EVERY GENRE PROJECT - February 25 - Chilote Music

Genre of the Day - Chilote Music

Album of the Day - Colores de Chiloé by Bordemar (1993)

The notion of going off to a hidden corner of a foreign country and experiencing a different life is one that’s becoming a little questionable, as we live in a world where digital nomads and YouTubers now roam every corner of the earth and economic and digital globalization blur the lines of uniqueness. It seems not a lot is really hidden any more. However, it’s not every day you get to expose yourself to the lore of a niche, green, almost Scandinavian looking island in southern Chile and get to bask in it for 48 minutes. It became easy for my mind to wander, wishing I could escape it all and go to Chiloé.

Chiloé is an archipelago in the deep south of Chile, serving as a bridge between the rest of Chile and the Patagonian part of the skinny little country. However, as with a lot of the island musical cultures we’ve seen in this column, the insular and isolated nature of the culture combined with a variety of influences from indigenous Huiliche and Spanish cultures and Croatia as well as immigrants from German allowed a unique musical angle to flourish in the archipelago.

Chilote music is generally lively, featuring many distinct dances and a healthy sense of vitality. Throughout this album, I found this to be true, although there are more downtempo and plaintive melodies featured here as well. The music here feels a bit more meticulous and less organic than some folk music, which makes sense: Bordemar was formed by professors of music education (and technically aren’t from Chilote, albeit nearby!), so it at times feels like an academically-influenced approach. 

The songs here almost resemble Celtic tunes, with longing violin—although here it’s the Rebec, a medieval-derived Spanish bowed instrument—and legato piano melodies, but the use of syncopated guitar strumming helps set it apart. It’s mostly jaunty, lively cuts with graceful waltzes interspersed throughout. It’s beautiful how islands act as breeding grounds for disparate cultures to come together, bound there by the sea, and draw from the wistful musical palettes to fuse different traditions together.