Sones de Mexico Ensemble brings ancestral traditions to city parks

Families filled Hale Park on Friday night, dancing with their kids on stage, singing in Spanish and Nahuatl, and discovering the Mexican regional traditions their grandparents brought north. Sones de Mexico Ensemble’s Fiesta Mexicana wasn’t a concert you watched from your seat — it was one you joined.

The ensemble brought 30 to 40 traditional Mexican instruments to the interactive concert. About 100 people attended the Night Out in the Parks event at Hale Park on May 29.

Juan Dies, co-founder and director of Sones de Mexico Ensemble, played his grinder organ before the performance started. He walked the field around lawn chairs, picnic blankets, and strollers to greet families in attendance and encourage kids to make paper masks at the craft station. Dies explained that the grinder organ is an instrument that the Germans brought to Mexico at the end of the 19th century and that is still popular on the streets of Mexico City. 

Dies immigrated to the United States from San Luis Potosí, Mexico, in 1982. He went to Indiana to study music theory, jazz, blues, and reggae, but in 1990 returned to Mexican music. Since then, he has played the music of his ancestors exclusively. 

He founded Sones de Mexico Ensemble in 1994 after moving to Chicago. Sones de Mexico Ensemble is a six-piece band of Mexican immigrants and first and second-generation Mexican Americans. At Fiesta Mexicana, they performed for families who shared their heritage.  

“We saw a need in our community for children, mostly descendants of children of Mexican immigrants, to have an opportunity to get to know our music traditions, not just what they get from the radio or commercial sources. To also see the deep tradition that’s been passed on for generations, and Mexican Sones is that music,” Dies said.

For neighborhoods like Clearing and Garfield Ridge, where much of the community is composed of first and second-generation Mexican Americans, it is important for their children to engage with their culture and to find pride in their bi-cultural identities. 

Night Out in the Parks

Sones de Mexico Ensemble is relatively new to the Night Out in the Parks lineup.

Night Out in the Parks partners with more than 100 musicians and organizations to provide Chicagoans with culturally rich and diverse performances, according to the Chicago Park District. Performances can include theater, music, movies, dance, and nature programs across city parks. 

Artists propose programs and can request preferred neighborhoods; the program prioritizes areas with less arts funding.

“We simply told the park district to put us where it is needed the most,” Dies said. “Especially in neighborhoods that don’t get a lot of programming.”

The ensemble’s track record helped. After a solo application last year yielded three test shows, they secured six parks this year. Dies attributes their success partly to being self-contained.

“We bring all the equipment we need — instruments, sound system, even a power generator if necessary. We can also bring tables and chairs and an activity table where kids can make crafts before the show,” he said.

Sones de Mexico Ensemble will be performing the next five Fiesta Mexicana concerts at Bogan Park on June 12, Harrison Park on July 24, Throop Park on Aug. 15, Winnemac Park on Sept. 3, and Pasteur Park on Oct. 16. 

Keeping traditional music alive for the kids

Dies and his band believe it’s also their duty to keep Mexican tradition and music alive for the children growing up in the United States. 

Five students from the Sones de Mexico Ensemble’s music school were in attendance at Fiesta Mexicana with their families.  

During the performance, Dies prompted the audience to call out Spanish and Nahuatl words. Nahuatl is a Mesoamerican language with over a million native speakers in Central Mexico, parts of El Salvador,  and the United States, according to Indiana University’s Center for Language Technology. 

Dies framed the performance as a journey backward in time.

“We’re going to take you back in time when the residents of Mexico had not met people from other continents,” he told the crowd.   

Early in the concert, the band invoked the spirits of the earth, wind, fire, water, and sand upon the stage to give them a good performance. Then, Dies prompted everyone in the audience to call the spirits in Spanish: tierra, viento, fuego, agua, and arena. 

Dies showed various instruments to the audience and explained their names and origins. For example, the drummer Eric played a walnut drum with rubber mallets made from an indigenous plant in the Yucatan Peninsula. 

Lorena, a first-generation Mexican-American was dressed in a traditional indigenous outfit with a pheasant-feathered crown mounted on a golden Aztec sun. She held a shaker filled with seeds in one hand, and a conch shell in the other hand, blowing it throughout the dance. 

Other performances included Sones de Mexico Ensemble singing Danza de Viejitos (the Dance of the Old Men or People), which invites everyone to join, especially the little ones wearing the masks created before the concert. Kids excitedly rushed to join the center stage to form a procession with the 100-year-old Doña Saria (played by Lorena).

Throughout the performance, children joined the band on stage, while families danced from their seats and clapped to the beat of the traditional music. Dies asked if anyone was from the Huasteca region (states like Veracruz, Tamaulipas, Hidalgo, and San Luis Potosí); hands shot up. 

Anna, a mother whose school-age daughter participated in the Danza de Viejitos, lives nearby and came out with her friends and their daughters. The mothers set up a picnic blanket for the girls, as they stood behind the blanket, catching up as the performance unfolded. 

Anna’s daughter showed her mask before the performance. For her, the mask-making and participating in the concert was a fun experience she had with her family and friends.