line, paved, in the desert. A formidable distance.
Suddenly, far away, a musical point appears. A faint sound that can barely be identified as sound. An incomprehensible melody, approaching. A little later, that melody acquires a definite form and some verses begin to blossom around it: the exact poem wrapped in the exact music, not one syllable too many, not one missing beat.
Cornelio opens his eyes and the song is right there, in front of him, waiting for him. He watches it for a long time, ecstatic. Finally, his fingers on the string of the bajo sexto help it spring forth:
“Your Beautiful Eyebrows”
Having just been born, the song feels trapped in the little house of its creator. It dreams of wide open spaces, where it can run, where it can feel free. As soon as Cornelio turns his back, the song escapes the house through the window. It feels the heat of the pavement, walks for the first time among the people of the border, slides between cars and passersby, climbs into trucks and taxis.
Every moment is a new experience.
The song wastes no time in learning to flirt and wiggle its hips with a sensual and captivating rhythm.
Men watch it pass by as if it were a beautiful woman and turn to check out her behind.
Women watch it pass by as if were a handsome man and turn to check out his behind.
Children understand that it is only a song, and they smile.
Amarillo no me pongo,
amarillo es mi color;
he robado trenes grandes
y máquinas de vapor.
—Lupe Tijerina
Now when I was a young boy, at the age of five
My mother said I was gonna be
the greatest man alive
But now I’m a man, way past 21
Want you to believe me baby,
I had lots of fun
I’m a man.
—Muddy Waters
CORNELIO: I don’t know who thought of it first. We were always real restless. We wanted to conquer the world. You know how it is, man. A man wants to make a mark. But we never imagined how it was going to go for us.
AB: How did it happen?
CORNELIO: Well, I don’t remember anymore. What about you?
How’d it happen?
RAMÓN: What?
CORNELIO: How did we get started?
RAMÓN: I dunno.
AB: You really don’t remember? Surely, there had to be a day when you decided to become musicians.
CORNELIO: Shiiit, I don’t remember, man. We were always doing crazy things, the stuff kids do. We were writing poems and stuff like that.
RAMÓN: Don’t give me that, man. I never use to write poems.
CORNELIO: Okey, but we were going along without rhyme or reason, without a care in the world, just getting by. You get me?
AB: No.
CORNELIO: The music, man. The music helped us land some ideas. One day we just decided. Let’s be musicians, man, let’s learn to play instruments.
RAMÓN: That easy?
CORNELIO: Don’t tell me you don’t remember.
RAMÓN: Well, I don’t remember all that crap, man. I think it was less complicated.
CORNELIO: We decided to be musicians, right. Yes or no?
RAMÓN: Ah, but not just any kind.
CORNELIO: Of course not. We had to be norteños, man. The rest didn’t interest us. Norteño music was and always will be the best music in the fuckin’ universe. I’ve said it.
RAMÓN: So then I got myself an accordion and he got himself a bajo sexto. But you can’t imagine, man, what I went through to get a good accordion. You love them because they are so expensive. I was saving to be able to buy one. Meanwhile, I convinced some guy to rent me one. It wasn’t that good, it had a lousy tone and was out of tune. But that’s how we learned, man. Alone. Although people would give us a little lesson here and there.
AB: Anyone in particular?
CORNELIO: No no no. Nobody in particular. And it’s about time we clarify that we never had a single teacher, and whoever says he taught us in Tijuana or wherever, we flat out deny it. There were street musicians that helped us, but that’s it, man.
RAMÓN: And so we walked from bar to bar, restaurant to restaurant, until fuckin’ Jimmy showed up…
CORNELIO: You say it like it was easy.
RAMÓN: It wasn’t easy or fast, man, we worked a lot. And it was then that my buddy here became a songwriter. Before Jimmy, of course.
AB: Okey, how did that happen?
RAMÓN: He just shows up one night at this bar where we were playing and says to me, “I have this song, man, I just finished writing it.” Right on. I didn’t know this about him. Anyway, the people didn’t want to hear it. Where we were playing they wanted the old songs or the latest hits. They asked us for José Alfredo and Bing Crosby.
AB: And you, how did you work on Cornelio’s new songs?
RAMÓN: Well that’s where it got weird, man. Cornelio hummed that first song (“Your Beautiful Eyebrows”) and I followed him on the accordion; I don’t know, it was real strange, man, like I already knew it, man, like we had written it together.
CORNELIO: Yeah, that was strange. Sometimes I would show up with a new song and it seemed like Ramón had already heard it. Really. And sometimes he would say to me, “Hey, you didn’t do this one, you heard it on the radio, man, it’s not yours.” But we never figured out whose song it was, and Ramón would start to play the rest of the song, like he had heard it before. It was very strange, man. That happened a lot.
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