UC Berkeley Lucero

Title Sounds and Memories of ’s Civil War in the Songs of Los Torogoces de Morazán

Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/3fj963w2

Journal Lucero, 24(1)

ISSN 1098-2892

Author Azahar, Christina

Publication Date 2015

Peer reviewed

eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California [Lucero

Sounds and Memories of El Salvador’s Civil War in the Songs of Los Togoroces de Morazán

Christina Azahar

“I know the civil war was terrible, but just think—you and your sister would never have been born if it weren’t for the war. Your father and his family would have gone back to live in El Salvador...” My mother is a white woman born and raised in the southern , and her words, though delivered with care and concern, haunt my life more and more each day. The histories of violence and erasure that have resurfaced as I have sought to understand my father’s homeland press viscerally against my scattered heritage, and the more I learn about the United States’ involvement in the , the more caught I feel between grief and shame. The more I learn, the more my very existence feels stained by conflict and the more that I seek those voices which fight for peace and reconciliation.1

The soundings of Los Torogoces de Morazán, an ensemble whose members market their performances as “the musical expression of the Salvadoran revolution,” constitute one such a voice (Chica Argueta). Formed in 1981 in conjunction with the FMLN’s Radio Venceremos, these guerrilla musicians were using their artistic work as a weapon of war by serving as a voice of truth during the worst years of the conflict when mainstream media obscured the facts about the United States’ and the Salvadoran governments’ involvement in mass killings and other gross human rights violations. Today, they continue to perform in honor of those who have fallen fighting for their country, and to shed light on histories that some have sought to erase from national memory, such as the massacre of over 600 civilians that occurred in the small village of El Mozote in December of 1981 (Chica Argueta). This performance of state killing as a ritual enacting justice and executive supremacy is not unlike the “lethal theater” described by Dwight Conquergood in his writings on capital punishment in the United States (352). In fact, the Salvadoran military’s tactic of CHRISTINA AZAHAR is a doctoral student in demonizing the guerrilla forces and their supporters in order to ethnomusicology at the gain popular legitimacy seems to epitomize Conquergood’s University of California, interpretation of the “effigy” as a dehumanized subject composed Berkeley. of an individual’s worst parts who serves as a linchpin for

8 Vol. 24] Christina Azahar contemporary execution rituals (353).2 sensory or embodied manner. After putting Against the enormity and barbarity of these together a brief history of the region and state-sanctioned killings, Los Torogoces de ensemble traditions from which Los Morazán continue to perform their own Torogoces de Morazán emerged, I will rituals of struggle and remembrance using utilize the aforementioned theories of what authors Jason Stanyek and Benjamin intermundane collaborations in conjunction Piekut call “intermundane collaborations,” with Richard Schechner’s or a form of co-labor with the “deadness” of conceptualizations of ritual performance to technology as well as with that of the human discuss the circulation of their music dead in sonic realms (19-20). Here, the through the work of Radio Venceremos. To authors frame these sonic “intermundane conclude, I will incorporate Diana Taylor’s collaborations” as processes that rearrange work on memory and transmission in her linear temporal conceptions of agency by book The Archive and the Repertoire: connecting distended pasts to multiple Performing Cultural Memory in the presents and futures, and through their use Americas to elaborate on theories of of radio, recording technology, and more intermundane collaboration in Los recently the internet, Los Torogoces have Torogoces de Morazan’s song “El corrido brought and continue to bring the distended de El Mozote.” voices of those fallen in the war to bear on Setting the Stage: Rituals of State Killing the evolution of cultural memory (Stanyek and the Suture of Chanchona and Piekut 18). In order to begin exploring the specific Los Torogoces de Morazán is part of an processes through which Los Torogoces de ensemble tradition called chanchona which Morazán have given voice to the hopes and has existed in the eastern departments of El struggles of many Salvadoran people, this Salvador since the turn of the twentieth paper will focus especially on two particular century. This rural area, in which the types of intermundane collaboration outlined population is heavily indigenous or ladino, by Stanyek and Piekut: “corpaurality” or has long been marginalized by the elite who “the imbrication of sound with fleshly live in the urban areas of the central and bodies” and “the leakage effect” or that western parts of the country; as early as which happens when, “a [sonic] activity in 1814 the Spanish Crown’s representative in one area expands unexpectedly into another reported that the natives of the area, setting in motion a second process, rural regions “had no culture nor religious or project or concern” (19-20). It is through social knowledge” (Todd 15). In 1854, even these processes of corpaurality and leakage Salvadoran government publications that I have come to hear the work of Los concluded that “they [the natives] remain as Torogoces as a resonant sounding of the always, rude and superstitious […] without need to reconcile my past with the critical social needs, without a wish to improve their and ethical responsibilities I have taken on condition […] they do not pursue progress in entering the field of music scholarship. nor do they seem to consider the wellbeing My paper therefore uses several personal of their descendants” (Todd 15). Sentiments interjections marked in italics which are did not change much during the twentieth intended to sustain my argument that, century, causing many officials to see the through the leakage of sound and images land and its people as superfluous. Some from their original sources during the civil even called the region la tierra olvidada (the war, collective memories of death and forgotten land) (Todd 16). It is due to this violence can be experienced in a multi- long history of marginalization and

9 Sounds and Memories of El Salvador’s Civil War [Lucero oppression that eastern El Salvador, following year. Thirty-six ensembles especially the department of Morazán, competed, and the event was such a success served as the stronghold of the FMLN that it became an annual carnival called the (Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front) Radio Chaparrastique Festival Campirano, guerrilla forces during the civil war that which has continued for the past four lasted from 1980 to 1992, thereby becoming decades (“Liner notes” 4). Because of its the site of some of the most inexcusable acts pivotal role in the cultural life of the eastern of violence perpetrated against rebel forces region, the Festival Campirano was even and civilians by the Salvadoran military able to bridge differences during the most during this time period (Ching xvii, xx-xxi).3 intense years of the civil war, between 1986 However, despite the hardships of poverty and 1990, when chanchona ensembles and war, chanchona music has emerged as supporting the armed forces and the one of the greatest sources of joy and local guerillas gathered together to sing and dance cultural life in eastern El Salvador. Now in the competition (“Liner notes” 8).4 As considered part of the area’s folklore, its rise Radio Chaparrastique announcer Jorge in popularity has contributed to the growth ‘Foxy’ Gómez elaborates, and fortification of regional sentiment, and In the time of war, [it was] incredible that at times it has even helped to soothe the in a Festival Campirano when things were sting of ongoing social and political conflict hot we could bring the guerrillas and the (Sheehy, “Salvadoran Chanchona”). armed forces together in a festival of According to Francisco Membreño brothers. Truly incredible! The guerrilla Granado, an elder musician born in 1930 in leaders as well as the army had come. They the hills of Morazán, chanchona ensembles got together, everyone dancing at the in the early to mid-twentieth century Festival Campirano, and neither realized typically consisted of two violins, two that both the guerrillas and the army were there. (qtd “Liner notes” 7) guitars, and an upright bass locally named the chanchona (meaning sow, or big female Gómez also mentions that during this time, pig), from which the ensembles took their Los Torogoces de Morazán, who had been name. To this arrangement was added a traveling and performing with the FMLN caña, a cylinder made from tin cans and guerrilla forces since 1981, emerged as one filled with pebbles or seeds to be shaken as a of the best ensembles of the area (“Liner rattle (Sheehy, “Liner notes” 3). Due to the notes” 7). immense influence of the Mexican recording However, these moments of blissful industry throughout the early twentieth unawareness between the military and century, these ensembles generally played guerrillas were, sadly, not at all the norm; it popular genres like corrido, waltz, and is due partly to the presence of Los bolero, but after 1950 Colombian cumbia Torogoces de Morazán, and especially of began to spread throughout Latin America their counterpart Radio Venceremos, that and now constitutes a significant portion of eastern El Salvador became a prime target chanchona repertoire (“Liner notes” 4). for military strikes (Ching xviv). Colonel In 1970 chanchona was transformed yet Domingo Monterrosa, leader of the lethal again. After noticing its significant U.S.-trained , stated that popularity in their annual competition of “the guerrilla always carries his masas 1969, the announcers and managers of (masses) into battle with him,” thereby Radio Chaparrastique in the city of San acknowledging that in the eyes of the Miguel decided to launch a festival and Salvadoran government and military, there competition exclusively for chanchona the was no such a thing as a civilian during

10 Vol. 24] Christina Azahar wartime (Danner 41). As such, widespread The massacre discussed in the scare tactics and mass killings of men, introduction, which took place in the town women, and children became common of El Mozote in the hills of northern practice by the Salvadoran forces who, Morazán in December 1981, is one of the under direction of the United States, sought most gruesome examples of misdirected to destabilize the leftist guerrilla forces by military targeting to take place during the eliminating their bases of civilian support civil war. Though officially begun as an (López Vigil 80). effort by the Atlacatl Battalion to interrogate Especially during President Ronald citizens about the whereabouts of the Reagan’s administration, these policies were guerrilla forces, it became clear after the allowed to continue despite the protests of officers spent less than an hour questioning many U.S. Democrats and human rights hundreds of supposed collaborators that organizations around the world, primarily their intention was never to gather useful because both the Salvadoran and United information (Danner 69). At the beginning States governments had deemed the FMLN of the operation, one of the soldiers shouted, guerrilla forces to be communists. As “All you sons of bitches are collaborators. Reagan declared in a 1984 address to the […] You’re going to have to pay for those nation, “El Salvador [has] become the stage bastards,” and by the end of the massacre for a bold attempt by the Soviet Union, that followed, over 1000 civilians had been Cuba, and Nicaragua to install communism disposed of in El Mozote and the by force throughout the hemisphere” (qtd surrounding areas (Danner 63). An Ching xvii). Erik Ching elaborates on this overwhelming number were children. statement: “He [Reagan] said the United According to Dwight Conquergood, at least States would do everything in its power to in relation to the judicial system, it is this stop the spread of communism in Central kind of killing that “anchor[s] belief in the America and therein defend the United criminal justice system, dramatizing in an States” (xvii). As is evident from his speech, especially vivid way that ‘something is Reagan believed, or at least wanted his being done,’ that the system is in control, listeners to believe, that El Salvador was the order has been restored” (352). Though not new front line in the Cold War. While it is operating within the same branch of true that a small number of highly-educated governance, the Salvadoran military clearly members of the guerrilla forces clung felt that they needed to carry out this type of desperately to Marxist-Leninist ideology, murder of innocent civilians in order to most cared little for communism and were eradicate what, in their eyes, was one of instead inspired to action by an emerging those effigies that “take on manifest powers radicalized Christian liberation theology. and becomes not just surrogates for the However, because of its staunch accused, but stand-ins for crime and all anti- anticommunist position, for eleven years the social forces of evil that threaten law and United States sent El Salvador over one order” (Conquergood 353). It is in response million dollars per day in military aid. With to and collaboration with these dead, this money, the Salvadoran armed forces martyrs for the FMLN and symbols of were able to sustain a war in support of the unacceptable resistance for the government, elite landowners’ attempt to defend their that Los Torogoces sounded their cries for property, while claiming to the rest of the justice throughout the war and after the world that they were championing the peace accords in 1992. Through their music, causes of capitalism, liberty, and democracy they were able to create new rituals of (Ching xvii-xix).

11 Sounds and Memories of El Salvador’s Civil War [Lucero testimony and remembrance which gave dislocation through radio broadcasting, amplitude to the voices that had been erased. added to Los Torogoces’ evocation of the voices and experiences of war victims “Los gemelos”: Sounding Deadness through processes of corpaurality and through the Airwaves leakage, helped to facilitate and expand the “En el mes de junio de 1981 en los reach of their involvement in rituals of momentos más difíciles que vivía nuestro remembrance, community-building, and país El Salvador. En las montañas de play in response to the state’s rituals of Morazán nacían dos gemelos. Que execution. posteriormente salieron al aire con sus According to the memoirs of Carlos nombres y apellidos. Estamos hablando de Henríquez Consalvi (better known as LOS TOROGOCES DE MORAZÁN Y “Santiago”), the lead anchor of Radio RADIO VENCEREMOS” (Chica Argueta). Venceremos, Los Torogoces de Morazán Los Torogoces’ Facebook page, created by emerged from a group of compañeros manager and original member Benito Chica (particularly those associated with the Argueta (also known as Sebastian Torogoz), FMLN) who were all campesinos and had introduces the ensemble with all the passion the intention of forming a singing group to and bravado that the group must have drawn record songs for the radio station. Their first upon to sustain their performances during two pieces were quite well-received by the the years of war. After forming in June station, and when they decided to solidify 1981, the group was given the tasks of themselves and make the ensemble more boosting morale among the dispersed involved in the cultural work of the guerrilla guerilla soldiers and militia and generating insurgency, there was much debate antagonism towards enemy forces (Chica surrounding the name they would take on. Argueta). They did this work in conjunction Some of the initial suggestions were either with Radio Venceremos, which formed in too comical or too obscene, but after early 1981 with the intention of creating an deliberation among the group members and uncensored media outlet to keep combatants the station’s team, Santiago eventually and civilians informed about the progress of suggested the name The Torogoces of the war. The guerrillas’ General Command Morazán in honor of a bird, native to the declared later in 1981 that, because of their region, that bores holes into walls and trees efforts, Radio Venceremos be recognized as to build its nests, and that, for all those the official voice of the FMLN, thereby gathered, represented the ingenuity and making their affiliate ensemble Los work ethic of the Salvadoran guerillas Torogoces the official music of the (Henríquez Consalvi 51). Besides Benito revolutionary front (Chica Argueta). While Chica Argueta, the original members they often performed at parties, dances, and included Andrés Barrera Mejía, Cristóbal even masses in order to enliven their fellow Chica Argueta, Andrés Barrera Jr., Ricardo soldiers and civilian supporters, it is likely Ventura, Álvaro, and Esteban, but because that their music was most often heard in the they were involved with the guerrilla forces regular shows broadcasted by Radio in times of combat, the last four musicians Venceremos. For this reason, in their lost their lives in battle (Chica Argueta).6 performances the sound was generally One of the first wartime performances dislocated from the artists’ bodies in a that Santiago describes was a mass held by manner similar to another process of Father Rogelio Ponceele in El Mozote on intermundane collaboration that Stanyek and March 24, 1981, to commemorate the one- Piekut call “rhizophonia” (19).5 This year anniversary of the assassination of El

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Salvador’s former archbishop Monsignor Es la radio guerrillera Óscar Arnulfo (Henríquez Consalvi 34, 51). de Farabundo Martí. (Los Togoroces de Unlike all of their recorded material, which Morazán, “Venceremos”) centers on themes of protest, national pride, Both of these songs, set to longing waltzes or solidarity with the FMLN, Los Torogoces rather than upbeat corridos or cumbias (as is sang a hymn, accompanied by children, common among other chanchona including the words, “You are the God of ensembles), rhizophonically create a the poor, the human and simple God” space—both in the recording studio and (Henríquez Consalvi 33-4; Los Togoroces across the airwaves among listeners—that de Morazán, Por nuestros caídos). The next allows for reflection and contemplation, performance mentioned was the day they rather than the celebratory spaces created by were formed, when the group recorded two some of their other works, such as songs to be broadcast on Radio Venceremos. “Torogoces de Morazán” (which will be The first was “Heróico Morazán,” and the discussed below) (Los Togoroces de second “Radio Venceremos” (Henríquez Morazán, Por nuestros caídos). Through Consalvi 51). Unlike the humble this initial rhizophonic process, their music supplications of their earlier performance, began to take root among FMLN supporters “Heróico Morazán” is a lament for the across the nation and beyond, to the point victims of war and a cry for justice against that they became an inseparable part of the violence being carried out by the Radio Venceremos programming (López Salvadoran and United States governments, Vigil 218). It is especially significant that while “Radio Venceremos” offers heartfelt this process took place despite the fact that praise for the work of the guerrilla radio the majority of their listeners outside of the station. The lyrical excerpts below attest to FMLN forces would not have encountered these sentiments: the ensemble or their music in a live concert

“Heróico Morazán” setting or rally, as was the case in other Mes de octubre del 80 protest music contexts, such as the nueva nos dan la falsa reforma canción artists of Chile during the 1960s and Y así invaden nuestras tierras 1970s. This means that their performance of dirigidos por los yanquis ritual camaraderie, which Richard

Nos quemaron nuestros ranchos Schechner calls “communitas,” became Macharon nuestras mujeres extended through the technology of the radio Mataron a nuestros hijos, station in a way which, although somewhat levantemos su bandera. (Los Togoroces de normative, nevertheless engaged listeners in Morazán, Por nuestros caídos) a process of transformation through which they entered into greater solidarity with the “Venceremos” guerrilla forces (Schechner 61-2).7 Though Se oye el Radio Venceremos not excusing the government forces for their Desde el centro de la montaña actions toward innocent citizens, community Transmitiendo sus mensajes building efforts like this one, combined with después de un pueblo en arma the fact that guerrillas were often housed A las seis de la mañana and fed by local families, clearly blurred the se escucha su transmisión line between soldier and civilian, to say the Es la Radio Venceremos, least (Henríquez Consalvi 8-9). However, es la voz de nuestra revolución Los Torogoces de Morazán also played a Una potente emisora, significant role in solidifying the todo le escuchan a ti

13 Sounds and Memories of El Salvador’s Civil War [Lucero camaraderie among the guerrilla forces Although the ritual presented in this last themselves. performance gravitates more heavily toward Turning back to Santiago’s memoir, his the function of entertainment, it is clear that records indicate that on February 26, 1982, on a broader level the performances of Los the sixth class graduated from the guerrilla Torogoces had a particular ability to boost military school, and Los Torogoces de morale among FMLN supporters, to spark Morazán played for the dancing and motivation for the guerrilla forces, and to celebration afterward, rallying the crowd serve as a “balm for the soul at every dance” with a lively cumbia called (Schechner 71, Henríquez Consalvi).9 Though their performance here did not pass “Torogoces de Morazán” (Hablado) through the same rhizophonic process as the Estos son Los Torogoces de Morazán - previous one, perhaps it was at events like Expresión musical these that the corpaurality of their music de la revolución salvadoreña became more clearly solidified. Claro que si, compa!8 Pictures of the group from during the war reveal how closely entwined their dual (Cantado) Vengan compañeros todos a gozar roles as musicians and soldiers were (López Con este conjunto que es muy popular Vigil, Henríquez Consalvi). With guns Vengan a gozar, vengan a bailar draped ready around their backs, food and con Los Torogoces de Morazán. ammunition fastened to their belts, and instruments held as if being played, they are Allá por los montes se escucha una voz portrayed as poised and ready at a moment’s Es el canto alegre del torogoz […] notice either to fight or to sing, using their (Hablado) voices and instruments with as much Claro que si, compa! intention and precision as their weapons. If Este es el ritmo con (sabor a) pólvora the corpaurality and rhizophonia of their Color del pueblo […] recorded songs were attached to images of A cargo de los Torogoces de Morazán these particular bodies, it is quite possible Acompañando al pueblo salvadoreño y demás pueblos del mundo that, through the process of leakage, En su lucha contra la opresión hundreds of listeners present only through y el imperialismo. (Los Togoroces de the airwaves of Radio Venceremos were Morazán, Por nuestros caídos) also gathered together in liminal spaces or moments of celebratory play, militancy, or The initial performance of this song, though community. This work continued lyrically still a pointed anthem of protest, unceasingly throughout twelve long years of also allowed for a time of freedom and play war, and even after the daily transmissions during which the participants in the were discontinued, Los Torogoces have celebration could dance and be joyful. In remained constant in their efforts to voice this liminal space of relative peace in the the histories of violence and struggle that midst of ongoing war, there may also have they feel should never be forgotten, and that been room for the formation of a different are now emerging as new projects of ritual type of communitas, which Schechner says remembrance and celebration (Chica can erupt more spontaneously as a sincere Argueta). outpouring of warmth and solidarity among participants in a ritual, and which transports or transforms those gathered into another, more connected way of being (57, 62).

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“El corrido de El Mozote,” Leakage, and seeing my hands and arms covered in fake Remembrance blood. Having no one in my family who was directly affected by the massacre, I had no The warm, sticky redness seeps down my obvious reason to experience the pain and fingers and onto my palm, gradually guilt that overwhelmed me in the moment of staining my wrist and arm as I watch – performance, but in reflecting more closely horrified and perplexed – momentarily upon the work of Tomie Hahn, I am frozen. Is it paint, or is it blood? Have I beginning to understand more clearly how been wounded or did I just do something multiple senses can be tied to transmission. unthinkable? Where am I? When am I? Is She states: somebody with me or am I alone? Heart pounding, voice and arms shaking, blood The senses reside in a unique position as the running cold, I somehow hear myself interface between body, self, and the world. reading the words, They are beautiful transmission devices, through which we take in information, “We go house by house, finding in each one comprehend the experience, assign meaning, cruel, gruesome acts… The cord that was and often react to the stimuli. Not only do used to hang him remains wrapped around the senses orient us in a very real, physical the neck of a child who was barely a few way; they enable us to construct parameters months old.” of existence – that which defines the body,

Then another voice, distant and uncaring yet self, social group, or world. Simply, we are situated by sensual orientations. (3) somehow, sickeningly, coming from my own mouth answers, By way of Hahn’s interpretation of the body and senses constructing parameters of “El Salvador has become the stage for a bold attempt by the Soviet Union, Cuba, and existence, I also felt that I was beginning to Nicaragua to install communism by force comprehend more fully the “repertoire” that throughout the hemisphere. The United Diana Taylor describes as the embodied States will do everything in its power to stop expression and transmission of knowledge, the spread of communism in Central in which memory is processed through America and therein defend the United mediums such as spoken language, dance, States.” sports, and ritual (16, 19). Since she further

And it hits me—the crushing sense of guilt points out that the embodied practices of the and the full weight of loss and the blood of repertoire can work in tandem with the hundreds of innocents simultaneously knowledges and memories contained in the incriminating me and pouring through me “archive” of physical documents and texts, I like an unhealed wound. Remembering that I have sought to be more aware of the ways in am only performing does nothing at all to which my physical and emotional senses alleviate my panic, and I am left only with respond to texts like Los Torogoces de an emptied heart and the knowledge that no Morazán’s recently released song “El matter what I do, parts of my broken corrido de El Mozote,” which I discovered heritage will never be reconciled. However, not long after my performance. The this moment is one of both heartbreak and recording, available on YouTube, is awakening… performed by a new arrangement of the ensemble that includes several of the earlier After giving this personally harrowing generation’s children, including Benito performance in a graduate seminar in the Chica, Francisco Sebastián Chica, Francisco spring of 2014, I struggled to explain to Alexander Amaya, Carlos Jonatán Chica, myself why I had reacted so viscerally to Diana Chica, Antonio Cabrera, and

15 Sounds and Memories of El Salvador’s Civil War [Lucero

Balmoris Gómez (Chica Argueta). Like la que allí sobrevivió. myself, these younger members had not yet (Hablado por Rufina: been born at the time of the massacre, but in “Que los niños los quitaron de las madres engaging with the sonic, visual, and literary y los dejaban en el piso de la casa. texts that document the event, they created a Allí dejaban los niños que no habían music video that collapses time, combines nacido.”) elements of the archive and the repertoire, El hecho fue denunciado and brings the listener and the performer por la Radio Venceremos into closer contact with the physicality of pero el gobierno y los yanquis the massacre. These effects are siempre al mundo le mintieron. accomplished through yet more projects of que los que allá habían muerto, ritual and collaboration with the todos serán guerrilleros. intermundane through processes of Fue en el mes de diciembre, corpaurality and leakage. final del 81, The “Corrido de El Mozote” video opens que en el llano de El Mozote with the emblem of the El Mozote al norte Morazán, memorial—the black silhouette of a family los autores de este crimen holding hands—above the words “Mozote fue el Batallón Atlacatl. nunca más!” Following is a long shot of Con el permiso de ustedes destroyed buildings, abandoned and terminamos el corrido. overcome by plant growth, along with Que no se olvide de El Mozote, broken items and other ruins from the attack. ni aquellos que han caído Meanwhile, Los Torogoces have begun to por defender los derechos sing: de este pueblo tan sufrido. (Corrido de El Mozote) En El Mozote, señores, algo malo sucedió. Nadie se la imaginaba, Rather than the gruesome acts of violence nadie de buen corazón, that the government used to enact justice que Domingo Monterrosa and state supremacy, these lyrics perform a la gente asesinó. justice through acts of testimony, or invitations for witnessing, in a similar Dispararon a los niños, manner to the Peruvian theater troupe hombres, mujeres también. Allí comenzó el sufrimiento Yuyachkani. Diana Taylor describes the y la masacre también, troupe as an artist collective intervening in disparándole a la gente embodied memories of collective trauma by por orden del coronel. engaging their audiences in a function of witnessing that puts their storytelling in Fue en el mes de diciembre, dialogue with the past in order to give final del 81, que en el llano de El Mozote viewers the chance to accept al norte Morazán, unacknowledged histories and recognize los autores de este crimen their connection to ongoing processes of fue el Batallón Atlacatl. oppression (209-11). The corrido accomplishes this intervention by naming Cuando los niños lloraban the perpetrators of the attack, by describing el coronel se sonrió. Los soldados disparaban the horrors of the scene using the first-hand sin ninguna compasión. account of a survivor, by explaining the Lo dijo Rufina Amaya, work that Radio Venceremos did to

16 Vol. 24] Christina Azahar denounce the massacre despite denial from from the intermundane elements of the the U.S. and Salvadoran governments, and performance sparks new actions in by calling on listeners at the end to use the unexpected receivers of sound, thus giving song as a way to remember the lives and agency to the humanly and technologically political work of those who were lost. dead. In Diana Taylor’s writings on cultural These truth-bearing lyrics intervene even memory and transmission, it is clear that more in memories of trauma when the music oral and embodied ways of knowing such as video enmeshes sound visually and the music, dance, and images combined in corpaurally with particularly significant the music video, though they by no means bodies, such as Colonel Domingo replace written text, are nevertheless part Monterrosa, the leader of the battalion that and parcel with political acts of transmitting led the attack, and Rufina Amaya, a survivor knowledge and memory. As she explains, of the massacre (Taylor 191).10 While in the “the telling is as important as the writing, colonel’s case, only the text makes reference the doing as central as the recording, the to his body and actions, a taped interview memory passed down through bodies and using Rufina’s actual voice connected to an mnemonic practices. Memory paths and image of her body is recorded into the track documented records might retain what the with the rest of the song and video other ‘forgot.’ These systems sustain and (Henríquez Consalvi 84). However, mutually produce each other; neither is throughout the music video sound is mapped outside or antithetical to the logic of the onto charred and bloodied corpses, other” (35-6). Through the ongoing acts of skeletons, women and children witnessing telling, writing, doing, and recording in the exhumations of the deceased from mass which Los Torogoces de Morazán have now graves, and finally the bodies of Los been involved for over thirty years, it is Torogoces’ younger performers giving a apparent that, regardless of changes in concert at what appears to be a relatively personnel and representation, their work of recent event (“El corrido de El Mozote”). political activism and community-building is The intersection of these multiple bodies sustained by reciprocal responses of through the dead technology of sonic and solidarity out of which new processes of visual text fixes them into a type of remembrance and reconciliation did and performance spanning the historical and the (hopefully) will continue to unfold. contemporary in a way that complicates the Postlude: Old Themes, New Beginnings lives of the living with the (non)presence of the dead. Without significant documentation of their That these corpaural connections are performances or descriptions and responses accomplished through the rhizophonic to their music from their audiences, it is process of recording the song in a studio and impossible to say to what degree Los releasing the video on the internet further Torogoces de Morazán truly affected the detaches the sound from its original source, solidification of FMLN support among but through this detachment an immense listeners during the years of the civil war. It body of listeners can be reached. In this is also unclear to what degree their music way, the sound, along with its bodily circulated beyond their occasional live entanglements, leaks from performer to performances and the transmissions of studio to internet to completely new bodies, Radio Venceremos. Nevertheless, the to whom the piece’s sonic and visual reception and likely censorship of their elements transmit new knowledges and new music by pro-government or even neutral histories. Perhaps, in this space, leakage media outlets and listeners, who might have

17 Sounds and Memories of El Salvador’s Civil War [Lucero perceived their work and relationship to the related to the Salvadoran Civil War. I also FMLN forces as too aggressive or hope that, in conducting such a study, I can combative to voice genuine messages of eventually give order to the conflicting truth and reconciliation, remains an voices of my background, which, being so important area for future study. Based on the deeply bound up in the history of U.S.- information available, it seems that the Salvadoran relations, would offer a space for Radio Chaparrastique chanchona festival legacies of domination to be confronted, may have been (and perhaps may still be) a critiqued, and overcome. major site in which their music circulated, but, again, it is unclear exactly how Los Torogoces de Morazán were received there Notes except as good musicians, and there is no indication as to how their audiences 1. Italicized text indicates personal responded to the fact that they were part of commentary by the author. the FMLN. 2. “An effigy is the fusion of image and body, symbol and source, the figurative and the In regards to their work with Radio physical. Because a jury will never vote to kill a Venceremos, more time must be spent in the human being, the fundamental task of the radio archives at the Museo de la Palabra y prosecutor is to turn the accused into an effigy la Imagen (Museum of the Word and Image) composed of his or her worst parts and bad in San Salvador, El Salvador, to determine deeds” (Conquergood 352). the specific manner in which Los Torogoces 3. The Salvadoran Civil War was a twelve- performed over the airwaves and thereby to year rebellion of peasant guerrilla forces understand better the types of rituals and organized under the FMLN, which was formed intermundane collaborations which may in 1980 with the intention of overthrowing the have been occurring in their broadcasts. U.S.-backed Salvadoran State. Though the Santiago, the station’s lead anchor and the guerrilla forces were severely outmanned, they managed to fight the Salvadoran Army to a draw director of the aforementioned museum, also in 1992, after which they achieved democratic mentioned in his memoirs that Los reforms and an overhaul of the Salvadoran Torogoces participated in a movement security forces. called The Creative Powers of the People, 4. Unsurprisingly, not all chanchona which was in charge of the cultural work of musicians were able to stay during this period. the FMLN, but he gives little explanation of Many ensembles, like the younger members of what that movement specifically involved Los Hermanos Lovo, were forced to flee the (Henríquez Consalvi 51). The most country during the civil war and brought their substantial and reliable sources of music to the United States. In Washington, D.C., information about Los Torogoces de where Los Hermanos Lovo now live, chanchona Morazán besides Santiago’s book are has become an outlet for many Salvadoran refugees to cope with the sadness and constant Henríquez Consalvi’s Broadcasting the Civil nostalgia of leaving one’s home country behind. War in El Salvador, José Ignacio López 5. “Rhizophonia describes the fundamentally Vigil’s Rebel Radio, and the ensemble’s fragmented yet proliferative condition of sound Facebook page. Gathering the information reproduction and recording, where sounds and described above will involve fieldwork and bodies are constantly dislocated, relocated, and interviews with current members of the co-located in temporary aural configurations. ensemble. It is my hope that this paper has […] Indeed, schizophonia describes sound itself. laid the foundation for that fieldwork by All sounds are severed from their sources – establishing research questions and that’s what makes sound sound. Rhizophonia is theoretical perspectives for studying music our term for taking account both of sounds

18 Vol. 24] Christina Azahar extensity and the impossibility of a perfect Danner, Mark. The Massacre at El Mozote. New identity between sound and source” (Stanyek York: Vintage,1993. Print. and Piekut 19). Hahn, Tomie. Sensational Knowledge: 6. The website only provides these last two Embodying Culture through Japanese Dance. members’ given names. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan UP, 2007. Print. 7. Schechner argues that communitas can be Henríquez Consalvi, Carlos. Broadcasting the enacted either normatively or spontaneously, Civil War in El Salvador: A Memoir of and it is generally the spontaneous form that Guerrilla Radio. Trans. Charles Leo Nagle V generates the greatest sense of community and with A.L. (Bill) Prince. Austin: U of Texas collective belonging. Press, 2010. Print. 8. According to a translator’s note in López López Vigil, José Ignacio. Rebel Radio: The Vigil’s Rebel Radio, “compa (also the Story of El Salvador’s Radio Venceremos. diminutive compita) short for compañero or Trans. Mark Fried. Willimantic, CT: comrade […] refers to a member or sympathizer Curbstone Press, 1994. Print. of the FMLN, and also to a lover or spouse” (ix). Los Torogoces de Morazán. Por nuestros caídos Compa can also serve as an abbreviated version y nuestra historia debemos continuar. Music of compadre or partner, but since the translation Art Productions, Inc., 2004. “comrade” has been used commonly in literature ——. “Venceremos.” 2008. YouTube. Web. 6 on Radio Venceremos and Los Torogoces de May 2014. Morazán, this paper is written in accordance ——. “Corrido de El Mozote.” YouTube. Web. with that interpretation. 6 May 2014. 9. “Efficacy and entertainment are not binary Schechner, Richard. Performance Studies: An opposites. Rather, they form the poles of a Introduction. London: Routledge, 2002. continuum […]. The fact is that no performance Print. is pure efficacy or pure entertainment” Sheehy, Daniel. Liner notes to album ¡Soy (Schechner 71). Salvadoreño! Chanchona Music from 10. “Trauma” here refers specifically to acts Eastern El Salvador. Washington, D.C.: of physical and emotional violence carried out in Smithsonian Folkways, 2011. the midst of social or political upheaval. In the ——. “What Makes a Good Smithsonian Peruvian context, Taylor is referring to trauma Folkways Recording? The Sound and Story experienced in the Ayacucho region during the of the Salvadoran Chanchona.” Smithsonian Shining Path conflict in the 1980s, and in this Folkways Magazine (2011). Web. 26 Oct paper trauma is referring to experiences of state 2013. brutality during El Salvador’s Civil War. Smithsonian Folkways Video. “Los Hermanos Lovo.” 2011. Web. 8 Dec 2013. Works Cited Stanyek, Jason and Benjamin Piekut. “Deadness: Technologies of the Intermundane.” The Chica Argueta, Benito. “Los Torogoces de Drama Review 54.1 (2010): 14-38. Print. Morazan Facebook Biography.” Facebook. Taylor, Diana. The Archive and the Repertoire: Web. 5 May 2014. Performing Cultural Memory in the Ching, Erik. “Introduction: Peasant Insurgency Americas. Durham, NC: Duke UP, 2003. and Guerrilla Radio in Northern Morazán, Print. El Salvador.” Broadcasting the Civil War in Todd, Molly. Beyond Displacement: El Salvador: A Memoir of Guerrilla Radio. Campesinos, Refugees, and Collective Action Austin: U of Texas Press, 2010. xvii-xlvi. in the Salvadoran Civil War. Madison, WI: U Print. of Wisconsin Press, 2010. Print. Conquergood, Dwight. “Lethal Theater: Performance, Punishment, and the Death Penalty.” Theater Journal 54 (2002): 339-67. Print.

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