“La quebrá’ del ají”: legendary place and community in the work of Los Jaivas.

At the outset of the 1970s, and in a context of heightened political polarization, the Chilean group Los Jaivas set themselves on a course of avant-garde musical experimentation, which led them to move between the rock music of the time and Amerindian musical traditions (González 2013). In the song “La quebrá’ del ají” they venture to bring together different natural and supernatural elements, emphasizing themes such as the happy country and the world upside down, typical of canto a lo poeta (traditional sung poetry), and restoring in a particular way the practice of describing enchanted places and lost cities, abundant in Chilean folklore (Plath 1984). The research described in this article deals with the causes in the history of the band that explain the appearance of these themes. The text draws upon the concept of anthropological place proposed by Marc Augé, and of legendary place proposed by Humberto Eco. Additionally, the article utilizes operational definitions of community and counterculture in its analysis, thus working to decipher the meaning that this song has in the creative work of the band.