First Popular Music Recordings in Venezuelan Soil

Early on the XX Century, recording companies realized that the business was good... Europe and the US were the biggest markets but the World War I made them look around for new lands to conquer.

The Victor Talking Machine Company began to send scouts to travel around the world to record local artists wherever they arrived. The success of the first Cuban recordings (as early as 1907) opened the door to less known Latin American styles like calypso, tangos and even venezuelan joropos.

George Chenney Passport Photo (1917)

On November of 1916, Theodore Ferry, George Cheney and Charles Althouse started a recording adventure that took them to Cuba, Puerto Rico and on January 19, 1917 arrived to La Guayra, Venezuela on board the SS "PHILADELPHIA" (Diaz, Victor Catalog).

It was so unusual that even "El Universal" mentioned the visit of the gringos that came to record "musica criolla".

I imagine them walking around the Plaza Bolivar of Caracas, trying to communicate with the locals asking where to find some fine musicians to record them.




They made more than 30 recordings during their stay in Venezuela from January 25th to February, 2nd. Some of the performers are unknown for us like Juan Blanco, Ramon Parisca, Tomas Abreu, Cuerpo de Francisco López y Salvador Flores (sic) or Pepino Sarno... but after a few days they were able to contact the Banda Marcial de Caracas (directed by Pedro Elias Gutierrez) and the Orquesta Tipica Caraquena under Manuel Briceno. Many of their records are still recognized among the best examples of venezuelan music.

The most important record of all? Without a doubt it is"Alma Llanera" the famous composition of P. E. Gutierrez. The existence of this record ends an old dispute about who recorded it first.  Apparently, Richard Spottswood attributed it to the Trio Colombiano of Alejandro Wills (recorded in NY - 1919). And so started a long dispute among colombians and venezuelans about who really wrote this joropo, so popular it is a second National Anthem for both countries.

We were lucky enough to find a photo of the actual "Alma Llanera" record, just if anyones still doubts the Victor Discography!

The Orquesta Caraquena, seems to be some ensemble Pedro Elias Gutierrez created on the spot to be able to record a different selection of songs. The guy was smart and probably sounded much better than the other performers...

Photo Courtesy of Carlos Alberto Montes de Oca

Apparently, the first venezuelan artist to record in venezuelan soil were forgotten by history. Years of research about them has turned no results until now, but finally thanks to the US Library of Congress' National Jukebox we are able to have a sample of what they sounded like.

La Noche Triste by Tomas Abreu

(the oldest venezuelan record available)

 

Flores de Pascuas by Cuerpo de Francisco

For more samples visit The National Jukebox site and search using the keyword "Venezuela"

The very first venezuelan music recordings

Parishara dance near the Roraima tepuy (1917)

Source: Miradas alemanas hacia America Latina

Many years ago I started a quest to find the first venezuelan recordings... Books written by Napoleon Bravo, Edgardo Anzola and others mistakenly name Alfredo Sadel (1948) or Lorenzo Herrera (1926). The magic of internet allowed us to trace some recordings made by Theodor Koch-Grunberg when he explored the Amazonia several times between 1903 and 1913. Ethnolusicologist Max Brandt dates the venezuelan recordings around 1906. However these are indigenous chants, not really music - listen to a sample of Koch recordings:

 Teresa Carreño recording for the Duo-Art, New York, 1914

Source: Duo-Art pianola system

Then, in 1914, one of the greatest pianists of all times, Teresa Carreño recorded several classical pieces for the Duo-Art pianola system. Amazon.com has a CD with some of those recordings, available here. That same year, the very first popular venezuelan music was recorded in Trinidad. Funny, uh? La Orquesta Venezolana de "Chargo" recorded 9 instrumental compositions, all venezuelan waltzes:

Copai

Niña de Puerto España

La adriana

San José

Adiós Opato

Rey de los oros

El obsequio

Caracas alegre

La perla

These will not be the only venezuelan records made in Trinidad, many beautiful melodies will follow from Trinidadian composers. Why? There could be many answers, but it seems that venezuelan waltzes were very popular in the neighboring island. For more information, visit the Victor Encyclopedic Discography.
Until the next post, about the first recordings made in Venezuelan soil.

Music Hunter

I have decided to write this blog in English (some Spanish will show sometimes) because I think the collectors of around the world will find the information useful. There are a lot of other popular latin music blogs, all of them in Spanish. So I will make my best effort to gather links and information in English since it´s my intention to expand the reach of this long forgotten music.

I will start with an essential list of resources, where you can find a lot of interesting material and information:

- SALVAVINILOS: http://www.salvavinilos.org/
This is a project I would really like to be involved with, I personally own a fair amount of vinyl records, and spent money in preparing my PC to digitalize them... but a full time Marketing career and a family did not give me the time to do it. In Salvavinilos you will find an excellent collection of music from Venezuela, Latin America and some english classics too.

- FUNDACION INTERNACIONAL JOSE GUILLERMO CARRILO: A library of voices of the XX century - http://www.fundacionjoseguillermocarrillo.com
This is a little known and surprising site, they have biographies and music in mp3 format (low quality) but you will have access to some wonderful things, like Lorenzo Herrera´s records, Luis Alfonzo Larrain and other hard to find artists. You gotta have patience and browse the site because it has a LOT of information.

- I´ve been able to find very valuable music (valuable to me ;)) in several specialized forums, I will not list them because they are usually private and require registration. I recommend you to start googling what you are looking for, be methodic: if you don´t find anything try every month or every couple months... you never know when another collector decides to share what you are needing. It has worked for me, and I have made good friends in the way. Just be perseverant!

Good luck in your adventure!