Latin American art song is a genre primarily of the first half of the twentieth-century, when popular folklore served as the voice and inspiration of many poets and musicians. The nationalist movement served as a means of expression, each Latin American country with its own identity. There is great benefit for singers to study Spanish diction at an academic level, since it is a language already familiar to most U.S.A residents. There is a significant amount of unknown repertoire that would be very useful in the singing studio because of the language's open vowels. This repertoire can also serve as a confidence-builder to young Spanish-speaking singers at the beginning of their training. I will be focusing on the (s), (ll), and (y) sounds as pronounced in the diverse regions of Latin America; in particular, why they matter when coaching singers, and the articulators involved in each. The purpose of this study is to discuss diction differences in the repertoire, expound on its benefits for voice pedagogy, all while informing about varied options for recital programming.

More than a confined account of the musical activity of the Chicano Movement, my research considers Chicana/o music of the period as a critical part of the protest music genres of Latin America (eg. Nueva canción, canto nuevo) and the Unites States (eg. labor/union and civil rights songs). Consequently, although situated squarely within the context of the Chicano Movement, this project necessarily examines the musical yet political links between Chicano musicians and their counterparts in the American labor movement, Civil Rights Movement, and Latin American social movements of the period. Coupled with the mobilization of their own Mexican musical and cultural traditions, Chicano musicians engaged these other repertoires of struggle to form the nexus of Chicana/o musical expression during the Movement. By viewing Chicana/o music within this broader lens, my research demonstrates that the complexities of the movimiento and Chicana/o political struggle cannot be adequately understood without thinking about how Chicano cultural producers engage a diversity of other race, ethnic, and regional struggles. Rather than assume a homologous relationship between music and identity, my research historicizes musical practices in the context of their struggle for political, social, and cultural rights and resources and the strategies employed by diverse communities working together to overcome the failures of governmental and institutional programs. The creative dialogues and musical exchanges that occurred among Chicano musicians suggest not only forms of ethnic solidarity but also the culturally “hybrid” expressions that shape even nationalist movements. Key to this approach is recognizing the simultaneously global and local character of Chicana/o musical production, where the flows of transnationalism circulated not only ideas, peoples, and sounds, but also political struggles. This project thus raises a number of critical questions about Chicano Movement music and its political import. Ultimately, I suggest that it was the ability to perform authoritatively within the bi-cultural and increasingly transnational space of the Chicano experience that empowered movimiento music to express the feelings of autonomy engendered by the Movement. / text