Northern and central Mexican mariachi music will be brought to you by the combined forces of Lubbock’s young mariachi musicians in a free concert at 8:00 P.M. on Friday, April 28, 2017 at the Hemmle Recital Hall of the TTU School of Music.
The student performers will be representing two different ensembles. TTU’s Mariachi Los Matadores is directed by Assistant Professor of Musicology Dr. Lauryn Salazar, who is a highly accomplished Mexican harpist and a performer in the award-winning Mariachi Divas de Cindy Shea. Mariachi Los Matadores features students aged from high school to doctoral students, and their degree concentrations span the breadth of the campus’s many schools and colleges. Students representing Lubbock High School and South Plains College are also members of Mariachi Los Matadores. Mariachi del Oro features students from Lubbock High School, under the direction of TTU graduate student Gregory Cavazos, who is also a member of Mariachi Los Matadores.
The first part of the concert will feature Mariachi del Oro, performing three songs with their ensemble of 14 students. The latter part of the concert will feature Mariachi Los Matadores, whose selections will include popular mariachi favorites like “El Herradero,” “Ella,” and “Las Mañanitas.”
As an academic mariachi program and a part of TTU’s Vernacular Music Center, Mariachi Los Matadores focuses on a wide variety of styles within the mariachi tradition. Established in 2010, the group is heavily influenced by the music and work of the oldest and most influential mariachi group in the United States, the GRAMMY Award-winning Mariachi Los Camperos de Nati Cano. Through a close association with Jesus “Chuy” Guzman, the director of Mariachi Los Camperos, students in the program learn the traditional repertoire along with more contemporary practice as Mr. Guzman coaches the group twice a year. The students in the group represent a wide variety of majors and demonstrate the importance of a STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics) approach to learning. It is the aim that this program represents a true pipeline in which mariachi music is a pathway to higher education through recruitment and retention.
For more information about this event, please contact Dr. Lauryn Salazar, Assistant Professor of Musicology and director of Mariachi Los Matadores, at (806) 834-3296 or at l.salazar@ttu.edu.
