Please remember Victor Jara,
In the Santiago Stadium,
Es verdad – those Washington Bullets again.
--
The Clash “Washington Bullets” 1980Victor Jara
Victor Jara, assassinated by the Chilean dictatorship, Benjo Cruz fallen during his participation in the guerilla war of Teoponte, Jorge Salerno, executed during the Pando takeover, are living symbols of the impossibility our imperialist enemy has at silencing the collective voice of our Latin American people. “There are musicians who are only musicians” Haydée Santamaria once said, and she added that what was true about Victor, Jorge y Benjo was that “they were musicians that loved the people”. To these group of voices belongs Victor Jara, whom I personally knew, with whom I sang; we would dialogued and discussed each others’ songs, united in the objective of finding a new humanity.
Victor Jara
As long as we sing his songs,
As long as his courage can inspire us
to greater courage
Victor Jara will never die.Victor Jara
It was quite fashionable to poke fun at Hugo. You remember Gide’s “Victor Hugo is the greatest French poet, alas!” or Cocteau’s “Victor Hugo was a madman who thought he was Victor Hugo.” Anyway, I hated rhetoric and eloquence. I agreed with Verlaine, who said, “You have to get hold of eloquence and twist its neck off!” Nonetheless, it took some courage. Nowadays it is common to debunk great men, but it wasn’t then.
Eugene Ionesco
When a rural Ecuadorian, in the heart of the mountains, listens on his transistor radio to the Chilean Victor Jara singing his “Plegaria a un Labrador” (A farmers prayer) he is, although he may not realize it, listening to a piece of folklore. Such songs belong to a group of sometimes ephemeral phenomena which might be called “subjective folklore”, and which have not yet been given a place among the categories made by folklore specialists.
Victor Jara
... and the art was in every corner and wall… a Mural of the Century of Progress in Colombia South America is rich in detail, painted by a student of the Fine Arts Academy of Chicago named Santiago Martinez; a name to remember…
Santiago Martinez Delgado
Jara, Victor
Jardine, Quintin
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