¡Little Joe y La Familia!
The musical genre of Tejano is very important to anyone with a South Texas background. One major contributor to this music is the famous artist Little Joe y La Familia. Little did I know before this essay but Little Joe signed my father’s copy of one of his album’s “Para La Gente.” I need not tell my parents about my research essay on Little Joe. They told me about the well known artist and were obviously great fans. My parents were definitely impacted by Little Joe y La Familia. These are just two South Texans with first hand knowledge of Little Joe. With time and some research, I came to meet many elder Chicanos around my parent’s age who were affected by Little Joe’s music and loved it very much.
Little Joe was born Jose Maria DeLeon Hernandez in Temple, Texas in 1940. Amazingly, he was seventh out of thirteen children. He began playing music with his cousins in 1953. His first paid performance was at a high school dance in Cameron, Texas. There was nowhere to go but up from this point on. Chicanos in Texas at that time wanted a new sound to their Conjunto music. They wanted a sound that represents their biculturalism. Little Joe y La Familia was the answer to their prayers!
He started small, but after his little brother Jesse died in a car wreck in 1964, he vowed to go commercial. Little Joe relied on small independent labels at first then started two of his own labels. He started Buena Suerte for recordings in Spanish and Good Luck for recordings in English. Later he made a third label, Leona Records. During the 1970’s, Little Joe’s music changed. He became infatuated with “Latinismo,” and this was the official time he changed his band name and added the “y la familia.” It took awhile but in 1985, Little Joe signed on with the first major recording label, WEA International. After doing two albums with WEA, Little Joe switched to SONY International. Little Joe stayed there until 1993 and then launched his fifth label, Tejano Discos. This was of extreme importance in his musical career because the first release on this label, “Que Paso,” earned him his third Grammy nomination.
Little Joe y La Familia created one of the first sounds of a new bimusical style which synthesized ranchero and jaiton. He is Tejano royalty and everyone knows it. I listened to his “Para La Gente” album and actually recognized most of the songs. I have grown up listening to this legendary artist and have never known about his history. This has helped me to relate to the music more and realize just what contributions he gave to Tejano.