Iconic singer Javier Solis performs in concert accompanied by Mariachi Potosino in Chicago, early 60s. My father is the second from left playing violin. Photo courtesy of Christina Cabrera.
Upon arriving in Chicago last month for a family visit, I was anxious to see a new exhibit at the National Museum of Mexican Art in the popular Pilsen neighborhood. The exhibit chronicles the humble beginnings in 1957 of Mariachi Potosino, among the first mariachi bands to form in Chicago, and my father, Rafael Gaspar was one of the pioneers who joined the group that year as a violin player until he died in 1977.
The exhibit is heavy on black-and-white photographs which transported me to different time periods, recalling hundreds of memories. The group would be hired to play just about everywhere in Chicago, and beyond. They played at weddings, quinceañeras, supermarket openings, and a host of other events. These blue-collar men provided more than just entertainment. They were a source of cultural and national pride for an immigrant community at a time when they were relegated to mostly segregated neighborhoods. Several of the members, like my father, came to the U.S. under the government’s Bracero program which imported Mexican workers to toil in the fields and railroads from 1942 to 1964.
Mariachi Potosino’s founder, José Cruz Alba was a native of Durango, Mexico who lent a hand to other immigrants settling in Chicago. Under his direction, the group grew and was invited to play for prominent politicos of the era, including a JFK rally in 1960, and in 1965 for Robert Kennedy. But it was playing for the community where they made the most impact, including at a protest march in the early 60s. Mexicans and other poor folks living on the city’s West Side were being forced out of their homes as then-mayor Richard J Daley pushed for the construction of a campus for the University of Illinois at Chicago Circle. But not everyone quite appreciated or welcomed the mariachi group.
A scary incident highlights the social iniquities of the era. The only remaining member of the group, trumpet player Amador Alba and son of José Cruz Alba vividly recalls what happened. On his very first performance with Mariachi Potosino in 1962–he didn’t even have a charro suit yet, the traditional mariachi attire. A prominent local doctor was celebrating his wedding anniversary and hired the mariachi to serenade his wife. As Amador tells it, they got out of their cars and crossed the street heading toward the doctor’s house when a man armed with a shotgun approached yelling racial epithets, ordering “you Mexicans” to leave his neighborhood. The then-18-year-old Amador immediately got in front of his father when the irate man began firing.
“All I saw was flashes/sparks from his gun. I didn’t know how to react since it was the first time I had been fired upon,” said Amador. Police arrived and made arrests–of four of the mariachi members including Amador, his father and two others. They were taken downtown, put in a cell and charged with disturbing the peace. The good doctor who hired them arrived to bail them out. The man who shot at them simply walked away. It was in the holding cell Amador realized he had several holes in his pants around the groin area that looked like tiny cigarette burn marks. “The individual had fired blanks at us! We considered ourselves very lucky they were blanks,” said Amador who would face fire again a few years later when he was drafted and sent to Vietnam for two years.
One of my memorable moments is certainly not as traumatic. Mexican boxing superstar Ruben Olivares, “El Púas” was in town to defend his crown and Mariachi Potosino was to play that night in the ring to welcome Olivares. My brother asked my father if we could tag along with the group, and help carry the instruments inside the venue. To my surprise, my father said yes. When the mariachi band started playing, the music generated an awe-inspiring wave of emotion of intense pride. We got ringside seats and watched as Olivares wiped out his opponent.
This band made up of ordinary family men with 9-5 jobs played with some of the top Mexican legends whose music is still alive including José Alfredo Jiménez, Javier Solis, Amalia Mendoza, Flor Silvestre and others.
The exhibit is the brainchild of Roberto Vargas, nephew of José Cruz Alba. He got the idea for the year-long project from his daughter, Micaela Vargas. One day she asked him why he no longer listened to mariachi music.
“She told me, ‘I want to know about my uncle, “Crucito” as he was called,'” said Vargas.
Vargas contracted polio as a child and to him, José Cruz Alba was more a father figure than an uncle. It was Alba who convinced Vargas’s mother, a single mom with ten children to emigrate from Mexico to Chicago where he helped her make a new life. With his daughter’s inquiry about her uncle, the seed had been planted and Vargas went to work not knowing what he would find. “It was mostly family members of the mariachi players who helped out with the project, but it wasn’t easy to find this material,” said Vargas. Vargas also found out that the majority of the band’s founding members hailed from the state of San Luis Potosí, hence the name, “Mariachi Potosino.” The group lasted for more than 60 years before dissolving.
Yet mariachi music continues to grow strong in big urban centers and here in Kern County. Several high schools and elementary schools have mariachi programs thanks in large part to funding provided by Proposition 28, The Arts and Music in Schools Act. And there’s something new this year at Bakersfield College. This fall BC will have a Mariachi Club where students can take classes in trumpet, violin, guitarrón, and others. It’s a great way for students to learn and experience the richness of mariachi music.
Had it not been for a daughter asking her father about her family history, this exhibit may never have come to light. Since the exhibit opened in March, public reaction has been positive and it’s also reunited families from the varies Mariachi Potosino members.
The Mariachi Potosino exhibit runs until October 13th and admission is free. Should you plan on visiting Chicago anytime soon, check it out.
