Until recently, very few people in the U.S. knew that a great deal of baroque music was composed in Mexico during the colonial era. It's yet another fact about Mexican culture that somehow never crossed the Rio Grande and became common knowledge to us here in the North.
Composers living in New Spain wrote music for New World cathedrals, churches and convents that emulated the music of the great European masters, but had its own uniquely Mexican style.
You've heard of Antonio Vivaldi. But what about Juan de Lienas? And you're probably familiar with the vocal music of Claudio Monteverdi. But how about the vocal works of Fabian Ximeno, organist of the Puebla Cathedral?
Some early music groups in the U.S. have begun to explore the vast Mexican baroque repertoire written in the 17th and 18th centuries, including the Newberry Consort in Chicago.
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