This year’s Festival will have two honorees: Andrés Emilio Beleño Paba, the first king of the piqueria of the Vallenata Legend Festival, in 1979, and also recognized as a great composer in the air of puya, recorded by representative figures of vallenato such as Jorge Oñate, Diomedes Díaz and Poncho Zuleta, among others.
Photo: Courtesy
Those versed in Vallenato know that there are two Cesar festivals around this time: the one that the entire country knows from television, the Vallenata Legend Festival in Valledupar, and the one that takes place a few days before this in the nearby municipality of El Step, the Accordion Piece.
Both festivals historically have a name in common: Alejandro Durán, the quasi-mythical first king of the Vallenata Legend Festival in 1968, born in El Paso, to whom the Pedazo de Acordeón Festival pays permanent tribute.
Even more: the least known festival was born due to a popular discontent at the most renowned festival. It was the year 1987 and the Vallenata Legend Festival would elect the first “king of kings”. The public favorite was Alejo Durán, but Nicolás ‘Colacho’ Mendoza won.
The indignation of Alejo Durán’s supporters was channeled into the creation of a festival in tribute to their minstrel, in 1988.
“Alejo said that his faithful companion and confidant was his piece of accordion and that when he died they would bury him with the accordion. When Alejo lost the crown of king of kings, his countrymen wanted to make amends and the way to do so was by creating a festival in El Paso; Thinking about the name of what Alejo wanted most, they came up with Piece of Accordion,” says Jorge Naín Ruiz, vallenatologist.
36 years later, the pasoros continue with their Festival, converted into a bastion of vallenato folklore, a meeting for those passionate about sones, merengues, puyas and walks that come out of an accordion.
The famous composer Rosendo Romero comments that “there is a group of people who are very concerned about the transmission of knowledge and preserving all that baggage that the Durán dynasty left in the town. From El Paso we have one of the largest and most significant minstrels in our region and that festival continues to be one of the strengths of preservation of Vallenato music.”
Version 35 of the “Accordion Piece”
This year’s Festival will have two honorees: Andrés Emilio Beleño Paba, the first king of the piqueria of the Vallenata Legend Festival, in 1979, and also recognized as a great composer in the air of puya, recorded by representative figures of vallenato such as Jorge Oñate, Diomedes Díaz and Poncho Zuleta, among others.
Tribute will also be paid to Néstor Segundo Martínez Pinto, one of the co-founders of the legendary group The Playoneros of Cesar. He, along with Carmencito Mendoza, Rafael “Wicho” Sánchez and Ovidio Granados, formed this group between the 50s and 60s of the last century.
And there will be special recognition to Nohema Fragoso, a popular singer from the beginnings of vallenato, who is said to have “sung for the first time in a party among men.”
In the main categories of the Festival competition there are 10 participants in Children’s Accordion Player, 13 in Youth Accordion Player, 14 in Amateur Accordion Player and 5 in Complete Accordion Player (plays accordion, sings and composes), for a total of 42 applicants.
In Piqueria there are 32 verseadores who will face each other in duels of free verse, forced foot and the tenth. In Unpublished Song, in the four rhythms of vallenato they classified: in Paseo, 11 songs; in Merengue, 7; in Son, 6; in Puya, 4, and in the Costumbrista rhythm, 6, for a total of 34.
The contestants come from different departments of the country such as Huila, Boyacá, Cundinamarca, Atlántico, Santander, La Guajira, Norte de Santander and Antioquia.
Wilfran Villegas, president of the organizing committee, anticipates that it is planned to include a fifth air, La tumbara, “predecessor of the four known airs of vallenato, with snare drum, guacharaca and accordion, but a different interpretation,” explains Jorge Naín Ruiz.
“We thought of paying tribute to those musical works left by Mrs. Juana Díaz, the mother of the Duráns, the also vallenato king Náfer Durán and the great Alejo Durán. They are native songs from El Paso, in drum rhythm. The pasora drum, authentic rhythms of El Paso, which were created by the descendants of Africans who came to work at Hacienda Las Cabezas,” adds Villegas.
As for the jurors, the Piece of Accordion Foundation reserves their names for now in order to prevent them from being questioned by fans. However, it is known that the honorees Andrés Emilio Beleño and Néstor Martínez will be juries in different categories of the Festival.
With respect to the other juries, it is highlighted that those who will fulfill this role “are people who are fully classified from previous years and who have had appropriate behavior before society,” says Wilfran Villegas, president of the Pedazo de Acordeón Festival.
Festival Agenda
A rich cultural and festive agenda, which goes from the opening of the Festival to the exciting coronation in the categories, this year will offer concerts with recognized artists from the region. On Friday the 26th with Óscar Gamarra and Farid Leonardo Ortiz. On Saturday there will be Beto Zabaleta, local artists such as Los Mellos Gnecco, Álvaro Robles and his band, and Mono Zabaleta, a success of the new wave.
At the closing, on Sunday the 28th, there will be Elder Dayán Díaz, Erick Escobar & Neno Beleño, the son of the honoree Andrés Beleño. There will also be room for amateur accordion players who will participate in the competition for the crown of their category.
*From the Color Foundation of Colombia.
