Women also do carranga!

The history of carranguera music made by women comes from the singers of Guabinas, or Guabineras, who were heard in the corn fields when there was harvest to brighten the long days in Santander, or in the afternoons of meetings of the weaving women in Boyacá , peasant women, who further participated as performers or composers of that mixture of rumba criolla, party bambuco and other peasant rhythms that the maestro Jorge Velosa united to create the Carranga, were already part of the peasant songs since ancient times.

The carranga, which in the 80s and 90s we saw on stages in towns in the interior of the country with men in ruanas, with mustaches and bearded men wielding tiples, requintos, guitars and guacharacas, is changing today and today we see it at festivals, fairs and parties performed by women with red cheeks, braids, flowery, wide and long peasant skirts and also pants, women who have had a rocky road to be taken into account, but who currently can be counted as more than 30 groups made up of women representatives of this peasant genre.

In the municipalities of Cundinamarca, Santander and Boyacá, an interesting women’s movement has been forging in La carranga, Radio Nacional de Colombia spoke with Ricardo Martinez, representative of Son del Frailejón, a group formed by women in Guasca, Cundinamarca, which will be part of La National Radio night, and who has investigated the subject:

“The guabineras were references for women in peasant music. Then we began to listen, after an album by Jorge Velosa: Cantas y relatos, a research album of peasant music, the female voices. And later we met one of the first representatives of La Carranga: La Comadre Ena and her goddaughter, from Duitama, who has been in the carranga for at least 40 years” Ricardo Martínez.

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Comadre Ena remembers that her beginnings were in the 80s:

“At Nobsa we paid tribute to maestro Jorge Velosa and he was very struck by the fact that a woman like me played the requinto so well and represented the carranga, that’s why he asked me to accompany him one day in Duitama on the stage, I played with him and his carrangueros and since that time I have been doing carranga, first with the Grupo Cristal, then with teacher Emiro Mendez we formed La Comadre Ena y sus ahijaos, we have been with the group for 25 years, we also made the group Las comadres, of only women , including my daughter, with them we had several generations, we did children’s workshops and we won several national contests such as the Guane de oro” says La Comadre Ena.

In the new millennium, groups formed by women are more visible and many of them come from training school processes.

Part of the interest that has grown in the participants of these groups comes from the creation of the “Convite Cuna Carranguera” Festival in the hands of Eduardo Villarreal, a Bogota lover of peasant customs, who with the support of teacher Jorge Velosa, created this festival in 2008 and has received lots of carranguera groups from all over the country, including many made up of women.
Villarreal also founded the Royal Academy of Peasant Music, a small school that has taught girls, boys and young people the basics of peasant music.

“There is a surge of women in the carranga who come from training school processes such as El Son del Frailejón, La primas de la Carranga de Chocontá, in Tocancipá, las Muñecas, in gachetá Dulzura carranguera, Anhelos, La carrangueras de Majú, de Cota , Monte Violet and many others. There are several very nice bets on these peasant music made by women” explains Ricardo.

In 2018 we met “La Carranguerita” on a reality television show, a girl of just 8 years old from Sogamoso, Boyacá, who carries peasant art in her veins. She wants to maintain the tradition of her grandparents and bring them letters about caring for the countryside, peasant landscape and the love for what is ours to children like her in the world, she released her first album in March 2023 and maintains her carranguero style.

For Ricardo Martínez, the most important thing is that women feel represented on the Carranguero stage:

“When women see that in a carranguero group there are women as players of instruments, voices, or whatever, they feel that they can also be part of these groups, it is very important that in schools, universities and in all spaces peasants, women see themselves represented in order to continue growing with groups formed by them” Ricardo said.