Guadalajara

A name in a song

Pepe Guízar wrote “Guadalajara”, a song that carries the name of his city. The lyric addresses Guadalajara directly, recalling the scent of wet earth and rainy afternoons near Los Colomos. It entered the mariachi repertoire and travelled far beyond Jalisco in versions by different performers.

The composer also wrote “El mariachi”. In an interview preserved by Radio Educación, Guízar spoke about writing it for the musicians he had admired since childhood in Guadalajara.

Guízar was born in San Juan de Dios, the neighbourhood of the Plaza de los Mariachis. The municipal tourism guide describes an area of inns, traders, musicians and cantinas; by the middle of the twentieth century the square had become known by its musical name.

Mariachi Los Camperos included “Guadalajara” in a medley of songs from Jalisco. Smithsonian Folkways notes the ensemble’s characteristic ending in blocks of chords.