When you think about chicha, the typical Andean drink base don fermented corn comes to mind. Chicha, though, is not just a drink, it is also a musical genre that the people of Peru tend to love and listen to every day.
It stems from the Andean cumbia and it has maintained itself for decades now as a classic music of our country.
The singer Lorenzo Palacios, known in his artistic life as, El Papá Chacalón, was one who managed to conquer almost the whole country with his chicha music. His most famous song was Muchacho Provinciano, the Provincial Boy. It describes the life of a young man from the provinces who arrives at the capital in search of a good income. He ends up having hard jobs in an immense city. This is the song that carried Palacios to success. From that time many other groups have developed to sing in this style.
Throughout the year there are chicha concerts in the City of Cusco as well as the whole of Peru. These events draw thousands of people who go to have fun, enjoy, and dance to these beautiful and moving music while drinking lots of beer.
Chicha is considered the music of the common man, a kind of Peruvian six-pack Joe. It is, as a result, the music of the poor who each day go out to do hard work and do not give up in the face of the hardest difficulty. The music is a motivation for everyone to progress.
While listening to the songs many people shed tears. Maybe that is because the majority of these songs have words that are sad and filled with solitude.
Some people classify chicha as the music of delinquency. This is because the majority of the people who live bad lives identify themselves with this music. It is their inspiration to crime.
For some it is the music of the ordinary people while for others it is the music of crime. In any case, whether for good or bad, this genre seems to never go out of style and is always close to the heart of Peruvians.
