Las Cuatro Milpas

The Starliners were from Rockport, Texas. Initially, it was a Rock-N-Roll Band. The Jim Crow Laws of those times restricted us to the places we could play and those that would hire us wanted us to play Mexican Music as well as Rock-N-Roll Music. Not all of us were happy about the idea, but we all agreed that it was necessary. Rudy Ramirez (no relation), the leader of the band asked me if I knew how to play any polkas because in his opinion we needed to be able to play at least one polka and I asked him what that was. Now, those who grew up with me usually point out that they happen to know that my grandparent took me to the Mexican dances they went to, so how could I not know what a polka was. It's true. They did take me to the dances that they went to. The thing is that I "heard" Mexican Music, but I had never "listened" to it. In those days anyone could've told me that a bolero was a polka or that a ranchera was a corrido and I would've believed it because I knew absolutely nothing about Mexican Music. About an hour after practice, Rudy came by my house to drop off two records that had "polkas" on them. One was "Las Cuatro Milpas" by The Broken Hearts and the other was "Atotonilco" by The Latineers. I knew who Little Joe and The Latineers (later La Familia) but I had no idea who Sixto Sanchez and The Broken Hearts were. I started out trying to play "Atotonilco" by The Latineers. It just so happened that Rudy called me in the middle of it and asked me how I was coming along and I told him that I was working on "Atotonilco". He asked me what I had thought of "Las Cuatro Milpas". I told him that I hadn't listened to it but I told him that I would since he asked to at least listen to it if nothing else. After we finished talking on the phone, I put the record on intending to listen to it and then taking out "Atotonilco". I heard it once, then twice. The following day at practice, Rudy asked me if I had "Atotonilco" and I told him and I shook my head saying, "No." I took out "Las Cuatro Milpas" instead. "Las Cuatro Milpas" was the first Mexican song that I learned and we used it as the opening and closing song for aproximately six (6) months.

At the time I learned to play "Cuatro Milpas" I never realized nor is there any way that I could've known that it would be one of the polkas that I would play with one band or another thoughout my time as a working musician which lasted all the way until the early Eighties ("80's").

Some People who have heard this story before have asked me how I heard of Little Joe and The Latineers if I didn't listen to Mexican Music? The thing is that Little Joe and The Latineers and Sunny and The Sunliners had English recordings that were played on local Rock-N-Roll radio stations. I had heard "Ramona" and "All Night Worker" (to name a couple of songs long before I heard "Atotonilco" by them). The very name "Latineers" gave me a good idea that they were Mexican. By contrast, Sunny and The Sunliners gave no hint of that fact. I heard "Talk To Me", "Golly Gee", "Judgement Day"(to name a few). Had I ever heard "A Thrill Upon A Hill" or "Slowly, Slowly But Surely" or "Crying Over You" (to name a few of their songs) on those stations, I would've heard of them. "Las Cuatro Milpas" was not only the first polka that I ever "listened" to but it was also the song that I ever heard from The Broken Hearts.

Sometimes, I shake my head when I hear that the "accordian" is "Our Roots". I agree that it is "our" roots but it's a just part of "our" roots. I've read writers who write about "Chicano" Music and wonder if they have ever bothered to look at the instrumentation of those "old" groups of yesteryear? If they have none of them have ever bothered to question the fact that bands like Sunny and The Sunliners, Little Joe and The Latineers, Sixto Sanchez and The Broken Hearts bear little resemblence to the instrumentation of conjuntos or the "old orquestas" of that era. While the old orquestas bore a resemblence in the horn section there wasn't a keyboard nor bass guitar in those groups. In both conjuntos and the "old orquestas" it was the bass violin that was the mainstay of those groups. However, if anyone will look at the instrumention or bands like "Fats" Domino, Little Richard, Anthony and The Imperials anyone can see that it is the same instrumentation of these very bands that evolved into "Chicano" Music.

Yes, the accordian is a part of "our" roots but equally true is that so is the electric guitar. If the "roots" of the accordian can be traced to Narciso Martinez, Flaco Jimenez, Sr. and Valerio Longoria, so can the "roots" of the role the electric guitar within "Chicano" Music be traced to the emergence of Rock-N-Roll on the American scene. Although Little Richard, Anthony and The Imperials, "Fats" Domino or Chuck Berry and the rest of the Mainstream Rock-N-Roll Musicians couldn't play Mexican Music anymore than Los Guadalupanos, Los Pavo Reales or Los Alegeres de Teran could play Rock-N-Roll Music.
However, bands like Sixto Sanchez and The Broken Hearts could play both genres of music. I once asked someone if they knew who the "Old Guard" were and the response I received was that they were Chicanos who could play Rock-N-Roll. It could be said that way, but the fuller truth was that they were Rock-N-Roll Musicians who could play Mexican Music!

Back in the Late Seventies (70's) I happened to tune in to a "Chicano" radio station that was playing "A Blast From The Past" music. I heard a couple of Sunny and The Sunglows ( not The Sunliners, but The Sunglows) songs, Little Joe and The Latineers, Rudy and The Reno Bops and then I heard the D.J. mention Sixto Sanchez and The Broken Hearts. The first song he played was "Plegarias Falsas" in it I heard the bluesy riffs of the sax. It accentuated Sixto's voice just like George Soto's guitar riffs had accentuated the saxophones in "Cuatro Milpas". As luck would have it the other song that was played from The Broken Hearts was "Las Cuatro Milpas". Once again I heard George Soto's pasadas on guitar and a sudden realization hit me. George Soto was imitating a bajo sexto with a guitar!! Any musician can copy a song but it takes a very talented musician to make his instrument sound like another instrument. Way back in the Sixties (60's) when I was a kid trying to play "Las Cuatro Milpas" and struggling to learn Mexican Music there isn't any way that I could've told anyone that because I didn't know anything about Mexican Music. The only thing that I could've told anybody about George Soto's guitar riffs was that they didn't detrack from the melodyline instruments but rather those pasadas accentuated the saxophones in that song. ----Chepe Ramirez