Left to right: Juan Cortes playing the gitaron, Jeron imo Cortes on the vihuela and Mario Galvez playing the guitar while performing at a birthday party in Fortuna. Photo by Shareen McFall
Everyone listened to each other as they tried to learn the notes for the song. “Do, Re, Fa,” Mario told Juan as they plucked the chords on the guitarron. In the background as the group practiced, Oliver and his cousin Jonathan Cortes were playing with a soccer ball in the kitchen. Jonathan, 8, is Jeronimo’s youngest son and currently learning how to play the violin. Jeronimo, 36, the middle son said that he and his brothers were stubborn when they were younger and did not want to play mariachi. “The reasons why I am now making sure my children learn how to play mariachi music is because I don’t want them to later regret not learning as I did,” Jeronimo said. Armando and his uncle Rufino Cortes are the only members who are unable to practice with the band. “I come out very late from work and also I feel like I already know how to perform the music so when I can attend practice I do and when I can’t I don’t,” said Rufino. “For them to be at the same level as me they must study more.”
“Here you pretty much play whatever the crowd asks,” Arechiga said. “For example even if I don’t know a song, we play it and I have to come up with the music right there on the spot, and it’s extremely difficult.” On Sept. 20 the band performed at two events in Eureka. The first was a boda and the second was a retirement party where no one spoke Spanish. “When people who understand spanish are present there is a greater chance they know about mariachi music and you know that they will request more songs,” said Jeronimo. “For people who don’t understand spanish we play songs we know that they will like, with different rhythms.” When Arechiga and Galvez arrived to the Sacred Heart Church in Eureka the Cortes’ were already in the parking lot. They were tuning their instruments. As they waited outside for the ceremony to begin they joked about how everyone in the band was chubby and how their pants and jackets were too tight. “I’m actually supposed to wear a skirt as part of the uniform but it doesn’t fit so I wear pants now,” said Arechiga. “ Jeronimo was changing in the car as Juan tossed Galvez a bow tie.
The practice session came to an end. The room radiated body heat, humidity fogged the kitchen windows and everybody wiped pearls of sweat off their brow. Arechiga and Galvez packed their instruments, said their goodbyes and headed back to Arcata.
“A charro suit is just the suit that a mariachi uses, it is the pants with the decorations on the side, with the buttons as decorations, and then it has a vest with the coat on top and then you have your bow,” Galvez said.
When Arechiga and Galvez agreed to join the band they were ill-prepared for the learning curve.
The mosaic stained glass in the church shone an array of colors as the wedding ceremony began.
32 | Osprey