Music is an essential component of life for all peoples, and this is no different for Chamorus. Prior to writing and the forms of technological media that we have today, music and singing was an essential way to commit important stories, events and knowledge to memory. To ensure that something would be remembered and passed on to future generations. It was something that also added entertainment and joy to life, with music providing the means for expressing humor, joy, sadness, reverence and love.
This was something the Spanish noted from the early days of their colonization of the Marianas, recognizing that to the Chamoru people, poetry, singing and creativity were considered to be great arts and represented important skills. One Spanish priest wrote in 1683,
They admire poetry and believe poets to be people who perform wonders… They sing in verse their histories and ancient things with measured time and harmony of three voices: soprano, contraltos, and falsettos, with the occasional tenor assistance of one of the nobles who attend these feasts.
This creativity was not only for large gatherings, but part of everyone’s daily lives. Music was something shared and passed back and forth between individuals or groups. A farmer starting his day might begin singing to himself, but as he walked through the village making his way to his ranch, he might see someone and begin singing to them. They might exchange some simple verses back and forth, teasing each other. As he walks, he will engage more people in song, and they will return his tunes, until finally he has left the village and is once again just singing to himself.
There was an inseparability between Chamorus and their music. As they moved through life, the music moved to match their rhythms. Even as new musical styles such as country western or jazz came into Guam with the arrival of the United States, Chamorus used those tunes for their improvised verses.
But the 20th century also brought new attacks on the Chamoru language, first by the US Navy which banned it in schools and public spaces, and later by Chamorus who stopped speaking it to their children, believing it would hurt their chances at success in life. By the 1960s the decline of the Chamoru language was already audible, with the appearance of some young children who were unable to speak their native language. While the language was still actively being used around them, it was no longer actively and regularly being transmitted to those younger, to future generations.
It is in this time of rapid cultural change, punctuated by a strong desire to Americanize and to consume American culture, that the contemporary Chamoru music industry is born. In the 1950s and 1960s, the Chamoru love of music blossomed into a multitude of bands, nearly all of whom covered American rock or pop songs. The 1968 release of the first full Chamoru vinyl record “Dalai Nene” by Johnny Sablan, represented a critical step in perpetuating the Chamoru language and ensuring that it would continue to persist and add texture to our island lives.
Chamoru musicians such as Johnny Sablan, the Charfauros Brothers and others made a conscious decision in a time where the fervor to Americanize was strongest, to create Chamoru music. They mixed the old and the new and developed new media and styles which would speak to their generation and remind them of their native language and past. The success of these groups encouraged other artists such as Jimmy Dee and Flora Baza Quan to begin to record in Chamoru as well.
This gallery documents the birth of contemporary Chamoru music through the display of 13 vinyl Chamoru records.
