Mariachi Mestizo XXV Anniversario
The birthplace of the United Farm Workers, and his students are not only first-rate musicians, but high achievers in other ways, entering colleges like Harvard, UCLA, and Wellesley. But Mariachi Mestizo is first an extraordinary group because they make great music.
Their newest release, Mariachi Mestizo XXV Anniversario, may have been recorded by 7th to 12th graders, but it comes across as entirely adult, a celebration of an amazing and ongoing story.
A composer, arranger, music director, and viheuela player for the legendary Mariachi Los Camperos, Juan settled down when his family began to grow. He gave lessons, many of them to children from Richgrove (just outside Delano), where the school principal had a mariachi group. Juan and family moved to Richgrove, and after teaching at almost all the local schools, he established the Mariachi Studio in 2010.
Not terribly long after that, Jim Pugh of Little Village Records, a nonprofit devoted to promoting cultural diversity and harmony, discovered them. The first MM album was Te Doy de Libertad.
Juan’s eldest daughter, Jazmin, was a violin virtuoso working initially in the classical realm. When she was eight, Juan established MM, and she became a mainstay. At the age of 15 she and her father recorded a selection of Huasteca folk songs, Trio Huasteco del Mars, just for fun.
As part of the celebration of 25 years of Mariachi Mestizo, it will be available, digitally only, at Apple Music https://tinyurl.com/57bueh5h and Spotify https://tinyurl.com/nda99z2d
Huasteca music is generally played by a trio; its fiddle-driven and bluegrass adjacent. And it swings. Jazmin has risen in the music world and is currently chief of staff at the Julliard School in New York.
Her younger sisters Xochitl and Anai succeeded her in MM. Xochitl (“So-Chee”), a poet, contributed a spoken word album, Descansos on Little Village https://tinyurl.com/4vbp5pwa , also Spotify https://tinyurl.com/bdmh5vxa and also Apple https://tinyurl.com/m2dfbezn
Anaì Adina, the youngest daughter, contributed her own leading vocal mariachi album, Espérame en el Cielo. Find it here https://tinyurl.com/k7pv6sax .
The younger sisters, Xochitl and Anai, were part of the 20th anniversary album, which included music from their performance at Carnegie Hall. Mestizo XXth Anniversario. https://littlevillagefoundation.com/mestizo/ They have also gone on to serious educational careers.
The learning continues. Jazmin said that her father is “A teacher who believes in the potential of each student to achieve excellence. So he holds his students to high standards.” And he teaches more than music. “We try to instill in them what’s called soft skills – punctuality, responsibility, teamwork and all that. And those are skills that are transferred to any other areas of their life. They can use those skills to envision what they want to do and get together what they need to do it. Some have gone on to play mariachi at UCLA, at Stanford, San Diego. We just had a member get into Wellesley.”
Mariachi Mestizo XXV Anniversario is what we want for the future; expert music made by enthusiastic young people. It’s crisp, danceable, and heartfelt. That’s a great combination.