Mérida

A song for a visitor

A visitor arrives in Yucatán in “Peregrina”: the lyric imagines her travelling from distant lands and discovering the region’s beauty. The song was associated with the American journalist Alma Reed and Yucatán governor Felipe Carrillo Puerto, whose relationship became part of its history.

Poet Luis Rosado Vega wrote the words and Ricardo Palmerín composed the music. The song was created in 1923 and first recorded the following year, according to an account of its centenary. Carrillo Puerto was executed in Mérida in January 1924, giving the story a tragic ending.

Palmerín’s song belongs to the Yucatecan trova tradition. In Mérida, the Museum of Yucatecan Song preserves scores and material about its composers. A later recording by Rodrigo de la Cadena and the Orquesta Típica Yukalpetén gives the song a place in a contemporary repertoire.