Sara Curruchich and Kaqchikel

Discover a very creative and powerful song by Sara Curruchich, sharing the Kaqchikel language and featuring Duo Fetén Fetén.

The song is called Qach’alal. It was recorded about 4 years ago and is from the album ‘Mujer Indígena’. In the description you can find lyrics in Kaqchikel, along with English translations. The song shares a profound message on the connection between people, nature, and the collective memory of a community.

This is a quote from Sara about the meaning of the song: “Qach’alal is a song about the forced disappearances that occurred during the internal armed conflict in Guatemala. The safeguarding of the historical memory of our bodies and territories must not be silenced. The memory of bodies, the memory of voices, the memory of communities remains; as well as the unwavering search for justice for the disappearances.”

—— The opening words of the song go something like this: Re jun q’ij re, Re jun aq’a’ re, Chuxe’ ri ru q’a ri loq’oläj che’, Oj k’o k’a wawe’, Ni qatün qach’ab’äl, Ni qapach’uj re jun b’ix chiwe’ (This day, tonight, under the branches of the grandfather trees, here we are, uniting our voices, braiding this song for you) ——

Sara Curruchich is known as the first Indigenous Guatemalan singer and songwriter to sing in Kaqchikel. She has won many well-deserved awards, not only for connecting her language to music, but also through work as an activist in defence of women’s and Indigenous People’s rights. She has said her biggest objective as a musician is to “share with girls and boys that we as Indigenous peoples exist”.

She has been a collaborator with UN Women Guatemala and won the MIAW Transformer Award for her fight for Indigenous women’s equality. In interviews, she has denounced the occupation of land by multinational corporations, as well as the attacks on and killings of Indigenous leaders who work to resist it. In 2022, she was ranked as a top 5 “Creative Woman in Central America” by Forbes Magazine, and in 2023 she was at the Indigenous Music Summit in Toronto.

The language in the song is Kaqchikel, one of about 22 Mayan languages spoken in Guatemala. There are approximately 400,000 speakers. Historically, the language was written using a hieroglyphic script. Some of what is currently happening for the language is cultural centers, radio broadcasts, bilingual education, language standardization, and literature such as books and poetry in Kaqchikel.

There is a great article with videos and information about Kaqchikel found here: https://uchicagoanthropology.shorthandstories.com/kaqchikel-language-revitalization/

It comes with a clip to a Kaqchikel tongue twister! https://soundcloud.com/kaqchikel/kechelaj-tongue-twister

https://soundcloud.com/kaqchikel/kechelaj-tongue-twister

You can also learn how an immersion school started and see some of the resources created for children:

https://folklife.si.edu/magazine/stream-of-voices-guatemala-maya-kaqchikel-language

Find more songs, info, and interviews from Sara Curruchich with her website or YouTube Channel. Enjoy the musica! https://saracurruchich.com/en/ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpNN5FODBk22mPpZHJv4_XA

** Information was found by searching online resources, inaccuracies are possible.

____♪_____Song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4m8q_PKU5pQ