This week is a celebration of latin music
Hello friends!
I can't believe we're already charging forward into May. I still have to remind myself to date things 2023, not 2022.
Thanks to everyone who joined us for the Raro single celebrations last weekend. Being a part of this band and wider community is truly life giving.
If you missed out, or are in the mood for more fun, we've got a radio performance this Thursday, a concert on the University of Illinois Chicago campus Friday, and a special Latin music concert Saturday. All the details are below.
And if you haven't heard Raro's debut, you can hear it on Spotify, listen on AppleMusic, or check it out on any streaming platform of your choice (including YouTube). Just look up Sombra / Meditation.
Celebrating Cinco de Mayo with some latin music
While Cinco de Mayo is a holiday comemorating the Mexican victory over the French army in the Battle of Puebla in 1862, I think it's a great opportunity to celebrate the richness of Mexican and Mexican-American culture (which goes way deeper than tacos and tequila, even though we must be grateful for both those things as well). One of many ways to do that is to spend some time appreciating the wealth of Mexican and LatinX American music.
I've been extremely fortunate to get to play a lot of Latin music these past couple years. My partner (in life and music) Stephanie Alma opened my ears and hands to the worlds of Cumbia and Salsa. And later meeting Marcos Rios and Jose Carasquillo playing with Piraguas y Piropos deepened my knowledge and enjoyment through Guarachas, boleros and other regional Puerto Rican styles. In mainstream U.S. culture Latin music gets put in the tiniest of boxes, but man there are so many rhythms and melodies that are criminally underrepresented.
If you're curious and want to hear some hyper local flavors of these some of these styles, this Saturday from 8pm-11pm I'll have the pleasure of accompanying both Stephanie and Piraguas y Piropos for 3 sets of music.
We'll be performing at Haz Cooperative Studios (AKA the Haz Room), which is located at 1776 S Halsted St. We'll be in the garden area if it's nice, or in the gallery if it's too wet. It's $10 to get in. I hope you can check it out.
Cinco with Raro
A lot of Raro's music comes directly from Stephanie Alma's experience as a disabled Mexican-American woman. I know I'm pretty biased, but I do believe this gives the songs a distinct and powerful shape.
This Friday, on the actual Cinco de Mayo, Raro will be performing a concert open to the public. It'll take place on the main quad of the UIC campus East (near morgan and Harrison). To hype up the celebration, the Rios Trio will be kicking it off with a short set followed by Raro playing through a lot of our upcoming album.
The UIC concert will run from 5pm-6:30pm and is totally free and open to all.
I hope some of you can make it, but if not we're also performing on the radio this Thursday 5/4. We'll go live at 10pm. The station is 88.3FM on the north side of Chicago, or at www.wzrdchicago.org anywhere in the world. Again that's 10pm CST.
In summary:
- Thursday 5/4 Raro radio performance on WZRD 88.3 Chicago (10pm)
- Friday 5/5 Raro and Rios Trio at UIC campus quad (5:00pm-6:30pm)
- Saturday 5/6 latin music concert at Haz Cooperative Studios (8:00pm-11:00pm)
Hope to catch you around,
Tommy