La Peña Cultural Center

Welcome to La Peña! Promoting social justice & intercultural understanding through the arts since 1975.

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La Peña at 40: Berkeley cultural institution reinvents itself

We are so honored to recently be featured in the SF Chronicle, along with a photo of the week, seen below.

La Peña has a rich history – and we are so happy to have shared part of it with the SF Chronicle.  The article features our executive director, Aaron Lorenz, and Paul Chin, current president of the board.

Follow their conversation, trip down memory lane, and hopes for the future!

“It’s a full-circle moment, only not quite a perfect circle. La Peña marked its 40th anniversary this year, and a lot has changed — politically, financially, socially — in those four decades. Now it’s up to him and a small staff of employees and volunteers to chart a course forward for one of Berkeley’s most storied cultural institutions, one that pays homage to the past while recognizing the realities of today.”

Find the full article below.

View the photo of the week here.

A special thanks goes out to Ryan Kost, who conducted the interview, and Scott Strazzante who took the photos.

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We won best venue for Social Justice Performances on the East Bay Express!

What’s going on at La Peña?

We were recently awarded Best of the East Bay – Best Venue for Social Justice Performances in the East Bay Express.  Shout out to Radix, Smokes Poutinerie, The New Parish, and The Rock Steady, who also won awards!

We wouldn’t have gotten this far without our community! Thank you!

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Our award, alongside of the Best of the East Bay issue

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chile at La Peña

During the month of September, La Peña remembers the barbarism of the 1973 military coup in Chile, mourns the deaths, disappearances, and torture of friends and compañeros, reflects on the invasive role of the United States foreign policy in Latin America, and celebrates the militants, solidarity activists, and cultural workers who responded to injustice with their passions and sometimes their lives. On Friday evening, September 11, the Peña community will gather at 6:30 for a shared potluck dinner, ceremonies, music, and compañerismo.

On Saturday morning, September 12, from 10-12am, La Peña will host short presentations and a participatory dialogue: Forty-two years after the coup: Where do we stand?  Topics will include the effects of neoliberalism, current governments and militarism, the cooptation of left politicians, the role of cultural resistance, indigenous cosmovisions and sumac kawsay, ecosocialism, and other radical imaginations of the way forward in old and new forms of community organizing.

On Saturday, September 19th, 12-2pm,  we will screen the documentary “Special Circumstances” on U.S. foreign policy in the 1970’s, the effects of the coup, and the current legacies of Pinochet. Director Hector Salgado will lead a conversation afterward. On Saturday, September 26th,  12-2pm, La Peña will screen the documentary “Archeology of Memory” on exile and the role of public memory and memorial. Director Marilyn Mulford will lead a conversation afterward. Donations requested if affordable to help La Peña carry on.

Pictures from the 4th Annual San Francisco Son Jarocho Festival Workshops

Workshops took place at La Peña from August 11-13.  We offer weekly Son Jarocho workshops in zapateado, jarana, and versada on Wednesdays.  Click here for class schedule.

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Factories in the Fields – August 12

Did you know that workers just hours south of the Bay Area are getting paid starvation wages? Did you hear that these workers waged a historic strike demanding dignity earlier this year? They talked about these issues and more.

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Japanese Obon

Obon is a custom that honors the spirits of one’s ancestors.  It is believed as a day that the spirits of ancestors are supposed to revisit the household altars in Japan. People often return to ancestral family places and visit and clean their ancestors’ graves.

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Taiko Ensemble, “Drum Revolution,” led by Kensuke Sumii started off Japanese Obon by calling to our ancestors’ spirits in the afterlife.
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Obon Dancing Experience: Japanese Day of the Dead took place at La Peña on August 15.

 

Discover the Guitar

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Discover the Guitar
Tuesdays 6-7pm | $20 per class or $160 for 9 classes
Instructor: Khalil Abdullah | Location: Back Classroom

Email: brotherkhalilmusic@gmail.com
Phone: 510-338-7974

This group class is designed for beginner to intermediate musicians seeking to find their individual voice on the guitar. Discover The Guitar offers students a solid musical foundation while exploring songs and styles from around the world.

Brother Khalil Abdullah has been performing in the Bay Area for over a decade with his Jazz Quintet the Brother Khalil Jazz Quintet. A master guitarist, Khalil creates individual plans with
students to bring them to their full potential.

Required Materials: Guitar, Tuner and Notebook

Discover the Guitar

khalil

Discover the Guitar
Tuesdays 6-7pm | Contact instructor for pricing
Instructor: Khalil Abdullah | Location: Community Room

Email: brotherkhalilmusic@gmail.com
Phone: 510-338-7974

This group class is designed for beginner to intermediate musicians seeking to find their individual voice on the guitar. Discover The Guitar offers students a solid musical foundation while exploring songs and styles from around the world.
Required Materials: Guitar, Tuner and Notebook

Latin American Songbook

“THE LATIN AMERICAN SONGBOOK”

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Latin American Songbook
Mondays 6:30pm | $350 for 12 week session
Instructor: Maria Marquez| Location: Theater Space
Next session begins September 14.

Welcome! To the world of Latin American music and culture.

This is a unique class in the Bay Area taught by Latin Jazz singer, composer, arranger, producer and educator Maria Marquez.

The class offers a great variety of songs from the different countries in South and Central America including Brazil, with all of its colors, different musical styles, rhythms and beautiful melodies.

The vocalists and musicians explore and perform in a recital a group of songs with interesting arrangements carefully selected by the teacher. The repertoire consists of a great variety of styles: boleros, sambas, Afro Peruvian, Argentinian zambas, chacareras, cha-cha-chas, salsa, waltzes, Cuban son, milongas, folk songs and more.

Vocalists interpret songs in Spanish and or Portuguese individually and as a group. Some knowledge of Spanish is helpful.

This ensemble class includes student musicians. We are always in need of musicians interested in taking this fascinating class.

Especially piano, guitar, bass, drums, percussion and horn players.

FALL OF 2015 CLASS – SPECIAL OFFER!

I am proud to present Tregar Otton as co- teacher for the fall class. Tregar is a musical treasure in the Bay  Area. Arranger, producer, composer, violinist and band leader of the ORQUESTA LA MODERNA TRADICION. I am sure many of you know this group, they have been together for over a decade thanks to the organizational skills and great knowledge and talent of this violinist from Corpus Christi, Texas.

The emphasis for this class, but not exclusively is – HAVE FUN WITH THE CLAVE AND AFRO CUBAN MUSIC – singers and musicians will be able to dig deeper into the roots of Afro Cuban music as well as get a taste of AFRICAN INFLUENCES in the music of other Latin American countries.

BIO:

Tregar Otton (Violin, Composer, Arranger, educator), born in the Marshall Islands and raised in Corpus Christi, Texas and California.

Otton began his classical music training at the age of four. He has been a part of the Bay Area Latin music scene since 1990, working primarily with Orq. La Moderna Tradición (Cuban), Los Cenzontles (Mexican), and the Potaje (Flamenco). While living in New York in the 90’s, he played as a regular member of Virgilo Martí y sus Majaderos with Cuban legends Chocolate Armenteros and Patato Valdez. He also worked closely with Juan Carlos Formell, and with the celebrated New York Charanga groups Orquesta Broadway and La Típica Novel.

Tregar founded Orquesta La Moderna Tradición with Roberto Borrell in 1995. Orq. la Moderna Tradición is a Cuban Charanga orquesta dedicated to playing popular Cuban music that incorporates violins and woodwinds (Danzón, Cha Cha Cha, Son Montuno, and more modern genres). The group has toured extensively in the United States and internationally.

Tregar has been on the faculty of the Community Music Center of San Francisco for over 15 years, teaching both individual and group classes to youth and adults. He teaches a performance oriented class in Cuban Charanga at the Center.

www.danzon.com

 

FALL COURSE

Every Monday
6:30 pm to 8 pm
Starting September 14th 2015
At LA PENA CULTURAL CENTER
3105 Shattuck Ave. Berkeley
Duration: 12 weeks at the end of which there will be a recital.

Registration open NOW!
New students should contact me at: orinokia@mariamarquez.com
$ 350.00
www.mariamarquez.com

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