xxiii (1979), 191–204
S. Stein: ‘El vals criollo y los valores de la clase trabajadora en la Lima de comienzos del siglo XX’, Socialismo y participación, xvii (1982), 43–50
R.E. Vásquez: La práctica musical de la población negra en Perú (Havana, 1982)
J.A. Llorens: Música popular en Lima: criollos y andinos (Lima, 1983)
A. Valencia: El siku bipolar altiplanico, i: Los sikuris y sikumorenos (Lima, 1983)
J.G. Carpio Muñoz: Arequipa: música y pueblo (Arequipa, 1984)
R.C. Smith: ‘The Language of Power: Music, Order and Redemption’, LAMR, v/2 (1984), 129–60
T. Turino: ‘The Urban-Mestizo Charango Tradition in Southern Peru: a Statement of Shifting Identity’, EthM, xxviii/2 (1984), 253–69
C. Bolaños: ‘Música y danzas en el antiguo Perú’, La música en el Perú, ed. Patronato Popular y Porvenir Pro Música Clásica (Lima, 1985), 11–64
E. den Otter: Music and Dance of Indians and Mestizos in an Andean Valley of Peru (Delft, 1985)
R. Romero: ‘La música tradicional y popular’, La música en el Perú, ed. Patronato Popular y Porvenir Pro-Musica Clásica (Lima, 1985), 217–83
R., E. and L. Montoya: La sangre de los cerros: antología de la poesia quechua que se canta en el Perú (Lima, 1987)
C. Bolaños: Les antaras Nasca: historia y análisis (Lima, 1988)
T.R. Turino: ‘The Music of Andean Migrants in Lima, Peru: Demographics, Social Power, and Style’, LAMR, ix/2 (1988), 127–50
C. Vasquez Rodríguez and A. Vergara Figueroa: ¡Chayraq! Carnival ayacuchano (Lima, 1988)
R. Romero: ‘Musical Change and Cultural Resistance in the Central Andes of Peru’, LAMR, xi.1 (1990), 1–35
T.R. Turino: ‘Somos el Perú: Cumbia Andina and the Children of the Andean Migrants in Lima’, Studies in Latin American Popular Culture, ix (1990), 15–37
T.R. Turino: ‘The State and Andean Musical Production in Peru’, Nation-State and Indian in Latin America, ed. J. Sherzer and G. Urban (Austin, 1991), 259–85
D.A. Olsen: ‘Implications of Music Technologies in the Pre-Columbian Andes’, Musical Repercussions of 1492: Encounters in Text and Performance, ed. C.E. Robertson (Washington, 1992), 65–88
R. Romero, ed.: Música, danzas y mascaras en los Andes (Lima, 1993)
T.R. Turino: Moving Away from Silence: the Music of the Peruvian Altiplano and the Experience of Urban Migration (Chicago, 1993)
Catalogo 1985–1993, ed. Archivo de Música Tradicional Andina (Lima, 1995)
Cosmología y música en los Andes: Berlin 1992, ed. M.P. Baumann (Frankfurt, 1996)
Indian Music of the Upper Amazon (Peru and Bolivia), FE 4458 (1954) [incl. notes by H. Tschopik]
Huayno Music of Peru, i, Arhoolie CD 320 (1989) [incl. notes by J. Cohen]
Mountain Music of Peru, i, SF 40020 (1991) [incl. notes by J. Cohen]
Mountain Music of Peru, ii, SF 40406 (1994) [incl. notes by J. Cohen and T. Turino]
Traditional Music of Peru, i: Festivals of Cusco, SF 40466 (1995) [incl. notes by G. Cánepa-Koch and others]
Traditional Music of Peru, ii: The Mantaro Valley, SF 40467 (1995) [incl. notes by R. Romero]
From the Mountains to the Sea: Music of Peru – the 1960s, Arhoolie CD 400 (1996) [incl. notes by J. Cohen]
Traditional Music of Peru, iii: Cajamarca and the Colca Valley, SF 40469 (1996) [incl. notes by R. Romero and others]
Traditional Music of Peru, iv: Lambayeque, SF 40469 (1996) [incl. notes by R. Romero and others]
Traditional Music of Peru, v: Andean Music of Peru, SF 40470 (1997) [incl. notes by R. Romero]