Casa Sin Dueno

Wednesday was the birthday of our new son-in-law, Israel. Cadence invited us to dinner at their place and I made Israel's favorite dessert, flan, my first attempt.  We divided the birthday candles among the four little ramekin-sized flans and Israel made a wish and blew them out. (I suspect his wish might have had something to do with warmer weather.) The supper was wonderful and the flan turned out pretty darn delicious, if I do say so myself.

Afterwards, we persuaded Cadence and Israel to play a few songs for us. They met when Cadence was studying mariachi music in Mexico City, and Israel was teaching and performing Son Jarocho music. Since then they have traveled in Spain and the Czech Republic playing Son Jarocho together. Now they are preparing for their first U.S. concert, at Crossings.
Son Jarocho is the traditional folk music of the Veracruz area of Mexico, with influences from indigenous,Spanish, African, and Caribbean music, played on specific stringed instruments.  Israel primarily plays the Requinto, using a piece of cow horn to pluck the notes, and Cadence plays the Jarana,which almost serves as the percussion.

The Leona is another traditional  guitar-like jarocho instrument. It much larger than the requinto and the jarana, and has a deep bass tone.

Israel has built many of the instruments himself. The body of these instruments are carved from a solid piece of wood. He showed us a jarana he is working on now.

He has also built a marimbol, a large keyed soundbox, sort of like a gigantic kalimba.

Cadence's first instrument was the cello, and they are working on a few songs together with it.  It's a  beautiful combination!

Cadence and Israel would be honored to have you hear them perform at Crossings in Zumbrota on Sunday, February 10th! I taped them practicing to give you a sneak preview:

Israel on requinto; Cadence on jarana