DeroVolk's Blog

From Pinochet to Perón... During the past century, most of South American countries were under the rule of ruthless dictators and polemic presidents who had a great impact on countries societies and culture. However, during these periods of times, by genuine desire or by force to meet the requirements of the cult of personality, many songs and marches were composed to honour those leaders and their political movements. " Songs for the Leader " is a section where we take a look at several songs dedicated to these people or their political movements. Today, we will review a list of the most popular songs of South American countries during those difficult times. Argentina Speaking about Juan Domingo Perón is very controversial. Especially after what the Peronist Party (now Partido Justicialista) has become. Nevertheless, Perón had a great popularity back on the day, and many songs were composed in his honour. However, the main song of the Peronist movement is, without any doub...

An Anthem without lyrics... The Spanish "Royal March" (Marcha Real) was one of the most watched videos in the original channel of DeroVolk, and even today in the backup watch it has thousands of views. There was a certain month in which many versions of the anthem were uploaded to the channel, each one as the anthem of a Spanish colony (e.g.: Spanish Sahara, Spanish Guinea, etc.) and this was subject of many jokes due to the overload of Marcha Real versions that flooded the channel during those days. This was done in order to show the many varieties in terms of instrumental and vocal version that this anthem has. Today, the Marcha Real is the national anthem of Spain, and it is one of the oldest anthems of the world. Even though the official anthem does not have any lyrics, there have been many unofficial versions during all these years. Source: Pixabay The anthem was composed during the XVIII Century and it appears with the name "Marcha Granadera" (Grenadier'...

Brotherhood... In a recent post in this Blog, I wrote that the national anthems of Paraguay and Uruguay can be considered “brother anthems” due to the fact that the lyrics of both anthems were written by the same person: Francisco Acuña de Figueroa. After an investigation carried out in recent years by César Manuel Barrios (composer, pianist and orchestra conductor), a great discovery was made public. And today, the world can see it in detail! Francisco Acuña de Figueroa After researching through many sources and investigation works in South America and the United States, it was discovered that the lyrics of the national anthem of Uruguay were used with a melody created by Francesco Casale, and which is in fact the melody of the current national anthem of Paraguay (arranged by Remberto Giménez in 1933). According to the story, the President of Uruguay issued a decree on 1837 stating that the music created by Francesco Casale would be used with Figueroa’s lyrics until a new proposa...