Juan Gabriel (January 7, 1950-August 28, 2016)l passed away two days ago in Los Angeles. He is the latest of a list of cultural icons who have died this year, among them David Bowie, Prince, and Mohamed Ali. “All the best ones are dead,” Morrissey recently said. Also known as Juanga and “El divo de Juárez,” Juan Gabriel was one of the “best ones.”
The first Juan Gabriel song I heard was “No tengo dinero,” a hit about being in love and unable to married because of the lack of money. Working in the agricultural fields of the Santa Clara Valley in California, it somehow spoke to me. For some reason, songs about money and marriage were in mode in the 1970s. (For example, Los Humildes’ “Un pobre nomás.”) Other Juan Gabriel songs soon followed such as “En esta primavera,” “Se me olvidó otra vez,” “La muerte del palomo.” I clearly recalled a young girl singing Juan Gabriel “Lágrimas y lluvias” at a talent show in my school to the delight of my schoolmates. It surprised me how well my schoolmates received it considering that they mainly listened to War, Tower of Power, Santana, The Jackson Five, Al Green, barrio “oldies,” and the Motown sound. Apparently, these young U.S.-born Mexicanos became secret Juan Gabriel fans at an early age. In my case, I have been a Juan Gabriel fan since the early days of “No tengo dinero.” Of all Spanish-language singers, he was the soundtrack of my generation.
Much has been written about Juan Gabriel and his contributions to popular culture in Mexico and beyond. It has been pointed out that his first twenty-years of his life, the formative years, shaped his music and Juan Gabriel as a performing artist. Born in Paracúaro, Michoacán, an ancient town with hundreds of years of history, Juan Gabriel was the youngest of ten siblings. Named Alberto Aguilera Valadez, he lost his father at an early age. Dirt-poor and seeking to support a large family, his mother moved to Ciudad Juárez. With too many mouths to feed and unable to provide for all, she placed him in an orphanage where he could be fed and sheltered. He lived most of his formative years in Ciudad Juárez, learning music at the orphanage. After his years in the orphanage ended, he lived the life of a street vendor and singer at seedy clubs such as the Noa-Noa, a nightclub that he immortalized with a song with the same name. Accused of theft, he served over a year in the infamous Lecumberri prison in Mexico City.
The death of his father, the orphanage, and prison shaped him as a human being. All three together also influenced the themes of his songs, especially those dealing with abandonment, loneliness, and forgiveness. After serving his prison term a recording opportunity opened up for him. He became a sensation with his first hit, “No tengo dinero (1971).” His well-known story of rags to riches endeared him to a broad audience, especially poor and working class women of the generations that he touched. For them, he was the nice and humble boy next door who loved his mother, greeted you with a big smile, and sincerely wished you a good day.
As I reflect upon his death, as many have been doing for the past couple of days, a few observations come to mind regarding growing up listening to Juan Gabriel’s music for over four decades. The first deals with a type of Nelson Rockwell cover of his fourth album (1974), “Juan Gabriel con el Mariachi Vargas de Tecalitlán.” It depicted a modern looking Juan Gabriel looking into a mirror that reflected Juan Gabriel in a charro outfit. The image offers many readings and left a lasting impression on me. In my view, that image made three claims. First, the crowning of Juan Gabriel as the heir to Mexico’s rich ranchera song writing tradition, the successor of José Alfredo Jimenez who passed away in 1973, a year before the appearance of this album (albeit there was not much competition in those waning years of ranchera music). Second, it symbolized a Mexico that was undergoing the transition from a “traditional” to “modern” society, and, perhaps, a hybrid product grounded on these two types of society. Third, the continuation of Mexican nationalism in this transition. He was a product of the traditional to modern transformation. Mexico had 26 million inhabitants when he was born in 1950. Twenty years later, during his formative years, the population had grown to 48 million almost evenly split between city and countryside (and almost doubled from 1970 to 2000, the height of his musical influence). He reflected that rural to urban teutonic change that involved millions of people with his family’s move from Paracúaro to Ciudad Juárez.
As one of Mexico’s baby-boomer, the “Mexican Miracle” generation, Juan Gabriel and a handful of other artists dominated Spanish-language music in Mexico and the U.S. from 1970 to 2000. Perhaps no other generation of artists had this type of impact on Mexican society and for so long. This generation included José José, Vicente Fernandez, Los Bukis (including Marco Antonio Solís, Juan Gabriel’s main competitor as Mexico’s leading “canta-autor”), Ramón Ayala y los Bravos del Norte, and Los Tigres del Norte. Juan Gabriel became the highest paid artist of the Spanish-speaking world, leading album seller, and one of the few Mexican artists with a large international audience.
The second observation is the honesty in his songs and in himself as a person, which Raúl Dorantes pointed out in his recollection of Juan Gabriel. For instance, he was not ashamed to talk and sing about his profound love for his mother (“Amor eterno” and “Te lo pido por favor”). He did not hide who he was. Alma Guillermoprieto, a well-known journalist, wrote in Latin America: The Heart That Bleed on a Juan Gabriel performance that she attended in Tijuana. She noted that women made up the majority of the audience. While they displayed their love and admiration for him, the few men yelled “marica” and “jotón.” Given his noticeable gain weight in the early 1990, another shouted “You’re pregnant, you faggot! Go home!” None of these drunk hecklers bothered him as he had been hearing them for many years. After a few songs and tequila shots the men were singing to Juan Gabriel’s songs as well. They too were secretive Juan Gabriel fans.
The third observation is the optimism found in a few of his songs and, by the same token, the complete absence of any indication of politics and social conflict. As a product of the border, he never mentioned in his songs the problems of the borderland (cartel wars, poverty, femicide, immigration, corruption), even though he grew up in that world. Songs about his beloved Ciudad Juárez, such as “Noa-Noa” and “En la frontera,” avoided mentioning social problems. He painted a rosy picture of Mexico and the troubled borderlands. His last recorded song was a Spanish-language cover of Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Have You Ever Seen the Rain,” a song about the announcement of forthcoming conflict, the “calm before storm.” His interpretation of this song serves as a good example of this optimism and the absence of conflict in his music. He renamed it “Gracias al sol,” changing the meaning of the lyrics “cuando veo salir el sol …No hay tristeza y no hay dolor. (“Someone told me long ago, there’s a calm before the storm”).” Was he naive? Innocent? Did he intentionally avoid social issues in his music?
Millions have grown up listening to Juan Gabriel. He touched three generations of people with his music and Im sure he will continue to touch the next generation given his large repertoire of songs and the many artists seeking to have hits. He was the master songwriter on love and its many dimensions: longing to love and be loved, loneliness and companionship, forgiveness, forgetting and punishment, falling in and out of love. His golden era as a songwriting lasted 30 years, ending around 2000. He produced little since then (this is the case of many composer of this generation). For the past years he mainly reinterpreted his earlier works under different music genres and in duos with other artists. The fact that dozens of singers have sung his songs is a testament to his songwriting abilities. His first hit, “No tengo dinero,” has been sang by many, including the great cumbia rendition that featured El Gran Silencio, the Kumbia Kings and him.
The fourth observation has to do with the continuing popularity of his songs, some reaching the half century mark in age. Perhaps this continuity has to do with the absence of “love” in song writing in our current times of mass consumption. In today’s world where self-interest is becoming more than ever before the mode of life, income is a major consideration in the undertaking of “love.” Take the case of online dating, a big business, that ensures the customers risk-free romances. “Una mala elección (Calibre 50)” and “Y ahora resulta (Voz de mando),” two major hits, are two example on self-interest in popular music. If not self-interest, then it is hedonism as manifested in reggaeton, hip hop, banda, and other genres. Juan Gabriel perhaps fills part of this void in a time when the market economy is threatening the ending of “love.”
Finally and on a personal note, it is hard to select a favorite Juan Gabriel song. He had so many good ones. In my case, I enjoy most songs that reflect the composers personal philosophy, and are usually composed and sang by the author in the form of a prayer. For example, Jose Alfredo Jiménez “Las ciudades,” and Paulino Varga’s “Reproches del viento.” That is the case of “Te lo pido por favor,” my favorite Juan Gabriel song:
Donde esté hoy y siempre,
Yo te llevo conmigo necesitos cuidados
Necesito de ti
Si me voy donde vaya yo te quiero conmigo
No me dejes ir solo necesito de ti.
Although this song has been major hits for Banda El Recodo, Los Jaguares, Marc Anthony, and Espinoza Paz, none of them surpass Juan Gabriel’s rendition when it comes to the emotional drive.
QEPD Juan Gabriel. You will be missed by millions who grew up listening to your music.
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Juan Mora-Torres. Associate Professor of Latin American History at DePaul University. He received his PhD from the University of Chicago and has taught at the University of Texas at San Antonio and Wayne State University (Detroit). His research and writings focus on the history of the U.S.-Mexican borderlands, Mexican migration, popular culture, working class formations, and Mexicans in Chicago. He is the author of The Making of the Mexican Border (University of Texas Press, 2001). The Making of the Mexican Border won the Jim Parish Book Award. He’s currently working on Me voy pa’l norte: The First Great Mexican Migration, 1890-1940. Mora-Torres is the Board President of El BeiSMan.