In October 2001, personnel from the Institute of Historical Organs of Oaxaca, A.C. (IOHIO) made a first visit to the church of the community of San Bartolo Yautepec. Our intention was to document a historic organ that had been reported in a registry of Mexican organs in 1990.

Located in the mountainous region of the Sierra Sur, San Bartolo Yautepec had a population of approximately 650 inhabitants, although many have left the community to live and work elsewhere. As in many Oaxaca communities, the indigenous language is disappearing and currently only older adults speak Zapotec. Fortunately, the technique of weaving exquisite cotton garments, mainly for sale rather than for their personal use, has been preserved by some women in the community.

As we ascended the spiral stone staircase to the choir loft, we wondered if the organ we hoped to find still existed and if so, its state of preservation. Upon reaching the loft, we were delighted to see a lovely organ, a smaller version of several neo-classical instruments. It was beautifully proportioned and practically intact with its bellows piled up on a table beside. Although the date of construction was not indicated with an inscription or a label, the case decoration and construction technique were typical of the early 19th century. A later discovery of a church inventory in 1803 cited this organ in good condition, so now we know it was built before then. A collection of band instruments imported from France in the 19th century was stored under the table.

As we proceeded to document the organ with photographs, measurements, cleaning, and analysis, we noticed two wooden boxes on another nearby table. We asked the sacristans who accompanied us about their contents, but they knew nothing nor did they have the keys to open the old locks. Finally, they simply removed the nails from the hinges on the back of the boxes and opened the lids from behind. One box was full of manuscripts of wind band music from the late-19th/early 20th century, as well as printed scores of popular music dating from around 1930 to 1967.

When we opened the second trunk we found… a treasure! It contained missals and liturgical books printed in Latin but even more impressive, finely copied and decorated book of Gregorian chant, all dating from the early 18th century.  Included among these books was the workbook of the musician Domingo Flores, native of San Bartolomé Yautepeque (as it was known in those days). It appears that Flores worked in Santo Domingo Nejapa, the Dominican evangelizing center for the southeastern Zapotec region of the state.  He copied into his notebook the music he heard in Nejapa, including sacred polyphonic works and lighter villancicos in Latin, Spanish, and Zapotec.

It is possible that he composed some of the works as well. The musical activity documented by Flores while he was in Nejapa indicates the enormous importance that the Dominican evangelizers gave to the composition and dissemination of sacred music. There would surely have been an organ in Nejapa to accompany the choral works and the mass, although this would have been implicit and not specifically noted in the scores. Domingo Flores apparently took the books and his notebook from Nejapa to Yautepec—a distance of approximately 20 kilometers, a day’s walk--where they have remained to this day. His intention may have been to use them for evangelizing purposes in the region, or perhaps something happened in Nejapa which required their removal to  another location. 

As we reviewed one of the Gregorian chant books, we were stunned to see that its back cover was lined with two scraps of deer skin that were painted with pre-Hispanic pictographs representing human figures, glyphs, and other symbols. At that moment we could not possibly imagine the magnitude of the discovery. Today, thanks to the analysis carried out by Javier Urcid and Sebastián van Doesburg, we know that the fragments corresponded to the eighth mantic or divinatory codex found in Oaxaca or neighboring territories, in contrast to all other known Mexican codices which are historical. Furthermore, it turns out to be the first codex in Oaxaca originating from the Zapotec/Chontal/Mixe region (the others are from the Mixteca Alta). Most of the codices are currently stored in libraries or museums in Europe and only two of them, including the one from Yautepec, safeguarded in Mexico.

We were informed by a contact in the community that around the 1970s someone—probably a priest—considered the old books and printed scores no longer useful and therefore stowed them in two wooden trunks. What luck! Otherwise it´s entirely possible that the documents could have been mutilated, destroyed, or sold to collectors. Due to the importance of this discovery, we suggested that the authorities contact personnel from the restoration workshop of the Fray Francisco de Burgoa Library to register and preserve the documents. This procedure was finally initiated six years later.

During a succeeding visit to Yautepec in 2006, the IOHIO photographed the documents page by page as a protective measure. On that occasion, the sacristans told us that the main altarpiece of the church had been intervened by a supposed restorer who had apparently applied fake gold instead of pure gold leaf. The result was evident: the altarpiece began to change from gold to green and purple and the local people were extremely upset, since they themselves had financed the restoration. The problem was reported to the Alfredo Harp Helú Oaxaca Foundation, which agreed to support the first phase of a re-restoration. It is likely that this support of a project so dear to the community encouraged the authorities to allow, in December 2007, the transfer of the music documents to the restoration workshop of the Burgoa Library for conservation and analysis. 

Shortly thereafter, the town assembly authorized the IOHIO and the Burgoa Library to present and exhibit the documents during the IOHIO’s Seventh International Festival of Organ and Early Music held in February 2009. On that occasion, the Festival incorporated into its program a series of conferences titled “Presentation of the Treasures of San Bartolo Yautepec” in which experts in related fields spoke about the manuscripts. The choir “Capilla Virreinal de la Nueva España”, directed by Aurelio Tello, renowned musicologist and member of the IOHIO Advisory Board, presented a concert of works from the Domingo Flores Notebook. Some fifty people from the Yautepec community gathered in the city of Oaxaca for this very special event. They were amazed by the activities inspired by the contents of the wooden boxes in their church and by the beauty of the music presented that night in the dramatic space of the former convent of Santo Domingo de Guzmán. In October 2010 during the Eighth IOHIO Festival, another concert of the music from the Notebook was presented in the Rosary Chapel of the former convent of San Pablo. Maestro Tello had been invited by the IOHIO to study and transcribe the music, so during these two events he could reveal the progress of his work. 

Don Bonifacio Antonio, the former director of the Yautepec band, and the municipal president, Urbino Martínez, talk with the director of the restoration workshop, María del Refugio Gutierrez, about the documents (2008).

On August 23, 2013, the municipal authorities of Yautepec gathered at the restoration workshop to officially receive the documents, already restored and classified, with the exception of the fragments of the pre-Hispanic codex which, due to their historic value, were stored in Mexico City. The next day, the final phase of the process took place with the return of the musical treasures to the community. The population assembled at the church to admire the restored books and scores that were until then completely unknown, having been hidden away in the wooden trunks for decades. The local people heard presentations by Sebastián van Doesburg (FAHHO), Aurelio Tello, and Cicely Winter. The festivities were enlivened by the local band as we processed through the town. The date for the return of the documents was deliberately chosen as part of the annual celebration in honor of the patron saint, San Bartolo, on August 24. The following year the municipal president authorized the publication of the Notebook and the recording of its music.

The discovery of the workbook of Domingo Flores's turned out to be as significant for musicologists as the pre-Hispanic codex has been for ethnohistorians. The collaboration between the community of San Bartolo Yautepec, the IOHIO, the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), the restoration workshop of the Fray Francisco de Burgoa Library, and the Alfredo Harp Helú Oaxaca Foundation has had far-reaching consequences and can serve as a model for other communities that have historic documents.

The transcriptions and analysis of the notations from the Notebook (Cuaderno de Domingo Flores) by the musicologist Aurelio Tello with professional photographs by Fidel Ugarte, as well as an audio of the music presented by Tello’s choir “Capilla Virreinal de la Nueva España,” were published in 2023 by the Fundación Alfredo Harp Helú Oaxaca.