August 31, 2022 504 PM
MARFA — Ballroom Marfa invites you to join us for a free premiere of MXTX: A Cross-Border Exchange on Sunday, September 4, at the Marfa Visitor Center Pavilion. The evening will start off at 7 p.m. with DJ sets from Beats of Burden and DJ Calle of Las Reinas de la Noche. The live, 10-piece ensemble will take stage at 8 p.m. There will be free drinks and a food pop-up from Cloudy’s.
MXTX is a live performance, album and open-source audio sample library crossing physical and social boundaries through collaborative exchange. The project involves more than 40 DJ-producers and composers from both sides of the Rio Grande. A collective of the contributing musicians will travel to Marfa to take the stage for the West Texas premiere of the project as part of the 35th Annual Marfa Lights Festival.
The multifaceted and dynamic project is a collaboration of numerous Texas and Mexico-based artists including:
- Golden Hornet, an Austin-based nonprofit led by Graham Reynolds
- Orión García, founder of the Latinx DJ/producer/artist collective Peligrosa
- Coka Treviño, art entrepreneur from Monterrey, Mexico and founder of The Projecto
- Felipe Pérez Santiago, highly-acclaimed Mexico City composer, sound artist and current artist in residence at California’s SETI Institute
- Ramón Amezcua “Bostich” of the groundbreaking Nortec Collective, based in Tijuana
- Rubén Albarrán, renowned vocalist and activist from Mexico City, lead singer of the legendary Cafe Tacvba
- Gabriela Ortiz, Latin Grammy nominated composer and recipient of Mexico’s National Prize for Arts & Literature
MXTX began in 2019 with the creation of a sample library commissioned from 20 composers and 20 DJ-producers based in Mexico and Texas. These 40 artists created a palette of sound designed to represent each of their perspectives. The DJ-producers provided beats, drops, and more, while the composers created melodic, rhythmic and chordal fragments to be recorded as segments and loops. All of these sounds formed the initial foundation of the MXTX library. A core group of six composers and six DJ-producers, commissioned with balanced geographical representation, used this library to create 12 songs. Created for a mixed chamber ensemble and a DJ, the twelve works will be presented live, with premieres in Marfa, Mexico City and Austin.
The MXTX: A Cross-Border Exchange album was released through Six Degrees Records in 2022 and consists of 13 songs that demonstrate the immense beauty and power of music to overcome divides. Presented as part of the Marfa Lights Festival, the show at the Marfa Visitor Center will be the second live performance of MXTX. Attendance is free and open to the public.
