(cheerful music) >> You don't really even need the instruments that we're playing today.

They play 'em on overturned dresser drawers, (table thudding) cigar boxes with spoons.

And so it's not necessarily specifically about the instruments, it's about the combination of those rhythms and how it all comes together.

(cheerful music) >> Music is so beautiful.

Its beauty is enhanced by the more you're exposed to it.

And if you're able to learn a little bit deeper, that's almost like having a deeper love.

If you could imagine love being deeper, why wouldn't you (laughs) wanna keep studying and learning?

I mean, that's what life is.

(cheerful music) >> Ibet: Women have been part of mariachi groups way back then, back in our motherland in Mexico.

But here, in the United States, it's a pretty new idea.

(musicians singing in foreign language) (hopeful music) >> Sunghee: This is a mini-orchestra.

One person with 10 fingers and two feet controls all the instruments.

Playing this instrument in this large space is really something special.

(hopeful music) >> Announcer: Doing as much as you can, as quickly as you can, is important to me.

(cheerful music) Life is short.

And the earlier we get started helping our community, the better off our community will be.

>> Announcer: Family, home, work, self, of all the things you take care of, make sure you are near the top of the list.

NorthShore Health Centers offers many services to keep you balanced and healthy.

So take a moment, self-assess, and put yourself first.

From medical to dental, vision, chiropractic, and mental health, NorthShore will help get you centered.

You help keep your world running, so make sure to take care of yourself.

NorthShore Health Centers, building a healthy community, one patient at a time.

(cheerful music) >> Announcer: Eye on the Arts is made possible in part by South Shore Arts, the John W. Anderson Foundation, and the Indiana Arts Commission, Making the Arts Happen.

(cheerful music) Additional support for Lakeshore Public Media and local programming is made possible by viewers like you.

Thank you.

(cheerful music) (cheerful music) >> Cuba was a hub of the slave trade, so you had many different peoples from Africa coming in, and then you also had Spanish and French European influences.

The songs are arranged quite often in a European form, where the rhythms are borrowing from all the different African influences that are in Cuban music.

And it really is used just for enjoyment.

It's a party in a box basically.

You don't really even need the instruments that we're playing today.

They play 'em on overturned dresser drawers, (table thudding) cigar boxes with spoons.

And so it's not necessarily specifically about the instruments, it's about the combination of those rhythms and how it all comes together.

(cheerful music) This music is a form that you really need to have other people to play with.

In this area, there aren't too many people who know of the form, let alone know how to play it.

So I started this up, so I could pass on what I know and just have some other people to play with.

(cheerful music) >> So in '19, I started playing like drums and a little bit of guitar, and then just kind of fell off for 10 or so years, you know, life, kids, stuff like that.

And then just started picking it up about a year, a year and a half ago.

I've been taking private lessons with Ed Brann, and I know he comes here, and he mentioned it.

I decided to pop in and give it a try, and it was great.

For me, it's totally different, you know, I wasn't a huge into like the drum kit, you know what I mean?

I didn't count.

I just kind of felt the beat, you know, something like that.

But here, it's like a lot of counting and feeling the beat.

It's mind-blowing, actually, hard to put into words, it's like talking through music.

(cheerful music) >> Basic conversation going between large drum, (drum thudding) the lowest drum, (drum thudding) and the middle drum.

(drum thudding) (Ed claps hands) (Ed singing in foreign language) Well, I found that I like to teach it.

I get a lot of joy out of sharing it with folks, but it also helps me, not just from a student standpoint, trying to play it, but also to try and explain it to somebody who doesn't have an understanding of it forces me really to break it down into components that I'm not even considering when I'm studying it myself.

You would shed it home.

You figure out how to play your instrument.

You learn some technique (drum thudding) and some lyrics (sticks clacking) and some things to play.

The next step with that is to go out and start playing (sticks clacking) with other people.

And that communication that goes on, that's the treat, you know, at the end of the hard work.

(cheerful music) When you are playing with somebody, and you get a sense for where they're going, it's very subtle, it's almost an intuitive level understanding of where everyone is going together.

So you stop playing what you are playing, and everyone is playing the entire piece.

(cheerful music) We were talking earlier today about this is the basic form, and then you're allowed to start bringing in variations.

(cheerful music) So there's some rules to it, but you get to choose what variation and when you decide to play it.

So that's when it opens up and becomes personal for everybody.

So, now, you're playing off of everybody, and everyone is connecting in that way.

So it really becomes a real-time conversation.

Quickly, you can change the feel, the sound of the rhythm, just by adding one note where somebody else isn't playing it.

So, now, you become two people playing one rhythm.

You birth the rhythm together.

(cheerful music) Picked this up probably 25 to 30 years ago, playing hand drums.

To be honest, I really didn't know what I was doing, kind of winging it for a long time.

And then I dug in and started getting new material and new ideas.

I took two trips to Havana, and it was five, six years ago.

And I'm still digesting what I learned there.

I am able to play the form.

I'm able to play around within the form.

But when you hear that Cubans play this, and the level that they take it to, the subtle levels that they take it to, I will forever be a student.

(cheerful music) Cubans have this knack for choosing very interesting points in time.

Dun, dun, dun dun, dun, dun, dun, dun dun, dun.

Well, that dun, which grabs your hip and moves your hip for you, that they call that the bumbo note.

So it just has that effect on you, when you place these downbeats and then throw an upbeat in there, yeah, your body responds to it.

>> Like I said, my first time here, I definitely, I came here, I felt comfortable right away.

Nobody's judging.

You're just free to be yourself.

You know, I kind of like it.

(laughs) (cheerful music) Playing with different people is great, you know, it's just they have their flavor, I have my flavor.

We're all just blending together like one little happy family.

>> Everybody that I've played music with has become important to me.

(laughs) They're all amazing people to begin with because, you know, they're on a similar path.

Doesn't matter what instrument they're playing, if you have that level of communication, that subtle level of communication, with somebody, you connect on levels that you may not, even if you have a regular conversation with somebody.

So if you do that, over time, they become family.

Just to get a feeling for playing off of somebody else, it doesn't have to be complicated, it can be do, da, do, da.

(sticks clacking) Once you feel that, you realize that it is within you, you are capable of doing that.

I teach these rhythms to folks who don't even own a drum, they maybe even never touched a drum.

And, you know, we're not digging into technique and doing, you know, a lesson necessarily, but we're able to birth that rhythm, we're able to get it up off the ground.

It might be a simplified form, but it is still gonna give that experience of communicating with somebody else, hearing your note in context of somebody else's note over and over and over, and keeping that consistent.

And then you kind of let go, and the conversation becomes what everybody brings to it.

And that is very accessible.

(musician laughs) (cheerful music) (musician singing in foreign language) (cheerful music) >> I've always loved music, first off.

As far as the drums, I attended a parade, and the drums were so powerful, I could feel it in my young chest, as they went by.

And it just kind of, it gave me a thrill, I just wanted to be a part of that.

I couldn't have been more than eight or nine, but I didn't actually get a chance to play a drum till I was 12.

(cheerful music) >> One, two, three, four.

(sticks clacking) (cheerful music) (cheerful music continues) (cheerful music continues) (cheerful music continues) (cheerful music continues) >> I grew up in Gary.

I recall, before I had my drums, I had a nice polo bike, you know, those with the monkey handlebars and the banana seat.

And this guy had a set of Ludwigs back then, unheard of.

(cheerful music) So I said, "Man, look here, I let you ride this bike.

(laughs) You let me sit down behind your drums."

So we struck up a friendship.

And needless to say, I would ride by his house every day.

But the way that I actually got drums, I came from a family of five siblings.

My mom and dad were divorced.

It wasn't my birthday.

I came home from school one day, and a set of drums were sitting on the living room floor.

And my siblings didn't complain about it because they knew that I was banging on everything in the house, you know, they were happy to see me have it, and I was happy to have it.

(cheerful music) (horns honking) Let's say early '70s, maybe late '60s, 11th Avenue in Gary, Indiana, had at least three clubs from each side of the street within a couple of blocks.

And you could go and watch great bands playing blues R&B.

And if you could catch one set, go across the street and catch someone else, you know, that's how vibrant the scene was.

And then a couple of streets over on 15th, you had Clayman's Show Lounge, where you could see national acts like B.B.

King, Bobby Blue Bland.

It was just a wonderful, wonderful time.

(cheerful music) I wasn't familiar how important Albert King was when I got introduced, but thank God I was in the right place at the right time and managed to get that education from Albert.

He was very nurturing.

He saw I was a little green in certain areas, so he would show me how to do a Texas shuffle or a slow blues the way that he wanted it, and watch his cues.

So I would know, you know, the dynamic range that he wanted.

But he was incredible guitar player.

I've even seen B.B.

King come to one of our performances and share the stage, and those two would go at it.

And at the end of it, B.B.

would give Albert his praise.

And for a young man to witness all this, it was just incredible.

(cheerful music) Oh, listening is paramount.

(cheerful music) And if you don't listen, you're not gonna keep the job.

Simple as that.

So I become very sensitive when I play with other people.

(cheerful music) >> Kevin: How does it feel to know you've taken something you love and shared it with another generation?

>> Well, this is the thing, Kevin, what they picked upon most of all was my love for it.

And in turn, they love it.

And from the looks of it, they taught you to love it.

So that takes care of itself.

So we're all on the same journey, on the same path, and hopefully, we will get to the heights that we inspire to be at.

(cheerful music) Music is so beautiful.

(cheerful music) Its beauty is enhanced by the more you're exposed to it.

And if you're able to learn a little bit deeper, that's almost like having a deeper love.

If you could imagine love being deeper, why wouldn't you (laughs) wanna keep studying and learning?

I mean, that's what life is.

(cheerful music) (cheerful music) >> Mariachi, it's stereotyped just being pretty much men.

But women have been part of mariachi groups way back then, back in our motherland in Mexico.

But here, in the United States, it's a pretty new idea.

(musicians singing in foreign language) Mariachi Sirenas actually translates to directly, which is mermaids.

Sirenas is mermaids, or sirenas is also sirens.

Mariachi Sirenas, actually, it was an idea that Jeanette Nevarez, our guitarronera, just kinda mentioned.

And it was one of those ideas I felt right.

It was such a feminine idea to such a masculine genre.

It's pretty, it's fun.

And, you know, mermaids are known for singing and killing men with their voices.

So that's what our goal is.

No, it's not, (laughs) just to have fun with it.

(cheerful music) In the beginning, it was pretty rocky trying to figure out what we wanted to do and how we were gonna do it, and being able to execute it.

Back then, we were still trying to figure out who we were and what mariachi really meant for every member in the group.

We all came from different mariachi backgrounds, we all played in different mariachi groups.

So it's just a matter of, you know, just because you play in one group or another group doesn't mean that we all play the same way or have the same ideas.

So I think, now, being where we are, we are more open to having that conversation and just being open (wood pallet thudding) with one another as to what Mariachi Sirenas will represent to us and how we will go ahead and translate that to everybody else.

(cheerful music) Mariachi music is its own culture.

It's its own genre.

It is composed of different styles, and it's everything, it's a beautiful marriage of what Mexican traditional music is.

It's more than just an ensemble 'cause with mariachi, we're able to play a bolero that's more romantic.

We're able to do the ranchera, which is pretty much what everybody remembers when they hear mariachi, which is like the Vicente Fernandez.

We can do cumbia, where people can dance.

So the emotions that come out of the mariachi genre is amazing.

We can make people cry, and we cry sometimes while we're playing or singing songs.

We can make people dance.

And it's just, it's one of those genres that can be placed (wood pallet thudding) into any emotion, depending on what's going on.

And having people like just sing back to us, granted it's not our original songs.

These songs have been in our tradition for, you know, years and years.

But knowing that they, almost them singing back is like they approve of what we're doing out there, and seeing them dance, and seeing 'em having a good time, and, you know, raise their glasses, if they're having a drink, it's the biggest salute.

(cheerful music) All of our members being under the age of 30, and then on top of that, we are all first-generation or second-generation Mexican Americans.

It's that feeling where, yes, we are young, but also feeling that we're not as Mexican as we should be.

So having to try to prove that to the Mexican culture that, yes, we were born here, but we are true to our culture.

You know, we are going to play the traditional stuff that was brought up years and years ago, when mariachi first became a thing.

So we practice two or three times a week to be able to get the work done.

It's not just putting on the makeup, it's not just tighten up our skirts, it's a lot more than that.

And we just hope that that shows when we are out there performing.

(musicians singing in foreign language) Working with Mariachi Sirenas has been an absolute, it's been amazing.

It's been two years of my life that I would not change for the world.

It's been two years where I have learned a lot about myself.

I've learned about members that I've been playing in groups before.

You know, it's just, we are, as cliche as it may sound, we are a sisterhood.

Like we do see each other almost every single day.

We just keep doing what we are doing because we share that passion and we share the goal.

And I think that's the important thing.

(musicians singing in foreign language) It's a beautiful, beautiful chaos hurricane that we love to be in the middle of.

And we have nothing to do, but just to do what we do, and just have fun with it, and show our passion through it, and hope that people like it.

(musicians singing in foreign language) (hopeful music) >> Announcer: Located in the Chapel of the Resurrection on the campus of Valparaiso University, the Reddel Memorial Organ is a sight and sound to behold.

Originally installed in 1959 and expanded in 1996, the instrument exists in harmony with the chapel, both architecturally and sonically.

(hopeful music) Organist Sunghee Kim was kind enough to share her talents and demonstrate this magnificent instrument.

(buttons clicking) (cheerful music) >> There is not single exactly same organ in the world because the pipe organs are designed based on the space.

All the organs are different.

Even though you see the same name of the instrument, which is called the stop on the organ, they sound differently.

As you can see, this is a giant instrument with permissive sound, which has four different keyboards and also the paddleboard, that's the fifth keyboard on this organ.

So each keyboard has its own sets of pipes, so you can make different sounds and also for the pedal, so your feet playing some kind of melodic lines or bass lines, and your 10 fingers are also playing the music on the keyboard.

(hopeful music) Several thousand years ago, they used the water power to create air pressure.

Nowadays, organ has the wind chest and blower.

Once you press the key, the pipe valve is opened, then air comes through, and it creates the sound, and you will hear very different colors and the texture, different textures, from all these different pipes.

(hopeful music) (hopeful music continues) (hopeful music continues) This is a mini-orchestra.

What I'm saying mini is one person's orchestra.

So one person with 10 fingers and two feet, the one person controls all the instruments.

Modern synthesizer, you have only one keyboard.

And in organ's case, you can have one, two, three, four, five synthesizers, in this case.

There are many buttons.

One button is one instrument.

The fascinating thing about the organ is, this instrument is so powerful as well as so humble.

So you can have the full orchestra on this organ to support like 2,000 congregation with powerful sound.

And sometimes you have only one instrument, not overpowering anyone, but it's supporting singing voices.

(hopeful music) This is the largest college chapel in the US.

And I believe this is also the second-largest college chapel in the world.

So playing this instrument in this large space is really something special.

The acoustic is quite alive in this hall.

So it's not just about playing something right under your ears or your fingertips.

So you will experience the whole sound fills this huge hall.

(hopeful music) Playing this organ begins from coming up through the spider staircase.

(hopeful music) In early morning and early afternoon, you will see the direct sunlight from the organ console, and it deflect all the beautiful colors through the stained glasses.

And while you are playing, it's not just about playing music.

You can enjoy all the beautiful pieces of this single corner and beautiful artworks.

(hopeful music) I am so blessed, and I'm so thankful, to have a chance to play on this organ and to spend my personal times too on this organ.

(cheerful music) >> Announcer: Doing as much as you can, as quickly as you can, is important to me.

(cheerful music) Life is short.

And the earlier we get started helping our community, the better off our community will be.

>> Announcer: Family, home, work, self, of all the things you take care of, make sure you are near the top of the list.

NorthShore Health Centers offers many services to keep you balanced and healthy.

So take a moment, self-assess, and put yourself first.

From medical to dental, vision, chiropractic, and mental health, NorthShore will help get you centered.

You help keep your world running, so make sure to take care of yourself.

NorthShore Health Centers, building a healthy community, one patient at a time.

(cheerful music) >> Announcer: Eye on the Arts is made possible in part by South Shore Arts, the John W. Anderson Foundation, and the Indiana Arts Commission, Making the Arts Happen.

(cheerful music) Additional support for Lakeshore Public Media and local programming is made possible by viewers like you.

Thank you.

(hopeful music) (lively music) (cheerful music)