PEANUT POLKA - Sunny and the Sunglows

On the label it says "La Cacahuata."  Ok.  That's what it says.  Its an instrumental performed by the Sunglows whom about all of us south of what would eventually become US Interstate 10 knew as "Sunny and the Sunglows."   No Sunny, no Sunglows that's how we saw matters.  Later they called themselves "Sunny and the Sunliners."

You have to learn to say this right:  "Sunny and The SunLIIIIINers!"  Hmmm how do I record in writing just how that was said -  the "i" in "liners" was held in your voice a little - especially when Mary on radio stanice Ka Efe Ere De announced that she had just played "The Peanut Polka" as she began her portion of the morning show on KFRD each weekday. She was on immediately after the Polka show each morning and the poor dear knew that most of us were changing our dials over to KULP in El Campo at that very moment for their morning Polka show which is still on the air after all these years. 

We stayed with Mary until the end of the Peanut Polka because usually the News on KULP was finished by that time and the music started over there.   I remember one morning when Mary said "I know a lot of ya'll will be leaving me right now to go on over where it is you go at this hour.  Zbogom, dobre den, have a nice day, and be good until I see you tomorow."   CJ just asked me if I had just a twinge of guilt when she said that all those years ago.  I answered "no, not even a twinge."  That's what we did you see, we  station hopped to get our polka music and that's how we lived everyday.  Nope, no guilt at all.

KFRD is gone now I think.  Joe Gavranovic was the DJ over there for lots of years.  chkelly1 over on YouTube has one video with Joe Patek performing "The Cradle Polka" from long ago.  KFRD used to be Fort Bend Broadcasting Co, Inc. in Rosenberg, Texas.  

I found an obituary on the Internet from October 6, 2000 for Clyde Morgan Jeffreys who was the Director of News and Talk Shows for KFRD for over 30 years.  He was born 1 Oct 1913 in Columbus Muscogee County Georgia and is interred at David-Greenlawn in Rosenberg. Buried nearby is Gonzalo Rodriguez, who was the first Program Director of the famous Spanish Program "Progreso Latino" at KFRD 980 AM in Rosenberg, Texas, in the late 1950's, 1960's and 1970's. He started with a little 15 Minute Spanish Music Format Show. The Show was so popular, eventually it went all out in a few years to 24/7 Tejano-Spanish Programing in the Greater Houston Area...with listeners all the way down to near Corpus Christi and near San Antonio to Beaumont, Galveston and beyond. In the 1980's the programing was transfered TO KFRD FM 105(aka KMIA FM 105). He was born 28 September 1902 and died 19 April 1982.
 
Last I heard, Ben Oldag was still kicking.  Ben performed live with Texas Rhythm Boys at KFRD and got a job reporting the agricultural news and later added his polka program.

Today I found a notice about Daniel Segura's death.  He was the DJ for Puro Tejano on KRFD.  The notice says "Marcua Rodrigues remembers him fondly.  Segura died 29 July 2008. I don't know how this all figures out but the Univision website says that along the line KFRD became KMIA - 10/05/1990.  KMIA became KMPQ-FM - 10/04/1993.  KMPQ became KLTO - 3/06/1995.  KLTO became KOVA - 08/01/1998.  KOVA became KPTY - 11/20/2001.  KPTY became KAMA - 12/4/2007.  The station is now owned by Univision and the Polka show is long gone but the memories remain of how Mary always always played Sunny's Peanut Polka at the end of the Polka show and the Beginning of the Tejano show every day but Sunday when the churches were on the air in the mornings.

KFRD is gone but Sunny Ozuna remains.  He is still alive and kicking, still performing although he left the Sunliners.  Sunny and a trio of close friends (Freddie Martinez, Augustin Ramirez, and Carlos Guzman) better known as The Legends, earned themselves a Grammy in 2000. According to his website "currently there is strong talk about more work with The Legends as well as many various shows and appearances by Sunny Ozuna himself in the near future."

The Peanut Polka like we used to hear it:

do sljedeći put, blagoslov - until next time, blessings,

Canovals a.k.a. Slavonac
11 Listopad 2011

DE COLORES - Of Colors

Bagdad.   The Battle of Bagdad, a Mexican victory from which the French fled as they often seem wont to do.  Bagdad, Brownsville, and the French. Not far away Fort Brown had the distinction of having been variously commanded by Robert E. Lee and by Phillip Sheridan. The first US airplane ever to experience hostile fire flew from Fort Brown.

Across the river, Matamoros, officially Cuidad Heroica Matamoros, is today the largest city in Tamalipas, and thirty-ninth largest city in Mexico.  With the transnational conurbanation of Matamoros and Browsnsville, it is the fourth largest metropolitan area in the Mexico-United States border. Matamoros is one of the oldest European settlements in North America.

Today Matamoros is presently located on the south bank of the Rio de las Palmas (Rio Bravo or Rio Grande). Previously the town was located elsewhere.  As you may recall, Alonso Pineda, the adventurer from Dubrovnik and whom we've discussed briefly in NA NAŠI PUDE STRAŠI, established a base in the area in 1519.  

Come with me to the old light house at Port Isabel. Close by here is where Charlie lives.  I won't tell you exactly where, he might not like that too much.  Let's get Charlie and help him put his boat in the water. Across the Laguna Madre to the northwest it looks like the bank of the Laguna is elevated at one point.  It is.  That's where we are going. From there, the slight elevation where the light house is located is all that obscures the passage way through Los Brazos de Santiago.   

Of course, if you want to root around there very much, you might should get permission from the Ždralović family, scions of which have been nestled safely on those bluffs for almost five hundred years.  They have very big dogs who get somewhat nervous if their master does not introduce you to them.  

Oh dear!  I've forgotten that I'm supposed to say "De la Garza" and not Ždralović. Tch tch, I've gone and done it now.  Slap my hand will you please.  Both words come out to the same.  Its "Crane" on english. Was "Crane" the family name in Europe or a name they took here?  Around here cranes come in white, pink, and blue.  Lots of colors to choose from, take your pick. 

They laid out a town around them, but several huricanes along the way moved the town inland to about its present location where in 1793 the Franciscans established a parish.  The town got its present name in 1826 when it was named after Mariano Matamoros y Guridi a hero of  the Mexican revolution against Spain. In 1889 a hurricane swept away  most of the remnants of Bagdad.  Matamoros which was supposed to have been Mexico's nothern port, isn't.  The port is on the United States side of the river, closer to where Pineda took rest and repaired his ships.

As it turns out, if you don't count the Ždralović family who  usually studiously avoid being counted, I am the oldest Hrvat around these parts and Joe is the oldest member of the other  oldest Hispanic family in the area.  If you take that bit of knowledge and fifteen dollars to Starbucks you can buy both of us a cup of coffee.  That's all it's worth really - except that part of this community lives in a world as invisible to the casual observer as is the ancient history of the place.

There are courts downtown with judges and lawyers.  All the trappings of modern western civilization are fully present and so are the methods and customs of the world less seen.  Joe and I venture forth when it suits us into venues where people gather.  It's not so uncommon that someone will come for advice or even a judgement on a matter.  We haven't the officials of the state to enforce our judgements.  No.  We have a more powerful agency at our disposal - tradition.   We don't hold posts to which we have been elected as in a modern democracy.  As a matter of fact, were  we to disappear, someone else would fill our places as we ourselves filled the vacancy someone else left when they departed.  Invisible traditions in an invisible world. Traditions of half a millenium and more.

Last Lenten season, Joe and I ventured into a particular venue where we were serenaded by a sixteenth century liturgical song rendered in this area now on Spanish.  Yeah, you already knew its also a Croatian song, didn't you?  "De Colores" this song is called here - "Of Colors."  The video of that event is hosted on YouTube, but you cannot see it there.  It is exclusively available to readers of this blog.  I thought there should be some small reward for you for coming here.

De Colores
the Text on Spanish
De colores, de colores
 Se visten los campos en la primavera.
      De colores, de colores
 Son los pajarillos que vienen de afuera.
      De colores, de colores
 Es el arco iris que vemos lucir.

     Y por eso los grandes amores
 De muchos colores me gustan a mí.
      Y por eso los grandes amores
 De muchos colores me gustan a mí.

     De colores, de colores
 Brillantes y finos se viste la aurora.
      De colores, de colores
 Son los mil reflejos que el sol atesora.
      De colores, de colores
 Se viste el diamante que vemos lucir.

     Y por eso los grandes amores
 De muchos colores me gustan a mí.
      Y por eso los grandes amores
 De muchos colores me gustan a mí.

     Canta el gallo, canta el gallo
 Con el quiri, quiri, quiri, quiri, quiri.
      La gallina, la gallina
 Con el cara, cara, cara, cara, cara.
      Los pollitos/polluelos, los pollitos/polluelos
 Con el pío, pío, pío, pío, pí.

          Y por eso los grandes amores
 De muchos colores me gustan a mí.
      Y por eso los grandes amores
 De muchos colores me gustan a mí.


the text on english:
In colors, in colors
 The fields are dressed in the spring.
      In colors, in colors
 Are the little birds that come from outside.
      In colors, in colors
 Is the rainbow that we see shining.

     And that is why I love
 The great loves of many colors
      And that is why I love
 The great loves of many colors.

     In colors, in colors
 Brilliant and delicate is dressed the dawn.
      In colors, in colors
 Are the thousand gleams the sun treasures.
      In colors, in colors
 Is dressed the diamond we see shining.

     And that is why I love
 The great loves of many colors.
      And that is why I love
 The great loves of many colors.

The rooster sings, the rooster sings
 With a cock-a-doodle, cock-a-doodle-doo.
      The hen, the hen
 With a cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck.
      The chicks, the chicks
 With a cheep, cheep, cheep, cheep, cheep.

     And that is why I love
 The great loves of many colors.
      And that is why I love
 The great loves of many colors.



De Colores as performed by a folk singer in Brownsville

do sljedeći put, blagoslov - until next time, blessings,

Canovals a.k.a. Slavonac

U RAJ NIJE PIVO - In heaven there is no beer

"When German immigrants of the 19th century, settled in the Rio Grande Valley they found ground that was fertile for both crops and culture. Their beautiful button accordions would seed a new Conjunto, (combination) music along Mexico’s northern border." That's what Flaco Jimenez' promoters want you to hear. According to them.  Flaco's father was the father of "conjunto."

Others want to tell you that conjunto was the product of German settlers in the mid 1800s in central Texas and their Mexican neighbors. Ok, there is a bit of truth to both stories, but neither is the whole story.

Let's take a look Princ Carskog od Hrvatska in 1863.


Who?


Car.


Yes. That's what I said: Car.


The Car.

Nooooooooooooooooo not a car, The Car. Not something with 4 wheels. Not with a K sound but a C sound, like ts on english, ok? Sigh. How do I tell you who this man is? Croatia has become a country like America where the car has become the Car. Ohhhhhhh, and people say Teksikanski talk funny? Ha! Car, like the Russian царь, only on croatian. Princ carskog od Hrvatska. The Prince Imperial of Croatia. Ferdinand Maksimilijan Josip. His brother Franjo Josip was the actual Car. Later on, their nephew Franjo Ferdinand met with some mischief in Sarajevo which created a bit of a stir in Europe.

Princ Carskog od Hrvatska Maksimilijan

On English then and his full title "By the grace of God, etc. etc. His Imperial and Royal Highness Ferdinand Maksimilijan Josip, Prince Imperial and Archduke of Austria, Prince Royal of Hungary and Croatia, and Bohemia, Galicia, Lodomeria, Cracow, and ... "

And its in those three dots following that last "and" that Maksimilijan the Princ Carskog od Hrvatska plays a role in the history of music. In 1854, at age twenty-two. Maksimilijan became commander in chief of the Austrian navy. And so now you are looking at the map and you are trying to tell me that Austria doesn't have any sea ports so how could it have a navy? Austria doesn't, that's right, but Croatia does, and remember his title - Princ Carskog od Hrvatska? He built the naval port at Pula in Istria, Croatia. Under his administration, in 1859 the SMS Novara became the first Austrian warship to circumnavigate the globe, with him aboard.

In 1857 he added Viceroy of the Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia to his list of titles. In July that year he married the beautiful Princess Marie Charlotte Amélie Augustine Victoire Clémentine Léopoldine of Belgium, a first cousin to both Queen Victoria and Prince Albert of Great Britain. Maximilijan was too progressive for his older brother's taste and so he was dismissed as Viceroy of Lombardy-Venetia where upon the Lombards and the Venetians pretty much told the Empire to take a flying leap. Maksimilijan and Charlotte retired for a while to Grad Miramar near Trst in modern day Slovenia.

Grad Miramar

The Mexican aristocracy approached Maksimilijan with an offer to become Emperor of Mexico. Mmm hmmm, that's the three dots up there. Mexico. No one told Maksimilian however that he had given up all his rights in Europe to accept this offer until he was under way on the SMS Novara escorted by the Austrian SMS Bellona and the French Themis. Away from land Maksimilijan was informed that he had a one way ticket to America. From the time he landed in Vera Cruz until the Mexican Empire came to a violent close Maksimilijan was in deep difficulty.

The histories want to tell you that Napoleon withdrew his troops from Mexico. Apparently its inconceivable to historians that a statesman would ever just abandon his forces. The forces Napoleon brought to Mexico were mostly Austrian, and yes, Napoleon abandoned them here. The fact that Felix Salm-Salm led a charge of Hussars to shield Maksmilijan in the last moments of the Empire attest to my story.  The fact that there were Hussars there for him to lead attests to my story.

These Hussars weren't Mexican - yet. Juarez was not inclined to be overly vindictive. As Juarez put it, he had smashed the head of the snake, he was not interested in the men who had come with him. These men were Austrians, yes? So everyone nowadays knows that means people of some kind of German background, yes? No! These were soldiers of the Princ Carskog od Hrvatska who got his soldiers where the Austrian Empire always got its soldiers - from among the Croatians.

These soldiers, like Maksimilijan had come to America with a one way ticket.  Prince Salm-Salm had money and influence and he could return to Europe.  He did return in  time to die in the war of 1870.  The average soldier had no way home. None.  All they had was their lives, and their harmonika, and their tubas, and their trumpets and their music. Their music, which they played, and which became popular among the Mexicans. Their music which was copied and adapted and re adapted. Their music became Ranchero. Their music became Conjunto. Their music became Tejano and which lives side by side with Teksikanski music to this day.  Their music testifies to the existence of these men though no monument or nor a single line in a college history book anywhere admits they ever lived. The music of the Balkans in America testifies to them.

Or at least, some of the rest of  the story - oh yes, there's more!  Zivio Princ Carskog od Hrvatska i Meksiko!!!

Lets listen to Flaco Jimenez, he does a really good job with "U RAJ NIJE PIVO."  Did I mention that Maximilijan's wife Charlotte  was from Belgium?  The Ex-Empress Carlota of Mexico, the Ex-Archduchess of Austria, retired to her estates in Belgium where she enjoyed a reputation for eccentricity.  During World War One the forces of the German Empire surrounded her estate but she was so well loved throughout the world that not a single soldier dared set foot on her property or disturb her in any way.  

U RAJ NIJE PIVO was  a popular song in Croatia about five hundred years ago or so.  Flaco Jimenez sings it in Spanish and in English.  Let's listen in as Flaco sings part of this song in Flemish in honor of the beloved Empress Carlotta. 

The Tekst:
En el cielo no hay cerveza que beber
por eso ando tomando noche y dia
porque ya cuando se me llegue el dia
en el mundo sequiera la ferrusquilla

In heaven there is no beer
That's why we drink it here
And when we're gone from here
All my friends will be drinking all the beer

In de hemel daar is geen bier
Daarom drinken wij het hier
Als wij zijn heengegaan
Drinken al onze verienden al het bier

En el cielo no hay cerveza que beber
por eso ando tomando noche y dia
porque ya cuando se me llegue el dia
en el mundo sequiera la ferrusquilla

In heaven there is no beer
That's why we drink it here
And when we're gone from here
All my friends will be drinking all the beer

do sljedeći put, blagoslov - until next time, blessings,

Canovals a.k.a. Slavonac