Before I had kids and became obsessive about school politics and hockey, I used to play music. The last group I played with before laying down my saxophone was Poli Chavez y Sus Coronados. The Coronados were an innovator of the “Tex Mex” sound in San Diego, and Poli brought the band’s cumbia, ranchera and conjunto rhythms with him to Portland in 1978.

I met Poli through his son in 1996 or 1997, and played a few Quinceañeras, weddings and anniversary parties with the band. Poli’s book was thick; there were probably a hundred or more well-worn charts in the alto sax book he handed me at my first rehearsal. Most of the songs were standards, but I’d never played any of them. After one rehearsal and one gig basically sight reading, I begged him to let me take the alto book out of his sight and photocopy some of the songs I really needed to practice, like the classic Rico Mambo. He grudgingly let me take it, and I still have my copies.

The Portland version of the Coronados was a family band. I replaced his son on alto sax. Another son played tenor sax, and his son-in-law played trumpet.

Though Poli was something of a legend in the world of Tex Mex music, few in the Portland Anglo community knew about him. Their best chance to have heard him was the annual Cinco de Mayo festival at Waterfront Park, where he was a mainstay. The last time I worked with him was on the main stage there in 1997.

Napoleon “Poli” Chavez passed away in 2003. I missed it at the time, and only found out when searching for some of his recordings online the other day. My sincerest condolences go out to his large extended family, especially the guys I worked with. Poli was a larger-than-life figure, and touched the lives of many people, myself included.

After the break, there’s a photo montage tribute, featuring songs from his 1976 LP “Mi Nueva Ilucion.”
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You’d be hard-pressed to find a eulogy of Kurt Vonnegut Jr. that doesn’t include that phrase, so I thought I’d get it out of the way in the title. Considering the body of work he leaves behind, I think it is appropriate.

Growing up in Iowa City, you pretty much have to be a fan. Vonnegut taught at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop from 1965-1967, and left an indelible imprint both on the Writers’ Workshop and the community. He lived in a big old farm house at the cobble-stoned end of Van Buren Street, just off Brown Street. Later, after he’d left to go teach at Harvard, the house was turned into a rental. I don’t know when it started, but an institution took hold that was beyond anyone’s control.

Each May Day, the grounds of the house became the scene of the biggest party in town. The “Vonnegut House” became legendary, not for the kind of party that once drew the likes of Saul Bellow and Jose Donoso, but for all-night, beer- and psychedelic-fueled, shout at the moon craziness. I was surprised by how well organized the thing was, despite having a life of its own. Bands played, including mine in 1988 and 1989. There was a beer trailer. A giant bonfire. Somehow, the huge old barn that served as stage never caught fire.

The cops would just block off the cul de sac and let the party run its course. Some time in the ’80s, the house was sold, and the tradition ended. The new owners wanted nothing to do with the tradition.

A tradition which, of course, had nothing to do with Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

I came to love Vonnegut when I was working as a waiter at a steak house in Coralville, housed in an old power plant along the Iowa River. Between shifts, I devoured his novels in chronological order. Even though many of them were written before I was born, they seemed to fit the zeitgeist in Iowa City at the time. They probably still do (I wouldn’t know; I moved away in 1989).

I only knew the man through his work and his imprint on my home town. I have enjoyed reading all the eulogies on the Web. Salon has a nice compilation of remembrances from some who encountered him in real life, capturing a hint of who he was as a human. The L.A. Times published an excellent obituary. (There are many more out there; too many to list here.)

When Vonnegut came back to Iowa City in 1989 to speak, he would only speak to students at the Workshop. This annoyed the hipsters in town to no end. The light his legacy cast across Iowa City was ultimately larger than he could have known. His influence on my writing and world view is immense, and the world is a poorer place with his passing.

So it goes.

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