Name: New Perspectives: “Sonic Memories of the Coast”
Start: 2025-10-09T17:30:00-05:00
End: 2025-10-09T19:00:00-05:00
Location: Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum

$New Perspectives: \u201cSonic Memories of the Coast\u201d$

In this Gallery Talk, master's student Ida Maria Tello will discuss pre-Columbian archaeological figures from the Remojadas society.
About this Event

“Sonic Memories of the Coast: An Ethnomusicological Reflection on the Remojadas Archaeological Site in Veracruz, Mexico”

Ida Maria Tello, master's student in the Department of Music in Arts & Sciences, discusses four terracotta whistles found on Mexico's Veracruz Gulf Coast. These figurines, classified as sonrientes (smiling faces), originate from the Remojadas cultural site located in central Veracruz, which is estimated to have flourished from around 100 BCE to 800 CE. Tello reflects on the potential ritualistic functions of the whistles and explores the methodologies that may be deployed when analyzing the social and musical functions of the figurines. She also reflects on their history, considering the politics of collection and repatriation while explaining the conditions with which the artifacts found their way to the Kemper Art Museum.

Drawing on ethno- and archaeomusicological methods and discourses, Tello asks, what is the role of an ethnomusicologist in an archeological setting, and what challenges might they face? Moreover, how might descendant communities of the Remojadas, and those living in the region, be included in cultural analyses and in artifact repatriation discourses?

About the Speaker

Ida Maria Tello is pursuing a master's degree in musicology at Washington University in St. Louis. Her research focuses on alternative socialities that are negotiated through musical creation and performance across southern Veracruz, Mexico, and in the urban United States. More broadly, Ida is interested in sociopolitical musical movements across Latin America and how musicians leverage cross-border relationships in order to foster political initiatives and social change. Tella is currently working on her master's thesis, which illuminates the voices of women who play music in the southern region of Veracruz, a style commercially known as son Jarocho. Her work asks how mujeres Jarochas carve their own voices into a canon that has historically placed them at the periphery of musical creation, all while navigating music professionalization and dialogues of solidarity and dissent within their communities. Tello completed a bachelor of music education at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and is interested in public-facing musicology and bilingual programming in public schools.