Musica Nortena

Mexican Americans Creating a Nation Between Nations

Catherine Ragland

• Publisher: Temple University Press
• Year: 2009
• Print ISBN: 9781592137473, 9781592137466
• eBook ISBN: 9781592137480
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Ethnomusicology

Música norteña, a musical genre with its roots in the folk ballad traditions of northern Mexico and the Texas-Mexican border region, has become a hugely popular musical style in the U.S., particularly among Mexican immigrants. Featuring evocative songs about undocumented border-crossers, drug traffickers, and the plight of immigrant workers, música norteña has become the music of a "nation between nations." Música Norteña is the first definitive history of this transnational music that has found enormous commercial success in norteamérica.

Cathy Ragland, an ethnomusicologist and former music critic, serves up the fascinating fifty-year story of música norteña, enlivened by interviews with important musicians and her own first-hand observations of live musical performances. Beyond calling our attention to musical influences, ragland shows readers the social and economic forces at work behind the music. By comparing música norteña with other popular musical forms, including conjunto tejano, she helps us understand and appreciate the musical ties that bind the Mexican diaspora.

Table of contents

• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1 Mexicanidad and Música Norteña in the “Two Mexicos”
• 2 Regional Identity, Class, and the Emergence of “Border Music”
• 3 Border Culture, Migration, and the Development of Early Música Norteña
• 4 Modern Música Norteña and the Undocumented Immigrant
• 5 Los Tigres del Norte and the Transnationalization of Música Norteña in the Working-Class Mexican Diaspora
• Conclusion
• Glossary
• References
• Selected Discography
• Interviews
• Index