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Birth of Victor Jara
Victor Jara was born in Lonquén, Chile on September 28, 1932. His parents’ names are Manuel Jara and Amanda Martínez. -
Victor Jara's Young life
Víctor Jara was born in 1932 in the locality of Lonquén, near the city of Santiago, to poor peasants Manuel Jara and Amanda Martínez. His father Manuel was illiterate and encouraged his children to work from an early age to help the family survive, rather than to attend school. Manuel worked as a simple laborer while Amanda, performed many odd jobs to make money for the family -
Victor Jara's father leaves him and his mom
His father could not support his family on earnings as a peasant, or find stable work to support his large family. As he took to drinking, he became increasingly violent. His relationship with his wife deteriorated, and Manuel left the family to look for work when Víctor was still a child. -
Victor Jara's mom dies
When Jara was 15 years old, he was in great pain. Not long after his dad left, his mother had died. She died of a cause that is unknown. -
Jara starts his music
Jara was deeply influenced by the folklore of Chile and other Latin American countries. Jara began his journey into folklore in the mid-1950s when he began singing with the group Cuncumen. In the 1960s, he started specializing in folk music, and got to sing at Santiago's La Peña de Los Parra. -
Victor Jara joins a mime group
By late 1954 he had made friends among the choir's membership, traveled with them to the north of Chile to learn about the folk music of the region—the one from which Jara had originally come. He joined a mime group consisting of Santiago theater students who were all much better off financially than Jara but accepted him as part of the group. -
Victor goes into plays
Then not regularly educated Jara did poorly on the reading portion of the audition but impressed the judges with his stage movements, and he was admitted on a scholarship. Appearing in several plays, he gravitated toward those with social themes -
Jara starts a family
Jara met two women who would alter the course of his life.One was an instructor, Joan Turner Bunster, a British dancer and dance teacher who was married to a Chilean ballet star. After her marriage broke up, she and Jara slowly moved toward a romantic relationship. They married in 1965 and raised a daughter, Amanda, along with Joan's daughter from her previous marriage -
Victo Jara makes his first solo disk
In 1966, he made his first solo disk, self titled "Victor Jara." In the following years he continued as a theater director but began to spend more and more time with his songs and political activities. -
Victor Jara dies
On the morning of September 12, Jara was taken as a prisoner by the military, along with thousands of others deemed suspect, and interned as a prisoner in the Chile Stadium in September 1973. His body was later discarded outside the stadium along with other prisoners who had been killed by the Chilean Army.
