|
Abstract:
|
This study explores the construction of regional identities through music performance and mediated forms of public culture in the urban Amazon of Peru , focusing on the city of Iquitos . A fast -developing metropolis , Iquitos's increasing industrial , ecological and economic importance on the national scale has driven a population explosion , drawing migrants from the surrounding jungle whose traditional communities are disintegrating . Urban musicians respond to these changes by attempting to create an inclusive , Amazonian regional community through public culture . A local folkloric genre called pandilla , which has morphed from a style associated mainly with native communities in another region of the Amazon to a distinctly mestizo music and dance from Iquitos , has been particularly central to this process . Shaped through forms of public culture in urban Amazonia that articulate cosmopolitanism and globalization to the local milieu , it connects a folkloric past - - molded by colonial dominance - - to the present , which is steeped in cosmopolitanism and regional pride . This project traces the region’s history beginning with an influential folkloric ensemble , Los Solteritos , which emerged in the early 1960s and came to epitomize local mestizo music , shaping iquiteño esthetics and repertoire , and establishing pandilla as a pan -Amazonian folkloric genre . It shows how this urban folkloric group claims deep ties to rural , indigenous Amazonia , even as it invests heavily in cosmopolitan esthetics and the mechanized reproduction of sound . Finally , this study demonstrates how Explosión , a pop group that performs tecno -cumbia music became the representative pop ensemble of Iquitos by bringing local symbols of cosmopolitanism and folklore into their performances . The ensemble re -packaged pandilla for consumption by various audiences locally and nationally , creating a unique music style at the juncture of community and cosmopolitanism , where industry and consumerism often shape musical trajectories . Overall , through the tecno -cumbiaization of pandilla , Iquitos is coming to terms with its position as an Amazonian city seeking admittance into the nation imaginary and radio , piracy , and public performance are the varied public cultural sites where regional identity is shaped as the Amazon grows in economic and political significance . |