Galicians are very proud of their traditions and culture, so they work hard to preserve aspects such as the Galician language and muñeira music. The Galician government encourages citizens to keep this music alive by funding official bagpipe schools that offer lessons for only 40 euros (about 46 dollars) for the year. During my time here, I have had a strong desire to dive deeper into the Galician culture. As a result, I decided to take bagpipe lessons. My bagpipe teacher, Marcos, has played almost his whole life, and he has traveled around the world with the Ourense bagpipe band to compete in (and win) international bagpipe competitions. Fun fact: the largest bagpipe museum in the world is located in little Ourense.
Galicia has these music traditions because of its long history of different settlers and its mix of cultures. There have been multiple periods in history when Galician traditional music began to die out and people fought to sustain it. During the years 1892 - 1975, Francisco Franco ruled over Spain as a dictator. Franco wanted a more unified Spain, and to do this, he created regulations that attempted to force regions to lose the unique aspects of their culture. One way he did this was to force everyone to speak Castellano (what is now known as Spain Spanish) instead of the many diverse languages in Spain. Franco also outlawed the folk music that is very common in Galicia. After the end of Franco's regime, folk music typical to northern Spain once again flourished. Now many governments of different Spanish regions are doing what they can to preserve their culture and traditions, including languages and music.
