Noche Azul: Villancicos and Canciones Decembrinas Brings Music for the Holidays

December 24, 2020 - San Antonio

By Valeria Torrealba, Staff Intern, San Antonio Sentinel

The Esperanza Peace and Justice Center will be hosting Noche Azul: Villancicos and Canciones Decembrinas with artist Azul Barrientos on Saturday, Dec. 26 at 8 p.m. The event will be livestreamed on Facebook and Youtube. 

Born in Mexico City, Azul Barrientos is a musician, educator and performer dedicated to uncovering and conserving the cultural influences and interconnections between Latin America, Africa, Europe and Mexico. Barrientos has resided in San Antonio since she was young, connecting Mexicana and Chicana cultures together. 

“Over Latin America, we know about villancicos and that’s mainly what we do,” Barrientos said. “We’re all very globalized now. We also now visualize songs that didn’t travel back to the U.S. I want to take it a little further. There are beautiful villancicos out there that we don’t hear very often, and when we hear them they sound kind of familiar –– like songs about the peregrinaciones –– I’ll be focusing on those. I’m going to also be focusing on a couple of songs that were shared by a school in Spain that I found online. They were doing some beautiful villancicos, they were really nice, and I’m going to sing one or two from that area. [Villancicos] are just beautiful music.”

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Aside from focusing on famous villancicos, Barrientos will also keep the traditional festivities of December alive with other musical cultural staples. She highlights how this year has been a particularly difficult one with the pandemic and its ongoing effects on the community, but holds out hope for maintaining the spirit of the holidays alive and well through music. 

“With canciones Decembrinas, I’m going to be doing the more festive side,” Barrientos said. “I’m not super festive right now, it’s been a very difficult time. It’s been so draining. I want to bring back some of that festive because at the end of the day, you know –– whatever happens, we’ve been alive and we’ve made it this far. Whatever happens, at least at this moment, we’re still on this earth.”

Barrientos was introduced to Latin America’s traditional and folkloric songs at an early age due to her indigenous roots. She finds passion in presenting cultural traditions and tapping into each song’s unique history and significance as she performs on stage, and she has a deep appreciation for her cultural roots and identity.

“Me personally, I come from different indigenous people,” Barrientos said. “In each one of those places, you have very strong folkloric festivities, all mixed with Catholicism as well. When [the holidays come around], the way I usually mix my strong, indigenous roots is by bringing the songs of La Virgen de Guadalupe, the songs that are really beautiful and sweet. Most songs are a mixture, totalmente mestizo, a mixture of the Indigenous with the Spanish.”

For now, Barrientos’s focus lies on the present. Faced with the hardships of navigating a pandemic and maintaining a livelihood, she brings a message of keeping our spirits up and going until the very end. Music ties Latin American cultures together –– naturally, Barrientos strives to do the same through her performances. 

“I’m just trying to focus on what we can do now. I bring music, and that’ll hopefully give us a message that whatever happens, we’ll always continue,” Barrientos said.

The Esperanza Peace and Justice Center is a nationally recognized nonprofit arts organization dedicated to the intersections of cultural arts and social change. Esperanza’s cultural programming champions the lives and experiences of women, people of color, LGBTQ, immigrant and working class communities.

Valeria Torrealba is an opinions columnist and public relations assistant at the University Star, a student publication of Texas State University. Email her at reporter@sasentinel.com