Exhibition: "Sonidos de la Frontera: Music across Borders and Time"

On October 1, the CSRC Library in collaboration with the UCLA Music Library will open the exhibition Sonidos de la Frontera: Music across Borders and Time. The exhibition highlights the Strachwitz Frontera Collection, the world’s largest repository of commercially produced Mexican and Mexican American musical recordings, which is made available to the public through the University of California’s Digital Library Program. Comprising more than 125,000 recordings, the collection spans almost the entire twentieth century. The exhibition provides a gateway to the collection by using a tiny fraction of the music in combination with material from more than a dozen of the CSRC’s archival collections to discuss significant moments in Mexican and Mexican American music history. Curated chiefly by CSRC archives specialist Doug Johnson, in collaboration with CSRC librarian Xaviera Flores and music inquiry and research librarian Matthew Vest, the exhibition includes photographs, posters, clippings, pamphlets, flyers, songbooks, and audio recordings in a variety of formats. CSRC collections featured are the Humberto Cané Papers, the Pedro J. Gonzalez Papers, and the Anthony Beltramo Collection, among others. Yuri Shimoda developed the digital exhibit and design, Nick Carlozzi contributed to the exhibit case installation and digital editing, and Doug Daniels managed the exhibit materials printing. The exhibit is installed just outside of the Music Library in the atrium of the Schoenberg Music Building and the listening station is found in the entry to the UCLA Music Library. The UCLA Music Library is open seven days a week during regular session. For hours, click here. The award-winning research guide to the collection, The Arhoolie Foundation's Strachwitz Frontera Collection of Mexican and Mexican American Recordings, was published by CSRC Press.

Image: “Con Carino, Lydia Mendoza” by Ester Hernández.  Self-Help Graphics and Art Research Collection, UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center.