Songwriter Sanctuary San Diego Celebrates Hispanic / Latine Heritage Month

Hi friends! We're excited to bring you an awesome lineup for Hispanic / Latine Heritage Month celebration, curated in partnership with alumni artist, board member, and guest emcee Julia Sage.

We can't wait to host Good Gravy Street Blues, Rey Wolf, and Nathan & Jessie in the Sanctuary on Friday, September 25. (Unfortunately Stanton Street Duo had another commitment, but we hope to re-schedule them for a future date!). 

According to the Hispanic Heritage Month website, the U.S. holiday (observed annually from September 15 through October 15) celebrates the histories, cultures and contributions of American citizens whose ancestors came from Spain, Mexico, the Caribbean and Central and South America. Other entities include Brazil, a Portuguese-speaking country in South America. The terms themselves can be complicated, in part because umbrella terms are often shaped by histories of colonization, marginalization, racism, and the ways those histories have defined who who is treated as an outsider.  As such, not everyone identifies with these broad categories. Some people prefer to identify by their specific nationality, cultural community, or another term entirely. This is all worth our acknowledgment as we celebrate and strive to amplify the many different histories, cultures, contributors, and musical traditions that exist within and beyond these umbrellas.

For further reflection, here's an article from The Chicago History Museum  titled "Why We're Saying Latine." And below is a 3-part series from the @littlejusticeleaders that seeks to offer additional terminology clarification.

Musically speaking, there’s no way we can feature every genre that exists under the “Hispanic / Latine” umbrella in one three-act lineup. Instead, we did our best to curate this concert using the same strategy as all our shows, which is highlighting top-tier  professional local songwriters and performers who have a cohesive yet expansive range of styles and sounds that align with our intimate and largely acoustic in-the-round format. From traditional blues to jazz improv to old-school crooning, this show has a distinctly vintage feel that we think you're going to love!

If there is an artist or style of music you'd love to see featured at Songwriter Sanctuary, we want to know! Artists can review or share our Booking Info page (please be patient - there are only so many performance slots in one season, and San Diego is crawling with amazing songwriters who have made our wait list quite long). Audience members can add their artist recs using our Attendee Survey.

In the meantime, we've listed a few additional resources and music below for your education, celebration, and enjoyment! 

National & Local Resources

• National Hispanic Heritage Month
• National Museum of the American Latino
• Salsa Videa: Salsa & Bachata Dancing in San Diego
• San Diego Center for World Music
• San Diego Latino Film Festival
• San Diego Latin Jazz Collective
• San Diego Museum of Art's Latin American Arts Council
• Smithsonian: Música Latina​

Musical Styles

We've put together a small Hispanic / Latine Heritage Month playlist that highlights a mix of traditional and modern songs showcasing some of these styles, as well as a few videos from this month's featured Songwriter Sanctuary performers and host. What would you add to this list? Send me a YouTube link (captions preferred)!

Below is a small glossary of some musical genres one might find in "Hispanic / Latine" categories that link out to short explainer videos about them.

• Bachata: A Dominican genre with roots in guitar music and romantic song, often associated with heartbreak and longing.
• Bolero: Romantic, often melancholy, and closely associated with intimate singing and guitar. The Cuban roots of the genre stretch into many different Latin American traditions.
• Bomba: Before salsa and reggaetón, there was bomba. The name not only refers to the ancient Afro-Peurto Rican music genre, but it is also the name of the instruments and the dance that accompanies the music. Learn more about Bomba.
• Bossa Nova: A Brazilian style that blends samba with jazz, known for its understated rhythm, gentle guitar, and conversational vocals.
• Corridos: Narrative songs that tell stories about people, places, history, and sometimes current events. They can be traditional, contemporary, or fused with other styles.
• Cueca: A lively South American musical style native to Chile, Bolivia, and Argentina that features a driving 6/8 or 3/4 sesquialtera meter, upbeat guitar and accordion accompaniments, and highly poetic, rhythmic vocals designed to mirror a flirtatious courtship dance.
• Cumbia: Originating in Colombia, Cumbia has traveled widely and developed distinct sounds in many countries. 
• Flamenco: A Spanish tradition with strong Andalusian, Romani, and other influences, known for its expressive singing, guitar, rhythm, and dance.
• Latin Electronic / Dance Music: Contemporary electronic music that draws on regional rhythms, club culture, and global sounds.
• Latin Hip-Hop: A huge world of rap, spoken word, and beat-driven music that has developed across the Americas and the diaspora.
• Latin Jazz: Where jazz and Afro-Latin rhythms meet. It can be big-band, intimate, experimental, or dance-oriented.
• Latin Pop: A huge category that includes everything from singer-songwriter ballads to dance-pop and crossover hits.
• Latin Rock / Rock en Español: Rock music made by artists across Latin America and the diaspora, with sounds ranging from folk-rock to punk, alternative, and psychedelic music.
• Mariachi: A Mexican tradition built around strings, trumpets, and voices. Stylistically romantic, celebratory, and/or dramatic.
• Merengue: A Dominican dance tradition with a strong, driving rhythm and many different forms, from traditional styles to modern pop.
• Música Norteña:  Style from northern Mexico that blends traditional folk sounds with European polka rhythms, driven by the accordion and a twelve-string guitar known as the bajo sexto
• Nueva Canción / Protest Song: A broad Latin American singer-songwriter tradition that connects music with social storytelling.movements, politics, and everyday life.
• Ranchera: A Mexican song tradition often associated with big emotions, love, loss, and the voice of the singer.
• Reggaetón: A modern urban genre with roots in Caribbean and Latin American music, especially Panama and Puerto Rico, and strong connections to dancehall, hip-hop, and electronic music.
• Salsa: A broad, evolving dance music with deep Cuban and Puerto Rican roots and a major history in New York. It can be brassy, percussive, romantic, political, and everything in between.
• Samba: An Afro-Brazilian tradition that grew into one of Brazil’s most recognizable musical forms, with many regional and contemporary variations.
• Son Cubano: A foundational Cuban style built around rhythm, call-and-response, and the interplay of voices and instruments.
• Son Jarocho: A traditional Mexican style from Veracruz that brings together Spanish, African, and Indigenous influences, often with harp, jarana, and rhythmic guitar.
• Tango: A deeply expressive Argentine and Uruguayan tradition, with a long history of instrumental and vocal music.
• Tejano: A vibrant Tex-Mex genre that blends traditional Mexican folk sounds with polka, country, and pop.
• Vallenato: A Colombian style centered on accordion, caja, and guacharaca, with a strong tradition of 

Disclaimer: The linked videos and genre descriptions above are meant simply as an educational launch pad and not a comprehensive picture of these musical traditions. Each of these genres is rich and complex enough to fill an entire college course (or several), so please consider these an invitation to continue learning and exploring.