Los Mariachi Sagas S4 E1 - Alex Y (Guest #1)

LMS is officially back. Let's welcome our first guest Alex. she recently finished with her masters degree from Florida State University. Before joining the FSU mariachi Alex had no experience with mariachi even still she was a part of the first ever FSU mariachi recital. Find out more about her story. 

email us at losmariachisagas@gmail.com
or instagram @losmariachisagas

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

This is the first episode I've recorded in three years.

SPEAKER_04 0:06

Wow. Why?

SPEAKER_01 0:09

Back in summer twenty-three, I moved back to San Marcos, which is where I kind of started this. But um I was living in that area. Then even before that, honestly, it it was like very sporadic. Uh where I was where we were doing this the most, my co-host and I met, was fall of 2020 to fall 21. Um, it got harder once I moved because I graduated from Texas State uh May 21, and I moved in July. So a lot of back and forth. Um then eventually I was living down in the valley in Texas, and then I moved back to Austin, and it was just so much back and forth. But I was still relatively within the area. I mean, within like five hours. But then I moved to South Carolina.

SPEAKER_04 1:04

What? I didn't know this. You didn't know this. It's so random.

SPEAKER_01 1:08

I never told you I lived in South Carolina.

SPEAKER_04 1:10

No.

SPEAKER_01 1:11

Yeah, I used to I lived in South Carolina.

SPEAKER_04 1:14

Why?

SPEAKER_01 1:15

Uh because of a job.

unknown 1:17

Oh.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

So I started my master's right in spring twenty two.

SPEAKER_04 1:22

Here?

SPEAKER_01 1:23

No. Um at UTRGV.

SPEAKER_04 1:27

Wait, RGV?

SPEAKER_01 1:29

University of Texas, Rio Gran Valley.

unknown 1:31

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:32

You don't know my story. I feel like I've sorry, you probably told me this before.

SPEAKER_04 1:39

Oh, I've just seen a lot happen.

SPEAKER_01 1:42

Excuse me. No, yeah, I I started on a master's down there, but then I moved because I was working. Uh then I got an internship in New Bromfels, summer 23. So that's when I moved back and I did a couple more episodes there because I okay, I'm like, alright, I'm gonna start it again. And then I got an offer to work at a national lab in South Carolina.

SPEAKER_04 2:06

Dang, that's cool.

SPEAKER_01 2:07

Yeah, and I was gonna I remember too, I was gonna bring that up here as part of the reason I haven't uploaded and explained, but also I don't know how much I can say because it's a national lab and it was like sworn to secrecy. Well, I was dealing with nuclear materials and dude, and yeah, that's so cool. Yeah, like talking about anything I was doing in there, it it had to go through like so I had to like write a formal um memo basically of what I was gonna talk about to somebody, um, and it had to go through internal review. Wow, and then I was able to talk about just whatever's was on that memo. So I was still doing my master's during that time. Um, but I went over there and then I still had my advisor, I was still doing my thesis, and I ended up doing the rest of my thesis based off what I was doing at the national lab.

SPEAKER_04 3:05

What was your job?

SPEAKER_01 3:07

So it was a specific program. I so I got a fellowship. Okay. Um, it was called the um MSIP, so environmental management um dash like minority serving institution partnership program. So they targeted minority serving institutions, which would be like HBCUs or HSIs, it's a Hispanic serving institutions, and UTRGV is like 95% Hispanic. So I got an email like in fall of 2022 about this program, and I was like, uh, I don't even know, I don't know anything about this. And they had national labs all over the country, so I'm like, let me just submit something. So I submitted, and then I got an interview in like April or no, it was February, but it was out in New Mexico for a different lab, uh, completely different national lab, completely different project. They didn't give me that. They they wanted something to do with like geosurvey and like rock materials, and I'm like, you guys read my my resume. Um I'm an industrial engineer, I don't do anything with materials and rocks and geographic formations. And then they told me I was like one of the final five candidates or something.

SPEAKER_04 4:30

Oh my gosh!

SPEAKER_01 4:31

I was like, uh don't give them me this job, please. Um, so I didn't get that. Um, I got some other messages when I got the interview for South Carolina. It was so cryptid. I just I got an email from just like throwaway account or something, and it just said it had a link to like um application um or invite to like Teams meeting or something. And I responded, I was just like, okay. I didn't really know what this was. And then I get on it, and then there's like 10 people on there.

SPEAKER_04 5:09

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_01 5:11

And it was uh who ended up being my manager, my advisor. Jeez, no pressure. It was a bunch of people, yeah. And they're they're asking me about a whole bunch of stuff. And they specifically wanted somebody with an industrial engineering background for a specific project. And well, they ended up choosing me. So I went and then they they picked 12 people across the country uh to go to the like different national labs, and I was one of two people to go to South Carolina. So I was there for a year. Well, technically it was supposed to be 13 months, but while I was there doing all this stuff, that's when I started applying to PhD programs, and then ultimately I I I came here from South Carolina, yeah. I moved from South Carolina straight to here, and that's part of the reason I came here was because I was already relatively close. Right. It was like a six-hour drive. My other options was Colorado or Wisconsin.

SPEAKER_04 6:15

And Wisconsin, I feel like, is so random.

SPEAKER_01 6:20

Uh they they have a lot because well, it's because they're it's it's a manufacturing hub. Oh uh just well the Bay Area, so like Milwaukee, all that. There's a lot of manufacturing that goes on in that area and well Detroit with all the cars. Um and so the programs are pretty pretty good over there, um, especially because well it's relatively close to Chicago. So it's just a lot of industry opportunities. But ultimately I chose here. Um that whole process and the whole reasoning will take like two hours, so I'll just uh skip over that. But I yes, now I'm here. And then that's when before I came here, so to go back to like the whole mariachi thing, I came to visit FSU FAMU um in April of 2024, or March, the end of March. And I knew there was mariachis in Orlando because I had played in Orlando before my sister used to live there. Oh. So I visited back in 2021, which another kind of funny, ironic thing, but when I graduated my undergrad, I was talking to the person I was living with at the time, well, not like my landlord. Um, and I was trying to decide where to go because I finished my undergrad and I didn't have a job. I was trying to get a job in Austin, didn't find anything, I didn't want to just keep gigging forever. Um, and I told him I was like, I really want to move to Orlando or like Florida. Because I'm like I've already played all over Texas, I've already done pretty most of what I want to do here. I just want to go somewhere else.

SPEAKER_04 8:07

Um Texas for a while.

SPEAKER_01 8:10

Wow. For a while. You say that like you're not going to Oklahoma. Let's not talk about it. This is gross. Uh but so I I had actually full intentions of moving to Orlando. I was like, gonna do it summer of 21. And then I ended up moving to the valley first for a bit. I was like, let me try and find a job, let me apply to grad schools, and then it just went down that hole. And then ultimately three years later, I ended up in Florida going to school here.

SPEAKER_04 8:43

Still to existence.

SPEAKER_01 8:45

I did. Uh so I knew a couple people, but more of the Orlando area, um, and then people from the fraternity too, because we used to have a chapter at UF.

SPEAKER_04 8:55

Okay. So did you know any of the Ariashi guys here before Yu-Gi-H? Like, did you know them from Orlando? Any connections?

SPEAKER_01 9:03

No, I mean I'm much older than two rent. Like when I was around here three years ago, there were uh f freshmen maybe at FSU, and they hadn't even started this group yet.

unknown 9:16

Old.

SPEAKER_01 9:17

Yeah, I'm I'm old. You're old too. Not as old as you. Funny. Uh I when I came to visit um that weekend at FSU, I I had no idea if there was an FSU Mariachi or not. Um just I never saw anything. So I was like just Googling FSU Mariachi. So I came across some video um that came up, and when I was Googling, just a huge coincidence, this the exact same day I was here, or the day that I had free, it was Carlos's senior recital.

SPEAKER_04 10:00

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_01 10:01

And he used it half classical, and the second half was uh Mariachi.

SPEAKER_04 10:07

Awesome.

SPEAKER_01 10:08

And so I went to it.

SPEAKER_04 10:09

Wow, what are the chances that happens that that lined up so perfectly?

SPEAKER_01 10:14

Yeah, so that's the first time that I met um Mariana, uh Carlos, Gabriel, Michael, uh, Lucas, and there was this other girl uh on Samuel somewhere um there that night.

SPEAKER_04 10:30

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 10:31

And I didn't I didn't know any of them. I didn't and then I didn't know their Instagram or anything, so I just like kind of showed up and then I went to talk to them afterwards. Um, and then they invited me to so they went to Olive Garden afterwards. Oh, that's cute to have dinner for the recital and stuff. So I went and yeah, that's where I talked to them more, met them, and Carlos's parents, and all this stuff. And so I was still deciding where to go. Uh-huh. And the thing is, University of Tennessee, Knoxville was inviting me to visit. And that's like a very good program and a lot of money. And they're like, Yeah, we we have this project for you, this team, here's your advisor, this is money. So, you know, I keep emailing. Where's the where's the money? Where's the letter? Like, I need you to send me an official letter because other universities have already offered me. And ultimately I finally got a response, and he's like, Ah, sorry, we don't have the money.

SPEAKER_04 11:32

Whoa.

SPEAKER_01 11:33

This is after they like hosted me for a weekend, they took me out to eat, they took me tour, everything.

SPEAKER_04 11:41

Wow, that's insane. Yeah, it seemed like everything worked out for the best, though.

SPEAKER_01 11:47

Yeah, uh, I mean, uh it's just fine here. Like, so Tennessee and Knoxville, there's not mariachis that I'm currently aware of, but there are a lot in Nashville and Atlanta. Um, which Atlanta. Yeah, there's a lot of mariachis in Atlanta.

SPEAKER_04 12:05

Um have you played there before?

SPEAKER_01 12:07

Yeah, a bunch of times. Um, so when I lived in South Carolina, there was no mariachi. Technically, there was one, but they're on the border of North Carolina, South Carolina. Um, and that was like four hours away from where I was living. And Atlanta was also four hours away. So I would go play very seldomly. Um, like my whole year that I lived over there in South Carolina, I played probably four times. I was also making lots of money at the lab, so I didn't have to.

SPEAKER_04 12:42

That's nice.

SPEAKER_01 12:43

Um yeah, for the first time in years since 2015. I pretty I basically permanently took a break from from playing.

SPEAKER_04 12:54

Do you feel like that was healthy? Did that help you appreciate it more? Like, do you feel like it refreshed you?

SPEAKER_01 13:00

I yeah, especially since I've been so 2015 when I started gigging, but playing Mariachi regularly, that started in 2011 in high school. So basically for 12 years straight, just playing at least once a week. And it it was uh it felt weird the very first week because it was Saturday night and I had no gigs, I had nowhere to go. I was literally just in my apartment. Like I watched Saturday Night Live, but like live for the first time since like high school or something. Uh it it it was it was weird, but it it felt yeah nice to not have to do that. Yeah. Uh it did mess up my hands though, because you you build up calluses and and stuff, yeah, especially playing the guitarrone. Uh, when I then came back into playing after a good eight months of not playing, I went and did like 10 hours in Atlanta on I don't remember what instrument. Broke your fingers in pain. Oh my gosh. Yeah, after month and then I had forgotten songs, like how to play or sing certain songs that I was doing all the time. So I I felt like so out of shape um in terms of my playing. Because back then I was actually starting to get into shape physically because I had nothing to do. Yeah. I was going, I had a trainer and I was playing basketball all the time. Um when I took the break, though, I I that's when I started like doing other stuff with music, recording just random things or other genres. Um then so then I ended up coming here, and um it was interesting with these guys because they started the Mariachi with no experience having ever been really in a school group. Gabriel technically did, he says he did. He played like in seventh grade in Austin, and seventh grade Mariachi or something.

SPEAKER_04 15:26

That's awesome. They offer it in middle school.

SPEAKER_01 15:28

Yeah, but the Austin Mariachi scene, school district scene is horrible. Oh and it's not so much their fault, it's that the the school district doesn't put any money in it, so there's literally um math teachers, science teachers teaching the mariachi program because nobody wants to do it. So I'll do it.

SPEAKER_04 15:51

Put me in coach. I feel like that has so much potential, like especially in Texas, like they could really build that up so well.

SPEAKER_01 15:59

They they could. And then also the it was funny when the UT Austin Mariachi years ago, this is like probably 2017, were starting to get better or really try to invest in themselves. They were asking for donations from people for for suits. And all the comments are just like, why is any UT ensemble asking for donations? And UT is one of the biggest endowments in the country of money. Um ultimately they they ended up getting money first those donations, but then once the school kind of started seeing them like as an a legitimate group, they started giving them a budget.

SPEAKER_02 16:45

Good.

SPEAKER_01 16:46

But it took a long time. Yeah. I mean, this is 2018, and UT Austin Money Ecci has been around since the 80s and 90s. So um when I came here, it was completely student run. Um Carlos and Gabriel started it. Um they were both from Texas. They had some experience in Mariachi, uh, but they're classical players, right? Their degrees were in classical um performance. So I came, Carlos technically will graduated, but he started his master's. Gabriel is a senior, Michael graduated, and Lucas was I don't know what he was he's still a student.

SPEAKER_04 17:34

He's still a student, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:35

He's supposed to graduate in the fall. Okay. Well see. Um what they did was so crazy to me. Um and and this is where I you were we were talking about earlier about how the structure of rehearsals, how unorganized, they're all this stuff. So part of that, you know, I'll take blame for that because I completely disrupted whatever they were doing before. Because I completely disagreed with almost everything they were doing. And and it it was no shot to their musicianship. It was the fact that they don't, they never were part of a school group. And the way Mariachi is run in the school is not the same how you run it at a gig.

SPEAKER_04 18:30

Right.

SPEAKER_01 18:31

Like at all.

SPEAKER_04 18:33

So were you wanting to run it more like a gig? Is that where things are?

SPEAKER_01 18:37

No, I want to run it like a school group. The thing that that they did is they created some weird hybrid thing where it was like a school group and a gigging group at the same time. And that's what bothered me the most because you cannot both. Right. Um it's just like a I don't know how to explain. So like at Texas State, um, one of the top Maniachi programs in the country, right? And that's why I went there and I made it and stuff, right? Uh competed and all that. We got called all the time to perform for people's weddings or birthdays, even alumni or uh faculty, and we never did that. And it it it wasn't because we couldn't. It's it's just um it's like separation of that that's a gig, right, and this is a school ensemble. Right. It's it's like if somebody calls the the USO or UPO and be like, can you come play for um a wedding or uh something?

SPEAKER_04 19:54

There's a big difference, right?

SPEAKER_01 19:55

You're not gonna send the orchestra or even like a piece of you're not gonna tell like your concertmaster and then tell some trumpets or something, like, oh go handle this gig as the university's symphonic orchestra. Like, you don't do that. Yeah, because now you're representing the school, you're then you're taking money, and that's also not allowed. And so that's how they were treating the group. They were taking gigs at restaurants, at birthdays, out on a ranch, and saying, Oh, yeah, we're the FSU and Mariachi. And I was like, What the hell are you doing? Like, you you can't like legally, first of all, you can't do that. Um, that's against a lot of rules. And if the school were to find out that you would be in a lot of trouble, they would come, they would just discease in the system, right? The group completely at immediately.

SPEAKER_02 20:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:52

And um so now you're also conflating what it means to be a school mariachi and a gigging mariachi. So growing up in the gigging room, so my senior year in high school, there was about seven of us that were seniors in the mariachi. Can you can you guess how many of those seven ended up gigging like outside of school?

SPEAKER_04 21:22

All of them?

unknown 21:24

One.

SPEAKER_04 21:24

Oh, just kidding. This is me.

SPEAKER_01 21:27

Oh technically there's two, but he only gigged for about a year and he stopped.

SPEAKER_04 21:31

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 21:32

Is this one? And that that's that wasn't just my score, that wasn't just because I'm like good or whatever. That that's just across um everywhere. And and this it so we would treat it like a sports team. So the varsity soccer team, how many of them actually go out to be professional soccer players? Zero to one.

unknown 21:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:54

And it it would be the same thing for Mariachi because there's just a certain level of That you have to kind of get to. And the school mariachis don't prepare you for that.

unknown 22:05

Right.

SPEAKER_01 22:06

So we would work on a concert, a very set list, ten songs, fifteen songs. On top of that, we do a performance um competition. And those are like a 10 minute set, seven to ten minutes of just continuous playing because it would be like a medley. And that's how we get judged, like how successful of a program you are. How many competitions you win, how well you do at UIL, how many all-staters, all region. It doesn't matter how many songs you have memorized, or how well you can change keys, or how many songs can you like pull from your phone and just start singing and be within somewhere in the key. Yeah. Because we're not gonna do that, you're not gonna get on stage and be like, can does anybody have requests anybody in the crowd? Right? That's a completely different skill set. So a lot of the players in these top high school groups, um, even the top top high school groups like Roma, Rio, the the percentage that gig from them is still very small. It's like less than a handful of things.

SPEAKER_04 23:19

So do you learn the gigging culture and how to gig just kind of by doing it, by like just meeting the right people and just transferring into it?

SPEAKER_01 23:30

Um yeah. It's still very old school, it's still very like you you have to go and get like hazed until you're good. Wow. And and it's every successful gigging musician that I know has gone through it. And it's gonna be the similar story. It's gonna be you showing up, maybe you're 16 to 20, right? That range, that age range when people most people start gigging. And you go and they ask for A. And then the really old school 60-year-old Mexican violin player that's in the group is there, and then he's like, Okay, we'll sing it. And then you just say, I don't know how to sing it. And he just looks at you and just goes off on you for not knowing Eia, one of just the most basic songs ever to ever exist in terms of gigging. Uh yeah, not with Eya though. But with yeah, with other stuff. Um so one experience I had was probably yeah, so many, but there was oh, you know, a very funny one. Uh I joined a group uh when I lived in Austin. So my freshman year, Texas State, after a couple months. See, being in the Texas State Mariachi gives you a lot of clout.

unknown 25:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:06

Being in the top group. Yeah. I don't really know either one. Um automatically, if you're in there, people assume that, well, you can play. Doesn't mean you can gig. So there's a very distinction between being able to perform on stage and being able to gig. Yeah. Like at a high level. Um, I could play the shit on my instrument. I could whatever music you gave me, I could sight read, probably open this. Well, maybe not now because I'm old and don't practice. But back then, you give me any sheet of music and uh sight read it. I knew all the chords and I just guitar and viuella. And then um we I go gig and then that's for hemah. And there's there's something in mariachi in gigging called cajon. Right? Did I tell you about cajon?

SPEAKER_04 26:02

Is it like the drum cajon?

SPEAKER_01 26:04

No, well, I mean technically that's a cajon, right?

SPEAKER_04 26:07

Okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:07

Or or cajon is also a drawer. But no, cajon and yeah, mariachi means yeah, you just something that that you should be able to just pull out of a drawer. Right. So these songs are something that you should just be able to open a drawer and be like, okay, we're gonna play this one and this one. Yeah, there's no need for music, there's no need to rehearse anything because they're just so common. Like El Rey, that's a cajon song, mariachi loco. You should just know it. Hem I was wondering, you should just know. And I did, but I knew a very specific showpiece type of version that the high schools play, and that's not the cajon version. So even though you know the song, there's different arrangements, right, for the same song. And so they said, or we play Hema, and then I was like, uh key, and they're like G minor, like, oof, I don't got that. And um I just had to like figure it out, and the only reason really why I kind of advanced so fast in the gigging was because one, I one I needed money, but also I didn't have a guitar player to follow or a viuella player. Like the the guy who took me in, his name is Alex, um, he he had been well, he grew up in Austin his whole life. So he knew about Texte Mariachi, he knew all this stuff, and he saw me play, and he's like, Okay, you can play. And I told him, I don't know a lot of songs, like memorized. You know, if I learn them, yeah, I'll I can learn them. Uh, and he's like, Yeah, you figure it out. So the guitarrone player at the time, she learned on her own. She was a little older, so I was 18 at the time, she was 30, um, or close to 30. She played very uniquely. She played like this slap style guitarr thing that I have never seen and I can't even do, I can't replicate it. It was so weird. But she didn't know the chords because she don't even play guitarr. So she couldn't tell me what the chords were.

SPEAKER_04 28:22

Wait, what were you playing?

SPEAKER_01 28:24

Uh Vuela.

SPEAKER_04 28:25

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 28:26

And I was by myself, right? So it was just a four-piece group, right? And that's huge difference from getting uh from four years of a 15-piece ensemble on stage with a microphone concert.

SPEAKER_02 28:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:38

Now you're a four-piece group, and you gotta know, you gotta know the song. There's no there's no hiding it, right? There's no yeah, we're just all the guitar player knows that I'll just follow him, or there's none of that. So I had to learn, or else I had to find something else to do. So eventually I started learning a couple more songs. Um, but so we would do like Hesuita and Chihuahua, we'll do El Rey, Girl Ponso Carinho, Roland Bagon. I learned those, I knew and memorized those. Um I had a good, I don't know, like 15 songs that I had like memorized, which is absolutely nothing. That's that's if all you know is 15 songs, you do do not go out and gig because you're just not ready. Um unless you're doing it for free or you're gonna follow somebody and and learn. Yeah. Um, Alex, though, he had so much faith in me. So we would play at a restaurant every Thursday called El Rey out in Drippin' Springs, Texas. We would it was a two-hour set or two-hour restaurant, so we would do 45 minutes, right? Take a break, and then do the second hour, second set. We'll play the first set, we'll do you know the song chihuahua, el rey, r lampago, all that stuff. Then we would come back, second set. I would do his dunchihuawa, all that. We would do that for I don't know how long this went on, weeks, maybe a month or something. And one day I finally I went to Alex, I was like, Alex, why are we playing the same songs like both sets? And he just looked at me, he's like, because that's all you know. Oh and I was like, Oh yeah, that's right. Let me go learn some more songs. So uh I was lucky that I was around the the age of where YouTube started turning big, yeah. Right, 2015. And so tutorials started becoming very common. And so uh there was this guy, a zombie, who he doesn't really upload anymore, but he had so many videos, so many tutorials of like the cajon arrangements for songs. So literally, I just learned so many.

SPEAKER_04 30:56

I learned that's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 30:59

I don't even know how many, but yeah, um, because of that, the video of just being thrown out there. I took gigs where I I really shouldn't have.

SPEAKER_04 31:08

Um experience is the best teacher, bro.

SPEAKER_01 31:11

Yeah, it is. Uh but not everybody uh can do that, and it and it's not just like me saying I'm like the best ever, but it's because there are people from Roma, right? And I know personally that and Gruya, um one of the top groups, Gruya just won Vargas last year. Um they just performed at Carnegie Hall. Dang! Uh, because they're on their win winners tour.

SPEAKER_04 31:38

For them.

SPEAKER_01 31:40

There was these guys, one from Roma, there's another from Gruya, that came around that time to gig. Um one of them was a trumpet player, another was like a violin player. These guys were amazing, right? They were like all region. Um when so many competitions, do these solos, play like amazing uh technique. The uh one the trumpet player played with um this group, Mario Chiro Lampogo in Austin. That they've been around forever, since like the 80s or 90s. And um that they they had like six hours that day or something of gigs. They took the trumpet player and he played the first hour, and after the first hour, he went to the the guy that owns it and he says, I'm going home. Because he couldn't do it, like he felt so bad because there was no music, right? There there was no, and and also at this time iPads weren't really that popular, or having like digital music wasn't a thing, or like these arrangements weren't as um easily accessible back then. So it's like you just so like in violin, if I tell you, you know, we're gonna do Admiral Carinho, it's like it's like this, and then just show you okay, that's it, and then not play it. Now do it a third up because we're doing a different key. And then um, if you can't do that, it's gonna be very hard to gig it unless you know the song.

SPEAKER_04 33:21

I feel like that would take so much practice.

SPEAKER_01 33:24

Uh it's a skill, it's a completely different skill to learn to be able to transpose on the spot or to be able to hear a melody and just be like and be like, okay. Uh so a lot a lot of things, especially melody players, melody or the violin and trumpet players, they have to play the intros to most of the songs. Yeah. And so if they don't know it, they'll go to the for some reason as an armonia player, Rita Ron player, we just happen to know the melodies for some reason. Like it's just like in our heads.

SPEAKER_04 33:57

They complement each other, like the lows and the highs.

SPEAKER_01 34:00

Yeah. But so they'll come to us a lot and be like, what's the how does a song start? Like, I can't remember how a song starts. And so I'll just sing the melody to them. The thing is, I don't know the pitches, and I don't have perfect pitch. Yeah. So I'll I'll just sing how it generally goes, but probably most of the pitches are not right. So just based off of my wrong pitches and the the the the intervals are gonna be very close, but I'm probably in a different key or something. Um I'll just sing the the melody to them, and then they'll be like, okay, so they just figure out what I just sung, and now they gotta figure out the key and then transpose it to the key that we're actually gonna do it in, and then start playing all within about 15 seconds. And if you can't do that, I mean you can still go, but you you will never be the main person. You're always gonna have to have somebody, right? Uh a first trumpet that you're just gonna follow, or a first violin that you're gonna follow. But you to you to go and like advertise yourself, I'm a violin player and uh I'm available for the gigging, and then you show up and you're the only violin player there, well, you but you better know what you're doing.

SPEAKER_04 35:22

Or else I'm not trying to do that.

SPEAKER_01 35:25

But no, but it's for for anybody, right? The gigs, that's what so uh even these top groups in high school. That's what and and the so that's why that that would explain why you know from the eight people in my senior year, one person gigged. That's me. And I wasn't ready to gig. I became ready. I I learned over time.

SPEAKER_02 35:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:50

Um, you also you also gotta have to want it. You don't want to do that. Um, but not not everybody does, not everybody can, not everybody wants to. Uh even some people in these top groups, like there is one girl who won Best in the US uh vocalist at Extramaganza in high school. She went on to play with like UTRGV Aslan, right? The best Mariachi uh collegiate Mariachi there is. And now she's a nurse. She spent, I mean, so much of her since sixth grade, right, competing and playing violin. She's a good violin player, a great vocalist. Made it to the top Mariachi ensemble in the country, and she's a nurse.

SPEAKER_04 36:49

I mean, I don't blame her for that shift though, because I feel like the longer you do music, like the more it makes you not want to do music. I just feel like the burnout hits hard.

SPEAKER_01 37:01

It it does. Um similarly, like, yeah, it's like and I think that's the biggest thing these guys didn't understand that I was trying to get across. Yeah. Um school mariachi to me and to people in the Southwest, it it is like sports because people start it at such a young age. Um, and then by the time you're senior, even though you could be amazing, you could get scholarship offers, um you're just burnt out. Yeah. There are people that I know that were great track runners or football, basketball players, but they've been playing since they were six, traveling, and then they they get to the and they're like, then I gotta do this another four years at a really high level at the university level and study, you know, and they're just like, no.

SPEAKER_04 37:51

So, okay, back to the whole transposition thing. The gigging group for Tallahassee, do you guys transpose on the spot? Because y'all play together all the time, so do you just kind of know what to expect or do you still switch around the keys?

SPEAKER_01 38:06

Now the they can transpose. Okay. Um, but again, so we have different musicians. Um Gabriel left, right? He graduated, now he lives in Tampa. Right. Um, Lucas helps out sometimes, but really just when we need him, he still has some trouble transposing. Um but see I can. Um Daniel, he didn't go through the school, Mariachi. So his experience is so wowily contrast to how I came up to Gigging, because we kind of started at the same time, except I started in school and he started on the street. So transposing or playing a song by ear is just what was expected. Right. At a very young age. So he can do that pretty well, and then I mean Joseph can can transpose. Um Michael struggled with it for a while, but now he's he's gotten pretty comfortable at it. Um, because it was just such an abstract thing, right? Especially he was just a classical violinist for so long. Yeah. And even before we got here, they they had the gigging group, and they only played the songs, um, how they were written on the sheet of music. So that's when I came here, and they were doing songs in just the most weird keys I've ever heard. I've never played these songs in these keys in my life.

SPEAKER_02 39:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:35

I'm like, what and I asked Carlos and I was like, Why are you all playing um Lolele Monten E? Um, and he was like, What's because that's what the music says. Uh you guys are uh no, that's not how it works.

SPEAKER_04 39:54

So did you conform to that or did you try to get them to push them?

SPEAKER_01 39:59

You know, I try to push them a little bit, but you know, they started this group back in 2023 or even before that 2022. I f I forget the origins. I said it at the recital and I don't remember. No, I didn't do that. Why do people keep saying that? No, so I put 2024. So no, 2024 is the establishment of Mariachi Aciola. Okay. So the the RSO, that that name was established. So before it were Mariachi Aciola, it was called um Grupo Classico.

unknown 40:41

Oh.

SPEAKER_01 40:42

So the original name of the FSU Mariachi group was Grupo Classico.

SPEAKER_04 40:46

Whoa, okay.

SPEAKER_01 40:48

Yeah. So that's why I established 264 because that's when we changed the name and became like this official. And from now on, we're this. Yeah. Um before that it was a different name. Uh and technically Mariachi As Yola was Fall 24. Uh, that's when we changed the name internally. It wasn't official yet with the university or anything, but Instagram we changed it, all the branding was changed.

SPEAKER_04 41:14

And then that name got dissed by FSU, right?

SPEAKER_01 41:18

Yeah, they had an issue with us using that name.

SPEAKER_04 41:20

Wait, what's our name now?

SPEAKER_01 41:22

It was really Mariachi Oro or something like that.

SPEAKER_04 41:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:25

I don't think it was changed it so many times just to conform to FSU. Oh, such a mess.

SPEAKER_04 41:32

Okay. Now another question. How the FSU ensemble is run right now, like that hybrid thing. Do other groups use that hybrid thing, or is that just a special thing that we have going on at FSU?

SPEAKER_01 41:48

Well, it it isn't run that way anymore, right? The the FSU Mariachi. I'm saying that's how it ru was run when I got here. But you see, not I don't know if you know this when I mean Carlos wasn't involved this past year. Yeah. Um, then Joseph wasn't in the spring. So I kept making that a point. Like, if you play and you gig with the school group, we have a performance or whatever, you are not gonna get paid. Made that extremely clear. And then they're like, okay. And they're like, all right, see you. Yeah. And I'm like, okay, that's I don't care. That's fine. Like, because that's how it should be. You shouldn't be getting paid to perform with the school ensemble. Yeah. Like, that's just so weird to apparently the concert master at the at the USO gets paid. Um, but I mean he's a concertmaster.

SPEAKER_04 42:38

I feel like that's got to be like a scholarship or something, too.

SPEAKER_01 42:41

Yeah, because usually it's a grad student, so it's usually like a performance grant or incentive or something. I guess not the same.

SPEAKER_04 42:47

Yeah, no. I don't know. I feel like that would just feel wrong.

SPEAKER_01 42:51

Yeah. Um, and so I yeah, I made that a point. I was like, nobody's getting paid. And there's some people that had issues with that and then they just didn't want to play. I'm like, okay, well then you guys were just in it to make sixty dollars just so you can go, I don't even know what you do. You're a bunch of 18, 19-year-olds that just go and party or something. I don't know, I don't know what they do. So um I stopped that. But there are other universities that do that hybrid thing, but the ones that do are again student run or not established or in areas that um school mariachi are not a thing. So the mariachi at Yale they take gigs and this or the Yale Mariachi or whatever. And there's videos of them playing in a house or whatever.

SPEAKER_04 43:47

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 43:48

And um Kennesaw State, when they had a mariachi, they'll do that. And they all graduated and now they keep playing. Oh um, but they're no longer affiliated with the school, right? 'Cause none of them are. A school at one of the California schools does that too. Harvard Mariachi. It's all these like weird, obscure mariachi programs that do it.

SPEAKER_04 44:19

Do you know people at all of these programs or is this just based off of your research?

SPEAKER_01 44:23

No, this is just based strictly from like uh Instagram and Facebook um posts that are made. Uh stuff you can just find online. I don't personally know them. I d I knew some people in other programs across the country, like you know, 10 years ago when I was still more involved or when you were all younger. But it's a new generation of people and and it just uh keeps happening. Yeah. Um so it it's not unheard of, um, but they all have the same thing in common where it's i i it's done in a way that that's not, at least to me, um beneficial to mariachi education and specifically mariachi education. I'm not talking about like beneficial for the students for money or exposure of mariachi, um, because it's gonna bring exposure, it's gonna bring all that stuff.

SPEAKER_02 45:24

Right.

SPEAKER_01 45:25

But it it also breeds this kind of um incomplete form uh that I would say of how a school ensemble could sound and coming from you know extremely competitive region, so back then uh it was called Region 15, I don't know what it's called now, but um where I I competed. I didn't go to Roma or Real or EdCouch, well Ed Couch, different region, but Valley View, but I competed against them because we're in the same region. So when I made All Region and VY Lag guitar and stuff, I had to beat out these guys uh because we would compete individually, um like per instrument. So yeah, I wasn't part of those top groups, but I met a lot of these guys and I was friends with a lot of them because when you make the all-region concert, it's people from all over go and make it. So my that was my view, my perspective on like how school money actually should sound and be and the and this is like a high school group. Now you're a university student, you're college, so you should be at an even higher level, right? And it just it it wasn't because they were so focused on uh money, yeah, and it's just like yeah, the arguments they would have it was so funny because it would be like uh because I I would complain about things in the gigging groups about like pay or about like driving or hours and stuff, and they would just say shit that pissed me off. Just because they'd be like, oh, you care about it, like oh, you just money, you don't you don't play for just like the love of Mariachi or something. Yeah, and I'll just I put on an entire recital in a year and a half when y'all were here for years and you never did it because you're just focused on making money.

SPEAKER_04 47:24

You know, I don't agree with that, but I will say I'm glad they weren't like as advanced as the other college ensembles because I feel like I felt okay joining, like you guys were very accommodating to where I was, and I feel like I would have felt very out of place and scared had you guys been like top tier, you know? Yeah, I mean that's but I also think if y'all like were like way up there top tier, I probably would be better at playing violin just because I think there would have been more drive and maybe hopefully more violins that kind of would have pushed me and we could have like worked together to like figure out like little stylistic things and Boeings. I feel like it just would have been more uniform. I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 48:23

That was the that was a goal. That was the dream to to get it to there.

SPEAKER_04 48:27

It could still happen. Do you think if it becomes a class or an actual registered ensemble that it'll be better? Things will look up.

SPEAKER_01 48:39

No. Within no, within the next it it could get to a point where it's a decent group uh over the next ten years. Uh it'll take about ten years.

SPEAKER_04 48:58

I mean I feel like it it takes time to grow any program, so that makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 49:05

Yeah, but uh it's i it's a lot quicker and easier to grow in Mariachi program if you do it. Or if you follow certain steps, which is what I was trying to do when I got here. I was like, if you guys just follow the plan that I have, we could have money and suits within like two years.

SPEAKER_04 49:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:29

And they just didn't want to.

SPEAKER_04 49:31

That sucks.

SPEAKER_01 49:32

Um so until that happens, or somebody comes and donates a whole bunch of money, specifically for the mariachi, which would be one day when I'm rich.

SPEAKER_04 49:47

Don't you worry.

SPEAKER_01 49:49

No, I don't do that. They're just gonna take the money. And we they'll probably be a stupid student group at that point. Uh yeah, there there's a lot of things we're we're planning that fall. The the best chance we had to get to that state of being a top good ensemble was fall 24. We had probably the the best musicians at the time, the the most amount of people. Yeah. Uh we were a complete group really at that time because we had six violins, we had three trumpets, we had a full harmonia section.

SPEAKER_04 50:24

You know, when I joined in the spring, I feel like I was coming in at the end of what must have been a high. And I don't know if it's just because I had no mariachi experience, so I didn't really have any expectations in place, but I thought it sounded so cool. And I feel like there were pros and cons to like both years I did it, but I feel like musically and musicianship-wise, that was probably the strongest I felt things were. I don't know. It sounded so cool, and things still sounded cool this semester, but then I guess after everybody left after the whole like money debate, I feel like attendance kind of dwindled and the musician all I guess it was all the good musicians who left. And not that the people in there aren't good musicians, but I just feel like there's a lot of room to grow and they have a lot to learn. I don't know. I feel like I like the people, but I think the spring or the yeah, the spring of 24 was stronger than this past year.

SPEAKER_01 51:31

Uh yeah. Um it was. Although spring twenty-four, I I did I took a step back. I don't know if you were aware or realized, but I really took a step back and let kind of Gabriel and Carlos just take over. Um again, just disagreements on how things were gonna be run.

SPEAKER_04 51:50

I remember.

SPEAKER_01 51:51

So I was like, okay, and then I don't see if you also remember this. We barely had well, towards the end, there was just no rehearsals.

SPEAKER_04 51:58

Yeah, okay. I was like so mad about that because there were a couple I couldn't come to, but then the ones I could come to, there was like nobody there. And so I had like allotted all this time, like mentally prepared. Okay, I have a rehearsal tonight, okay. I need to like do scales or something, and then I would show up and I'd be like the only person there, and the good the guitar guy. What was his name?

SPEAKER_01 52:19

Um in the spring?

SPEAKER_04 52:22

Yeah. He was so nice, he was always there. Oh my gosh, what was his name? He was younger, I think he was at TCC. You were helping him.

SPEAKER_00 52:37

Oh my gosh. I don't remember who it was. Who was there spring 24?

SPEAKER_04 52:42

I've got to look at the group chat and see if I remember. But it was like him and I, and then either you or Josh. And if you were there, we'd like to.

SPEAKER_01 52:51

You're talking about this past spring?

SPEAKER_04 52:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 52:53

Oh, yeah, no, this past spring. No, he wasn't TCC. Are you talking about Seth? Or are you talking about uh Jacob?

SPEAKER_04 52:59

Seth.

SPEAKER_01 53:00

Seth, he's a voice major at FSU. The real skinny is it Seth? Yeah, skinny White currently speaks Spanish randomly.

SPEAKER_04 53:08

Yeah.

unknown 53:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 53:10

And then wait, the other guy, his name is Jacob.

SPEAKER_01 53:13

Yeah, with the long hair, he's uh also white. Yeah, I don't know what happened. Like he was super into it. I would meet with him, he would text me. And after Lent, he just stopped showing up. It was Lent the last time that he he was well.

SPEAKER_04 53:26

I mean, I feel like it was after Lent that things kind of fell apart. So I mean Yeah, a lot of people start showing after that.

SPEAKER_01 53:36

Um and I don't know, I can't that that was a criticism that was given to me. I mean, a lot, right? But I I also don't really care.

SPEAKER_00 53:56

Okay. No, I don't care.

SPEAKER_01 53:58

But it's it's just like uh, you know, being told by a 19-year-old that you're not a good teacher uh on something that I've been doing for 15 years and they've been doing for a year or two years in a very vacuum type of environment, it doesn't uh bother me.

SPEAKER_04 54:25

Okay, I've gotta say there were a few minutes where I or a few minutes, a few times where I was just so pissed off because I I have a whole music degree, bro. I mean, like, no violin is not my primary instrument, but I know how to read sheet music, and there were a couple times where somebody was like, no, you came in wrong, or like, no, that's not right. And I was like, let's do it again. Because I knew I wasn't wrong. And like, I know that I'm not well versed in all mariachi repertoire, but I know how to read sheet music, and I know I am not wrong. Sometimes I am, but in those instances, I was not. Oh, it got on my nerves.

SPEAKER_01 55:06

Uh so you wanted to fight?

SPEAKER_04 55:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 55:10

Sometimes uh you felt no uh so you know, I I did a lot of reflection during even during the two years. I would go to Texas State um throughout the last two years um for different reasons. But one one thing I would do, what I was trying to do is so Texas State has their set rehearsal times, and it's been that way for ever. I mean, when I was there, it was the same rehearsal times, and to this day it's still the same. So I assumed, even though it's been like three different directors. So I just I'm like, I'm pretty sure they're gonna have rehearsal at this time. Let me show up. And I I know the current director. Um, the way I know him is crazy. In 2015, I made the Allstate Mariachi. So I was I made it on Vuela. Um, ranked number one, technically two. But the number one, he he dropped out because the same weekend the concert was supposed to be was his senior prom.

SPEAKER_04 56:14

Oh.

SPEAKER_01 56:14

And it was also my senior prom, but I was like, nah, I'm gonna I'm gonna go. Prom's not worth it. Uh and I was dating somebody too at the time. Uh but I took her to prom the year before because we juniors and seniors would have prom together.

SPEAKER_04 56:27

The twins.

SPEAKER_01 56:30

Yeah. Uh one of the twins, yeah. Uh how do you remember that? Out of all the things, you you remember that. Uh, but you don't remember where I live, you don't remember that what a cajon is. You remember a twin. Uh yeah, this is when I was yeah, 18. So the the guy dropped out, whatever. That that year, the Armonia instructor for the All-State group was um this guy named Cirilo Campos. And he was a graduate from Texas State, like in the 2000s. So I met him there. And then years later, right 10 years later, he ends up becoming the money edge director at Texas State. Um, and also he was the very first person I ever gigged with in San Antonio.

SPEAKER_04 57:20

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 57:21

Um, he posted I need help, and I was like, oh yeah, I can be there. And he remembers that. God, I was so bad. That was my first, that was technically my second gig ever in the Central Texas area. Wow. And remember, I knew good 15 songs. I was just uh just faking it. So what one of the most wildest things I ever said, and it's funny, uh, you know, History Tanchihua. Yeah. Right. Um I asked, because I said um Lord Place of Tanchihua. And me, Tom asked 18-year-old not knowing nothing. I asked, uh, what key? The song of the that does not change keys. Well, it doesn't change key from what everybody does it in. Right? It's G, D, G, D, C, G, then back to D then G. The same form that does not change ever. And I asked, well, what key are we doing in it? And the guy was like, all of we didn't know what to say. And now if somebody would have asked me, and I would have taken them to a gig and then they would say I'd sit in Chihuahua. And he's like, What key is that in? I hope you like all of them. So I I get that, I get that, I get that. But uh, that was the first gig I ever did um in San Antonio, and it was with him.

SPEAKER_02 58:49

Nice.

SPEAKER_01 58:50

So I I went uh fall of 24. I just happened to be visiting. I sat in the rehearsal. And then because I was like, okay, let me let me see if I can sit and just learn something. Let me see how I'm supposed to teach or how how to handle this. And I'd be like, okay. So it was about like the the rehearsals are an hour and 20 minutes, hour, 15 minutes, three times a week. Um, and then there's night rehearsals. We would rehearse a lot, um, especially competition time. But so I went to one of their day rehearsals, sat there. They were doing Los Argeros, I think, or some sonaveno, and um just just going through the the motions of of how like we teach in Mariachi. And the the thing that I that I got from all of that, the point is I was doing the exact same thing he was doing. The problem is I'm doing it with a a bunch of uh teenage classical musicians that don't understand when I say do it, do long, short, long, and cut this out and start on this measure. Yeah, go. They can't do that. So literally be like, okay, I'm gonna sit down, okay. Here's the sheet music and come in at this point, and this note, okay, make it a dotted sixteenth, whatever.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:23

Like it's just not something you do in mariachi, just because it it's it's so nuanced that if you were to really do that with every single song and every sheet of music and everything, like it'll take so long, and at that point it would lose what makes it special or unique. Um because and I I think that's uh that was another issue too. So like I would say, okay, we're gonna play Elmo So Cariñum, we're gonna play long and then short, uh the the intro. So instead of and they're just so used to playing ba like just quarter, quarter, and then I was like change just that simple little change, and it was just like so much to be like, um well, like what does that mean on the music? Yeah, and I'm just like I don't know what you're sure ear. It doesn't matter, yeah. Um but the thing is I would say to do that, and I think in their minds, or just like in classical music's minds, I've I've never fully been in an orchestra from like beginning to end. I have played in an orchestra, but I was literally I just go to some rehearsals, so I never made it to all the way to I'll be in a concert. But I assume your the the conductor would tell you to play certain things a certain way and you'd write it, and that's just how it would be. Yeah, that's not how this money achieved. So I would say do pa and so we'll do that and be like, okay, you know, four months pass, and like, you know what, let's do paint and it's permanent, yeah. Like, and be like, well, why? I'm like, because why not? We've been doing it the same way for three months.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:22

I could have a little bit change it, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:24

And so all the changes or the things I would say were never permanent. It was just let's do it this way because it's gonna be uniform and they're gonna sound together, and this is an actual style in Mariachi. This isn't the only style, this isn't me saying that I'm right and Josh Nanas is wrong, or are all these other mariachi recordings that you heard are wrong. It's just there there's so many different ways to interpret it, and this is the way as a director I want to interpret this song.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:54

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:54

So just do it. And it was so difficult to do that, and uh, you know, certain a lot of issues. I mean, I don't have a music degree, right? I have a minor in music, I did a bunch of ensembles, I did um music theory, I did uh world music, I did a a lot of those like basic ones that the musics would do, but I I didn't get advanced. I mean, I did a studio, I did juries, I so I know what it is that music majors go through. I just I just didn't go through it for five years. Yeah, I I just did it well briefly. Um but aside from that, all my mariachi directors um from the so if we put it this way, so I had one in high school, uh the two all-region directors that I had, an all-state mariachi director, um Texas State, I had a total of three different mariachi directors. So if we were to say from the eight mariachi directors I've had um one of them, not two of them, had degrees in music, and neither were in mariachi. One was a percussionist and the other was a classical violist.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:24

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:25

So it does not matter. Yeah. It does not matter that I don't have uh a degree in classical violin to tell you play this long and short.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:36

I mean, I feel like with mariachi, it doesn't have nearly the same history as the classical music. I feel like you it just can't be taught the same. Like I feel like it's all passed down by rote. You don't really use the music like you do, or the sheet music like you do classical music. It's just a different way of teaching and a different way of playing. I feel like it you don't need the same qualifications to teach mariachi that you'd need to teach classical music. They're different.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:04

Yeah, you don't. And so they pay attention to every single thing you said, right? And I said something of course I was hyperbole in the the when our first rehearsals like music does not exist. Everybody think that music does not exist. No, of course it exists, but the sheet music does not matter.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:20

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:21

Like, it's just a guide. It's just like that's the main melody, these are the notes, the note value is subjective. And it it was just like so much fighting. So the classical players that were good, they just couldn't adjust, didn't want to adjust. Yeah. And the ones that could adjust didn't want to because they felt like they already knew or had the style because they've been doing it for two years or something. With no director, with no past experience, um with nothing. I'm like, just well, how do you know? You you had no teacher. Uh I've Been in some uh countless amount of conferences over ten years in the education system teaching myself when we would so at Texas State one of the things we have to do was go and clinician, uh middle schools and high schools and judge. Uh so I'm just like I I've been around this for a long time. And I don't have a degree in my teaching Mariachi, but also that didn't really exist until the last five years.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:28

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:29

So it was just, you know, a lot of like back and forth. Um had to deal with um people's egos. Um and it was funny, it was one person told me, it's like you have a really big ego, and I'm just like, I'm the the director. I gotta yeah, I tell you what to do. That's literally the point.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:52

What do you mean a director is like, well, you just tell me what to do?

SPEAKER_01 1:06:56

Like, yeah. I'm directing you to play the music how I want you to play it. Um, and also another criticism too was funny. I was like, Oh, you didn't really like demonstrate how to do it, you just like show a video. Um, so and I was like so again, I don't know um how it is in orchestra, but does the conductor play every single instrument in the orchestra?

SPEAKER_04 1:07:26

They normally have some knowledge of it.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:28

Yeah, no, that's what I'm saying. Do they play it at a master level? No. Every single instrument in the orchestra. So why am I expected to be a master violinist trumpet and armonia player?

SPEAKER_04 1:07:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:43

Like that's stupid.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:44

I also want to add that there are definitely, definitely conductors with big egos or directors with big egos. And I don't think that you have a big ego. Some men out there for sure. You're not one of them.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:03

No, I never felt like I had a big ego. I just had a a clear vision and a lot of experience in doing this, and I was like, this is just how it's done. Like it in a way they felt like attacked or being like, oh, what you've been doing wrong for the last two or three years. And well, I mean it was, but it's just because like you didn't know. And I'm trying to tell you past the knowledge of the past 15 years of my life, this is how it's done. And they're just so ingrained and doctrinated in how they're doing it that it just it wasn't gonna um it wasn't gonna work. Yeah. Um, so ultimately we did what we could. Um, we could have had an amazing recital fall 24, even better than the one that was uh fall twenty-five. Yeah. Musicians, right? We had a complete group. Um, but one I was focused on trying to compete. Um which didn't they don't follow through. Uh but um and looking back, that probably should have been the goal to do a recital, fall 24. Instead of trying to compete. Compete was a super stretch goal. Um, but ultimately we still did the recital, and it almost didn't happen.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:25

And I didn't want it to happen. Honestly, I was like, we I'm glad it did though. We gotta pull this.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:31

I'm glad I got to play.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:33

Yeah, ultimately it worked out, whatever. But um, so yeah, there there's and then people stopped showing up over or gradually over time, it was less and less people.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:43

Yeah, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:45

Um it's funny. Um I know there's one person that said they just stopped showing up. They didn't tell me they told somebody else uh because we weren't performing, so there's like no reason to like go. Yeah. And I was like, but but there's just so much you still gotta learn.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:02

Yeah. Um I don't know. I feel like it would do well as a class. I feel like that would give people more of an incentive to show up, and that way things can't happen like they did this past spring.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:14

In conclusion, how did you like your two years at FSU? I everything you love, expected.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:23

You know, I don't think I had any expectations going in because I never really expected to actually get to play with a mariachi band. So because mariachi band mariachi band. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:37

That's gross.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:38

Okay. Hang on, scratch that, let me start over. Okay. I didn't have any expectations because I never got to never expected to do mariachi. So I think everything was just so cool to me, and I think I got a lot of good information, a good experience out of everything, just because everything was new. But I do feel like it was disorganized and I don't like how things ended. I think my my issues come from just the structure and how the people treated it. Not it nothing came from the music. I really enjoy and I wish that we could have been more serious because I feel like there's so much I still have to learn, but I don't I mean, I don't know of any mariachi in Oklahoma, so I don't know how my future mariachi endeavors will look. But I would love to keep learning. I mean, this was so cool. I felt so cool saying I was in mariachi. Like, oh, it was so cool.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:50

So all your um all my white friends. Your white friends they were so impressed.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:00

Wow, and then they're like, okay, sing a song.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:05

And then no yet, not yet. How many um performances did you actually do?

SPEAKER_04 1:12:11

You did I think just two. Well, you did the amphitheater. The amphitheater, and then the one in DRH, I think it was. It was an indoor one.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:19

Well, well, I mean you did a recital.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:24

Then you did How Wait, you did not do Ruby Diamond.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:29

No.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:31

Did you just only do two?

SPEAKER_04 1:12:34

Then I did that really odd fundraiser. I don't feel like that one well.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:40

What odd fundraiser?

SPEAKER_04 1:12:41

It was like the was it the dance-a-thon? It was at the Civic.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:45

Oh, you did do that one. That was your first that was your first performance, right?

SPEAKER_04 1:12:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:49

Yeah, that was where there was just thousands of screaming people and we had no microphones.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:53

No, I can hear anything.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:55

I was on stage.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:56

Yeah, that was horrible. They asked us to do it again this year, and I was like, no.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:00

Good.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:01

Um that was another thing. We got so many requests that we could have done, but it it it it's just part of the reason I turned them down, and part of the reason I wanted to change the image of this group was because uh they would take these performances before, and it was just like, oh, we just want you to play like 15 minutes or do like one song and go, or or or can you not take the full group? Just bring like four people and and it's just like no. I mean, if this were a gig, yeah, but a school ensemble, like again, what are you gonna tell a marching band like oh we would love to have like a marching band at the FCC library, cool, but we can't have the full one, so you know, just bring like four people, yeah. You're gonna do that, and it was the same for mariachi, and that that's what I wanted to change so much. It was like the the image of what people expect and to see of a mariachi. So doing the gigs or or going to a gig and saying, Oh, we're FSU Mariachi, that's the perception people are gonna have, that's the image, and some of these people are maybe go to FSU or administrators or teachers or students, and then that that's just what they think of when they think of um a mariachi in general, not even just FSU Mariachi or anything, just Mariachi in general, and it's it's just not it's it's wildly different.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:30

But I don't know, maybe let's see what happens over the next couple years because I'm still gonna be here for a while.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:38

Keep me updated, fell me the tea.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:41

You're you're gonna uh come as a clinician.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:44

Yeah. You know, there's a mariachi uh ensemble at the school I'm gonna be teaching at. I think it's middle school.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:52

Really?

SPEAKER_04 1:14:53

I think it's middle school, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:54

And you're gonna say you were you have collegiate mariachi expenses.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:57

Yeah. No, the teacher who teaches is very good. So if she needs help, I'll I just kind of want to sit in and see how she teaches.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:14

You know what you should go to though this year. Snow you're gonna be closer and you're free and you have a master's degree and you can do it.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:21

That mariachi conference?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:23

Yeah, extravaganza in San Antonio.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:25

You gotta send that to me. I wonder if I could get it uh paid for. I wonder if they'd pay for my travel.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:31

That'd be a continuing education.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:33

I wonder if it'd be professional development.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:36

I mean it could be, especially if you help out with the Mariachi.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:41

When is it?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:42

It's um the first week of December. Every year.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:46

I'm definitely gonna ask about that. That would be so fun. Oh, that'd be so fun.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:51

Yeah. And then you can say, oh, and you were like, oh, is it FSU Mariachi? Yeah! FSU Mariachi shirt.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:59

Are you going?

SPEAKER_01 1:16:00

Uh yeah, I'm definitely gonna go this year. Uh I didn't go last year, and I was so mad about that, so upset.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:07

We'll reconnect in San Antonio in December.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:11

Oh yeah?

SPEAKER_04 1:16:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:13

Are you gonna pretend that you don't know me?

SPEAKER_04 1:16:15

Probably.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:18

That's okay.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:19

Alexis? Never heard of him.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:27

Well, you you finished, you graduated, you did a master's degree in what?

SPEAKER_04 1:16:32

Arts administration.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:34

Yeah, so now you're gonna be an arts and administrator.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:40

You know, I'm sure I'll get to use the administrative side. And I mean, like my job is a high school orchestra director, and I'll be planning trips, I'll be dealing with finances and fundraising, so I'm sure my admin skills will come in.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:53

Like head director assistant. Yeah. That'd be crazy to me head director right away.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:00

I don't love that for me. Not yet.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:05

You're gonna be teaching all the violence.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:09

Probably at some point. We'll do sectionals.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:13

There's high school.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:16

Is it is it a high school known for its fine arts or just regular high school?

SPEAKER_04 1:17:22

It's pretty well known. I feel like there are five big high schools in the Tulsa area, and this is one of the big ones. They have a pretty solid program, solid growing program.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:34

I mean you got something out of the the program, right? FSU, um I guess just in general.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:40

Yeah, I I do think I got a lot of stuff out of it. Like I think my issue is actually putting it into play, like actually using the skills I learned and the knowledge I got. But I think all of my anxiety comes from not actually having an opportunity to put everything into practice yet. I feel like maybe once I'm actually teaching and once I'm actually doing things and utilizing the skills I have, then maybe I'll feel more confident in my abilities.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:16

Well, maybe you should have gone and got a job before you did your master's.

SPEAKER_04 1:18:20

Yeah. I wasn't trying to live that life though.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:25

You just want to run away from all your problems and your loans.

SPEAKER_04 1:18:28

Yep. Like actually. I was just putting off real life a little bit longer.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:35

And now you gotta start paying those loans back.

SPEAKER_04 1:18:40

I am very confident I can get them all paid off this year. As soon as I move back, I'm putting down a big payment on a lot of them.

unknown 1:18:49

Really?

SPEAKER_04 1:18:50

Yeah, and I'm living at home, so I don't have to pay rent. Literally every dime I get is going straight to my loans. I'm going to be leaving living extremely cheap this year. I will be debt-free. May 2027. Speaking it into existence.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:05

Really? Because a record of it, so. Yeah, yeah. Play this uh clip this clip.

SPEAKER_04 1:19:13

Yeah, May 2027.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:15

May 27, and I'm gonna ask you to show me your loan balance.

SPEAKER_04 1:19:19

I'll send you a screenshot. And then I'll send you my bank account and it'll be like zeros.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:26

You know, I haven't used this thing in all three years. So there's things honestly, I forgot, and I'm like, why is this like you're doing great on. It's like highlighted red. Oh, there it is. I'm smart, right? I used to do this full time. Um so yeah, that's it. We're done. Bye.