Group history
The Agrupación Folclórica Tejeguate was founded in 1976 in La Frontera, El Hierro, when residents of the Valle de El Golfo, led by Ramón Padrón, set out to keep the island’s traditional songs, dances and instruments from disappearing after the death of singer Valentina la de Sabinosa. The group’s name comes from Tejeguate, a since-vanished hamlet in the lower part of Tigaday and Merese, in the Valle de El Golfo. From its earliest days it gathered material directly from the island’s elders, and in 1977 it revived El Golfo’s participation — the so-called “raya de El Golfo” — in the Bajada de la Virgen de los Reyes procession. The group has also been central to preserving the Carneros de Tigaday, declared a Canarian Cultural Heritage Asset in 2018.
