1979: Que Suerte La Mia, Ramon Ayala Y Sus Bravos Del Norte

By Tatiana Hernandez

Luck is a luxury I’ve often thought of as being out of my price range. Loss, on the other hand, is relentlessly accessible. 

Que suerte la mía, estar tan perdido y volver a perder. “How lucky I am, to be so lost and lose again,” Ramón Ayala y Sus Bravos Del Norte sing on “Que Suerte La Mía,” the opening track on the album of the same name. 

I don’t remember the first time my grandpa played Ramón Ayala around me or the last. That’s the way things seem to go for me. I never remember beginnings or endings, just everything in between. What I’m trying to say is that I don’t remember the last time I spoke to my grandpa––or even the last time my grandpa was my grandpa. He was the one with dementia, but I’m the one who forgot. 

*** 

When I was a kid, waking up to the voices of Ramón Ayala y Sus Bravos Norte meant that I was in for a long day of cleaning or cooking, or both. My family didn’t need alarm clocks. Back then, my grandparents followed the same schedule as the sun. If they needed help with chores, they simply popped a CD in the stereo and raised the volume until the rest of us were awake enough to roll tortillas or rearrange the living area for maximum seating to accommodate the incoming rush of family members gathering for the holidays. 

In that way, this album was a siren song, by both definitions of the word. The loud accordions and gritos were alarms that were impossible to ignore. I think deep down though, I really didn’t want to ignore them. Following the sounds to the kitchen meant a day of working alongside my grandma and watching her move through the space in a way that only grandmas can do. Familial duties - a symphony of labor and love. She would tell me stories about her childhood. My grandpa would pop in intermittently to “check our progress,” which usually involved him dancing into the room singing along to the songs loudly and off key while he stole our freshly made food. 

These days, hearing Ramón Ayala’s music sets off a different kind of alarm for me. Since my grandpa passed last year I haven’t been able to listen. If a song happens to come on shuffle there is always a race to see if I can hit the skip button before the tears start flowing. Ramón 

Ayala was one of my grandpa’s favorite artists. At least, I think he was. My grandpa never really spoke about his favorite things. He never spoke much at all, really. Every once in a while he would burst into song though. He would spend the whole day in silence and then sweep into the room ranchera style, crooning about lost love. There were times when he would pick me up from school and I would hear Ramón Ayala's voice long before I spotted the car. His was always that voice that led me back home. I would get in the car and watch my typically stoic grandpa put on a show. Now I find myself yearning for my grandpa and his world and Ramón Ayala's voice is once again leading the journey.

As I listen to this album now, it is bittersweet. In a way, it feels like a homecoming. Maybe memory is all the home you get. Although listening to these songs still hurts, it hurts in a way that’s familiar, comforting even. It’s impossible to hear Ramón Ayala without also hearing my grandpa singing along. Because of this, Que Suerte La Mia is an album so full of companionship after a year of no serenades. 

The album vacillates between songs about love and songs about loss. Where there is love there is loss, or perhaps, where there is loss there is love. The two are inextricably linked. 

I think about songs like “Que Falta Me Haces,” and how it feels to be abandoned. It’s written from the point of view of a man who was deserted by his lover, one who is stuck in a dream of being with her. But the song’s lyrics (“My mind wanders all over infinity until I find myself next to you in my delirium”) feel just as much about grieving and trying to find a way to connect with someone who is not there, to me. 

Whenever I think about Ramón Ayala, I think about how Ramón Ayala is also Daddy Yankee’s real name, which is to say that sometimes two different things can go by the same name, like grief and love. The thing about Ramón Ayala is that the band carries his name but he is not the lead singer. He’s the accordion player. Although he sometimes lends his voice as a background singer, the voice that most people think is Ramón is actually that of Eliseo Robles. Ramón is a stand-in for Eliseo. Ramón is a stand-in for my grandpa. 

*** 

In the midst of his struggle with dementia, my grandfather's essence seemed to both fade and intensify. I watched him become less a person and more of a concept to himself and everyone around him. During that period, there were days when he would lie in bed lost, sometimes screaming, sometimes silent. My family did whatever we could to ease his mind, to help him find comfort. Once, my grandma asked me to help her find music to play. The hope was that the music would find a way through the dementia, that it would help him find his way back. We played Ramón Ayala. If my grandpa heard or recognized the sounds, he didn’t offer any indication. There have been plenty of times when I wished I could forget the past, but I’ve learned that only the lucky get to remember. I blame my ancestors for my fascination with memory. I blame myself for everything else. 

Hoy quiero olvidarla, por mi bien. “Today I want to forget her, for my good.” Those are the final words on this album. Interestingly, the last song is a stylistic departure from the rest of the album. While the rest of the songs are traditional Nortenos and rancheras common in Mexico, “La Ultima Noche” (“The Last Night”) is a bolero mambo, which is of Cuban origin. By the end of the song, Ramón Ayala Y Sus Bravos Norte incorporates many of the instruments and elements found in Mexican music. I suppose there’s a metaphor in that––how, in the end, you always return home. Every ending is an inception.

This album contains countless memories - countless histories - that form together into a massive heartbreak. Now, in the wake of my grandfather’s absence, I turn to that cherished album, each track a time capsule I’m hoping will help carry me to a new understanding of who he was. Listening is my remorseful reacquaintance. My memories are fleeting stories, lost dance steps, and fading lyrics in the distance. Grief is my companion, but so too is the determination to hold onto the fragments of him that remain. 

Tatiana Hernandez is a sometimes writer and a forever student. She currently (begrudgingly) lives in Los Angeles, but will always be a Midwesterner at heart.