Jimi Hendrix: A Brief History Of The Conjunto Style

An accordion, along with banjo-sexto, are the instruments used most predominantly in the genre conjunto. The Germans and Bohemian settlers first introduced the accordion to Mexicana’s in the mid to late 1800’s while working construction building, “factories, mines, and railroads in Northern Mexico. The accordion was favored for its availability, low cost, and portability” (Sewell, 2014). Conjunto is referred to as “group” music initiated in the bars and cantinas of the US/Mexican border, and was derived of Mexican norteño style. Later, the conjunto style of music word transform into a more developed Tex-Mex or Tejano genre. The accordion is described as having either one, two, or three (diatonic accordion) rows of buttons. Therefore, with the two row accordion both rows of buttons are for treble. Correspondingly, as the musician works the bellow in

He was referred to as the “Jimi Hendrix” of his artistic Tejano style. Although, he despised the reference, and felt he alone had revolutionized the sounds of the accordion. Unlike Martinez’s traditional Polka style, Jordan uniquely advanced the artistry of Tejano by creating a more modern sound. He was a conjunto musician, who combined the use of a phase shifters, fuzz boxes, and synthesizers to intertwine the genres styles of jazz, rock and country and create his own (Hendrix) Tejano style (Chadbourne, 2018). Moreover, Jordan’s music embodied the merging of genres. A precise example of Jordan’s artistry is “La Cubmia De Cho,” “from his Grammy nominated LP, Turn Me Loose, RCA/Ariola International, 1986” (Martinez, 2009). Listening to “La Cubmia De Cho,” one hears how Jordan plays the diatonic accordion in a cumbia, disco, and jazz genre (Rojas, 2011). While accompanied by the saxophone, bongos, drums, electric guitar, guitar, and percussionists the beat is still in a 2/4 beat, but there is almost no remnant of the polka