El Paso Opener Celebrates Mexico
El Paso is a borderlands town. On one side of the Rio Grande sits the largest city in West Texas, and on the other side is Ciudad Juarez, a bustling Mexican city with over 1.5 million residents and the state of Chihuahua’s largest metropolis. With this unique geography and cultural mix, it’s no surprise that the El Paso Symphony decided to program a special season-opener tipping its hat to its neighbors and its own heritage. Scheduled for the weekend directly coinciding Mexican Independence Day on September 16, the September 18 & 19 two-concert series “Mágico: The Magic of Mexico” will be conducted by EPSO Music Director Bohuslav Rattay.
For the occasion, the EPSO has programmed our two-part piece Mágico, celebrating the beautiful diversity, warmth and cultural richness of Mexico—both in music and images. Nicholas Bardonnay spent a year photographing across 18 states in Mexico to create the imagery that went into the choreographed accompaniments. In El Paso the visuals will be set to Moncayo’s Tierra de Temporal and Márquez’s Danzón No. 2. Through the music, Mágico portrays a modern Mexico few outsiders get to see: 18,000-foot snowcapped volcanoes, 16th century colonial towns, and colorful festivals like Día de los Muertos, Semana Santa, and Carnaval.
Mágico originally premiered in another Texas city, Dallas, in 2018 during a DSO concert that was co-hosted by the Mexican Consulate—and it has been one of our most popular pieces since. A short list of diverse communities that have presented Mágico have been: Reno, NV; South Bend, IN; Tucson, AZ; York, PA; Fort Lauderdale, FL; Yakima, WA; Columbia, SC; and Wichita, KS. No matter where they’ve been presented, the visuals in Mágico often have a two-fold meaning. For some, they’re a connection to places where they grew up or their families have deep roots. For those with more limited experience of Mexico, the imagery instills a greater appreciation for Mexico’s natural beauty, kind people, and rich cultural heritage that Mexican citizens cherish deeply. In El Paso, there will surely be both connection points, and we expect there to be plenty of excited questions at both the pre-concert talk and after each concert.
Also on the concert is a selection from Mozart’s Seraglio Overture, as well as Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade.
¡Nos vemos pronto, El Paso!
