Toño Azpilcueta was a scholar of creole music—all of it, from the coastal and mountain varieties to the versions played in the Amazon. He had dedicated his life to it, and had won the distinction—naturally worthless in monetary terms—of being known as the country’s greatest expert in Peruvian music, especially after the death of the grandee of Puno, Professor Hermógenes A. Morones—the A stood for Artajerjes, he would eventually discover. He had met Morones when he was a student at the Colegio La Salle, not long after his father, an Italian immigrant with a Basque surname, had rented the small house in La Perla where Toño would grow up. Toño earned his bachelor’s degree at the National University of San Marcos, and his thesis on the Peruvian vals was overseen by Morones, whose assistant and favorite disciple he had become. Toño’s work expanded upon Morones’s own studies and findings concerning regional music and dance.
In his third year, the professor allowed Toño to teach several classes, and it was expected in San Marcos that, when the master retired, Toño Azpilcueta would inherit his chair. Toño took this for granted as well. For this reason, upon finishing his five years of study in the School of Arts and Letters, he began research for a doctoral dissertation to be entitled “The Street Cries of Lima,” dedicated, naturally, to Morones.
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