Founded in Memphis over 15 years ago, Danza Azteca Quetzalcoatl, a traditional Aztec Dance group, works to preserve and showcase the sacred rituals of the ancestral people of Mexico. Born in Guerrero, Mexico, Eduardo Tellez moved to Memphis 25 years ago. He helped form Danza Azteca Quetzalcoatl, and has been dancing and drumming with the group ever since. The group is known as Memphis’s premier Danza Azteca group and has a prolific schedule of performances and demonstrations around the region, including at the Brooks Museum, Rhodes College, el Dia De Los Muertos Parade, Crosstown Arts, Germantown International Festival, and dozens of powwows around the state.
Originating from central Mexico, Danza Azteca is a traditional dance that could best be described as “a prayer in movement.” It combines the music of sacred instruments—the drum (huehuetl), the hand-held rattles (ayacaxtlis), and the foot rattles (coyollis)—with the movement of the dancer’s bodies. In Eduardo’s words, “It involves many artistic expressions such as paint, handmade crafts, music, poetry, and dance. Preserving this part of a culture identity reinforces the education and values of an ethnicity with art as a principal base. This art builds our members into community leaders.”
For many, the danza ceremony creates a connection of the human spirit with Mother Earth, the Creation. Chicana/o Studies scholar Jennie Luna writes, “Danza is movement and human expression of natural and cosmic phenomena, creating consciousness and a connection between participants themselves and with the delicate balance, equilibrium, and harmony of the earth and universe. Danza was viewed as a science of human movement, a bodily expression of cosmic philosophy/theory, and a form of spiritual empowerment” (2012, 89). Part of the mexicanidad, or “mexicanity” movement, Danza Azteca is defined by use of the Náhuatl language, the Aztec solar calendar, the celebration of seasonal changes, and the practice of pre-Hispanic spirituality.
Danza in the United States developed into its current form during the period of the 1960s to the 1980s. Contemporary Danza movements such as Danza Azteca and Danza Mexica serve as a “collective voice of self-representation and self-determination.” Dr. Luna writes that, for those who come together to practice this pre-Hispanic dance form, “it is part of the restoration process to rebuild and recover what was lost due to the invasion over 500 years ago” (Luna, 83).
A key element of the danza is the drum. As part of the Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program this year, Eduardo will teach apprentice Moises Rodriguez all facets of the drum’s role, including making the drum and playing it for the dance. Moises explains, “It is [important] because the identity and explanation to certain traditions that have a starting point; we can see now in the multicultural world and explain to others the significance of understanding and respect as individuals.”
