Manuel Peña traces the evolution of the orquesta [orchestra] in the Southwest from its beginnings in the nineteenth century through its pinnacle in the 1970s and its decline since the 1980s.  Beto Villa, Isidro Lopez, Little Joe y la Familia, and many others are given their recognition.  Rich in ethnographic detail and boldly analytical, this book is the first in-depth study of this important but academically neglected musical ensemble.

            “[Peña’s] theoretical interpretation is always provocative, elegantly expressed, and insightful. . .”

                   —John Koegel, American Music

            “Peña writes from a unique perspective: he is not only a scholar of this music, and a Mexican American, but he is also a performer with a wide range of experience in the orquesta tradition.”

            —Kevin Korsyn, Decentering Music