Beto Mendoza blends activism and music to raise immigrant voices and take back narrative control. His “Voces en Pandemia” project connected musicians across borders to tell stories of recent and ongoing struggles through song.
Words & Photos by André Joseph Gallant
Beto Mendoza wields a multifaceted voice. In his music, he controls it as a nuanced instrument, imbuing lyrical ballads with fragile hope. As an activist, he amplifies the voice via megaphone, brandishing it as a political weapon. As an organizer in his adopted home of Athens, Georgia, he uses his tones and messages to connect, bringing diverse people together in conversation.
Yet some might count Beto — an undocumented immigrant from Mexico — among the voiceless, part of an estimated 11 million paperless people who live and work in the shadows. But Beto and immigrants like him live full-throated lives. Though many of us choose not to listen, via protest and music — and with purpose — Beto demands our attention.
Here's why: Powerful forces usurp and mutate migrant narratives, Beto contends. The media often describe migrants as a wave overwhelming the southern border, but rarely ask what compels immigrants to leave their home or who's enticing an immigrant to come. On the campaign trail, certain candidates paint migrants as drug dealers and rapists. During the COVID-19 pandemic, business leaders labeled the undocumented people who harvest vegetables, slaughter animals, and construct buildings as essential workers. Their labor, despite threats to their health, could not stop without wrecking the economy. But their labor, despite threats to their health, does not deserve high wages or access to medical care. They're treated as inputs, not people, and the hypocrisy comes as no surprise to Beto. The United States desires immigrant sweat, but won't care for the immigrant soul. It's time, he says, for immigrants to take back narrative control. “It’s our responsibility to not let these people tell our stories."
One way to reclaim the narrative, Beto believes, is to create art from experience and to make art for posterity. During the pandemic, Beto, a multi-instrumentalist who performs as Beto Cacao, produced a collaborative album that crosses borders and immigration statuses, and elevates quiet stories of migrant life in the United States. It's called "Voces en Pandemia," and it is art born of struggle.
To fuel the album's songs, Beto collected personal stories from undocumented immigrants living in Athens — stories about having wages stolen by bosses, about the pain of losing a parent back in Mexico to COVID-19, about the treacherous journey across the border. Musicians in two places — Silverio Jiménez and Francisco Palacios in Mexico City; mother-and-son duo Alys and Nico Willman, Lydian Brambila, and Beto himself in Athens — turned those stories into lyrics and melodies, singing in Spanish and English. In song form, Beto says, the stories become historic documents of immigrant life in the South during the pandemic.
Beto is also a co-founder of immigrant rights organizations Dignidad Inmigrante en Athens and Athens Immigrant Rights Coalition, which advocate for the undocumented community at the local and state level. During the pandemic, both groups became essential sources for food, money, and other resources for undocumented people, who found themselves barred from institutional aid. Beto and I have been friends for nearly 15 years. I've written stories about his activism, and we've shared restorative meals together after long days of protest. I've listened to him perform countless times and know how influential music has been throughout his life. But Beto's personality blends politics and art so seamlessly that it hadn't occurred to me to ask him how he understands these roles, their similarities and differences. I'd been listening, but not closely enough. The pandemic gave us some time, and the album gave us a reason.
The following conversation has been edited for length and clarity:
André Gallant: The stories featured on "Voces en Pandemia" were collected as part of mutual aid efforts by migrant advocates in Athens. Undocumented people couldn't receive financial assistance from the government, so volunteers created the Fondo Solidario, which offered donated money to families who'd been affected by the pandemic, as in the loss of jobs or housing. The stories on the album come from those families. How did you go about choosing those stories?
Beto Mendoza: I didn't have much choice. Not everyone [who received money] gave their stories. Some of the stories were short, for different reasons. From 70 applications, there were five stories. Everyone involved embraced the idea [of collecting stories], but there were technical difficulties. The majority of applicants had other emergencies, like the pandemic. And some people didn't see the value in sharing their stories because they don't think their life has value.
AG: What from those stories did you find most powerful? What has stuck with you?
BM: I saw the narrative of my own life. What still sticks with me is the narrative of migrant women, because it was mostly women applying for the Fondo Solidario because of gender roles in our community. So there were stories of abuse, rape, persecution. There's the idea of a better life, the American dream, coupled with the pain of what you leave behind. But [I recall] the pain, sexual harassment of women in our community, not only in crossing the border but making a living here in the USA.
AG: An early album of yours, "Undocorridos," follows a similar premise to "Voces en Pandemia" in that it's true stories set to song. In what ways do you see them as similar or different?
BM: "Voces en Pandemia" is really a continuation of the same idea — to capture stories of the people and use music as a tool to deliver that message. "Voces" gave me the opportunity to bring in different voices and perspectives. It was a great platform as a songwriter to learn in collaboration with other songwriters. Anyone who listened to "Undocorridos" and listened to the two songs I did on "Voces," they will see someone else's hands, and that is of Silverio [Jiménez, Mexico-based composer and producer], who coached me on how to improve my songwriting.
AG: "Voces en Pandemia" was officially and quietly released in the fall of 2020. What has been the response from people so far?
BM: Many people see themselves reflected in the stories and say, "This is us!" It's not just the story of someone, it's a collective story. There's one song, "Guitarras Braceras," that I wrote the lyrics for and Silverio and Francisco [Palacios] created the music. Most people cry at the line "My mother died without my embrace." That is the migrant experience. It's my experience, which is why we included it. Most migrants have lost someone at a distance and were not able to say goodbye.
AG: As your friend, I know that music transformed your life at an early age back in your hometown of San Juan Ixhuatepec. And it might be impossible to unravel music and politics in how your friends see you and how you see yourself. How do you think this album fits into that understanding?
BM: We are complex as human beings. And as I've learned, we are incomplete. We are still in the process of making ourselves. And in community, we are not perfect. Any poor person can't separate themselves from politics. Everything they do and say is charged with powerful forces. But we can think of ourselves as oppressed, or we can work toward liberation. And the album is a reflection of that. It's like the question, To be or not to be? That question is pressing in every aspect of our lives. We have to embrace it; we have to channel it in one way or another.
AG: Before the pandemic hit, you and your comrades in Dignidad Inmigrante en Athens, which advocates for fair treatment of undocumented people by government entities, were already helping the community deal with the pandemic of deportations and other daily struggles for undocumented immigrants in the United States. What were the discussions like in the organization when you realized there was a whole new role for you to play because of the coronavirus pandemic?
BM: It was a challenge. It was confusing. But there was no time for hopelessness. On one hand, we saw the suffering of the community, and on the other we had people saying, "How can I help?" At first, it was like a shock, with everybody buying too much toilet paper and food. But we needed to keep going. One part of the group wanted to keep pushing and keep fighting because the [political] situation hadn't changed for the community. The other part of the group recognized the urgency of the moment. We had to make a decision between the urgent and the important. We chose to fight for the urgent. We used the same relationships we built with nonprofits and government officials [to get help for the community]. But we realized the immigration status of the people we help was a problem for many bureaucracies. We were at the table, but realized that we were just waiting for crumbs. So we switched gears to face the migrant community. Again, we saw ourselves as by ourselves.
AG: Your music has always been political. I've heard you say that the folk music of Indigenous people under colonization is inherently political. What role does protest music have during a pandemic?
BM: One of the things I learned during the pandemic is that we are not somebody else. We are still who we were before. So if we were protesting and working on liberation before, we're still working. For me, it was the people who are activists who first responded to the needs of our community. At the same time the government was giving billions ... to the rich, we were giving food to people who were losing jobs. That reflects in the music in general. The role of protest music is: Keep it real.
André Joseph Gallant is a writer, multimedia journalist, and teacher based in Athens, Georgia. He is the author of "A High Low Tide: The Revival of a Southern Oyster" (UGA Press, 2018) and hosts Hear-Tell, a podcast about the art and craft of narrative nonfiction. Listen to his conversation with Jasmin Pittman Morrell about her essay, “Is That Your Mother?”
Wendy Alcántara comes from a family of readers and has a master's degree in literature, so it is not surprising that she knows that stories can change the world. She began interpreting at the age of 15 for immersion trips designed to bring people from different cultures and backgrounds together so they can establish personal connections by sharing stories (Facebook @AmextraSemillas). She now runs Advanced Academic Editing (Facebook @ESL.Edit), a translation service that has as its mission helping Spanish-speaking academics — in the U.S. and abroad — to have their voices heard in the predominantly white, English-speaking world of academia.