For our huge 2023 summer finale, Grand Performances and Discos Rolas present the acclaimed cumbia sonidera band Grupo Kual?
Born from cumbia sonidera royalty and hailing from Mexico City, Grupo Kual? were one of the first bands to infuse Colombian cumbia with local influences, as well as from further afield, to create this unique Mexican style we now know as sonidera. You're in for a festive evening under the stars.
Set times:
6:00pm – Discos Rolas
6:50pm – Very Be Careful
7:45pm – hellotones
8:30pm – Grupo Kual?
For Location, Parking & FAQ, click here.
Discos Rolas presents Mexico City’s Grupo Kual? celebrating more than twenty years pioneering cumbia sonidera and infusing it with regional Mexican and tropical Caribbean sounds. Proudly from the humble barrio of San Juan de Aragón, Grupo Kual? is one of the most beloved cumbia groups in the US and Mexico. Grupo Kual? continues the “Dinastía Pedraza” family legacy which begins with the legendary Super Grupo Colombia in the 1970s. Although cumbia originated in Colombia, Super Grupo Colombia reinterpreted the genre for Mexico City in the pitched-down style developed by sonideros (soundsystem DJs).
Additional performances will include special secret guests representing the sounds of the far-flung cumbia universe from Colombia to Puebla to Los Angeles and DJs Ganas and Xandão.
Founded in 2002, Grupo Kual? is a beloved band from Mexico City’s San Juan de Aragón whose “música de barrios” sound brings together folkloric and popular dance music styles like cumbia, rumba, and ranchera from Colombia, Cuba, Peru, and Mexico. They perform across Mexico, the United States and Latin America from the Los Angeles Sports Arena to the Plaza de Toros Mexico, to Mexico City’s Zócalo, Teatro Metropolitan, and for the immigrants rights protest on May 1st, 2006 in San Jose, CA. They have scored chart success with the singles "Rumba Kimbumba," "Las Mujeres No Se Akaban," "Rumba Cha Cha Cha," "Soy Maraquero," "La Chicharrita del Kafé," and "El Pájaro Zinzontle." Their albums have sold in the millions. Grupo Kual? proudly continues the Dinastía Pedraza legacy established by the group leader, Angel Pedraza’s uncles and father with Super Grupo Colombia in the 1970s.
Discos Rolas is an independent record label and creative ethnographic collaboration founded by multidisciplinary artist Gary Garay (Ganas) and anthropologist Alexandra Lippman (Xandão) in 2018. We follow musical and sonic connections within Latin America through album releases, screenings, dance parties, artist talks, and long-term collaborations with artists, designers, photographers, and musicians. We release music on vinyl and cassette with artists including Turbo Sonidero, Grupo Kual?, Grupo Soñador, Grupo Jejeje, Sonido Dueñez, and others. We also work with visual artists and designers including Roberto Rodriguez, Jaime Ruelas, and Local Offices. In 2020, we released the short documentary “Grupo Kual? Música de Barrio” on the Pedraza family’s multi-generational legacy as pioneers and innovators in cumbia in Mexico City. Our work has been featured in the New Yorker, FADER, Vogue Mexico, and elsewhere.
Adventure has never been a task for Very Be Careful. A Caribbean soul and a California heart have sustained two decades of ceaseless romp-downs and raucous times for L.A.’s vallenato veteranos, inciting 10s of 1000s of earthlings, and even some ETs, to boogie to the Colombian coastal beat. From the debaucherous streets of: Austin’s SXSW, Germany’s World Cup Tour ’06, L.A.'s Sunset Junction Street Fair; to the cultural pinnacles of: Chicago’s Summer Dance Series, New York’s Central Park Summerstage, L.A.s’ Grand Performances & Levitt Pavilion, London’s Hammersmith Apollo; colossal concerts: L.A. Sports Arena Cumbia Fest, Glastonbury Music Festival & Bestival UK, Fuji Rock Festival & Asagiri Jam Japan; clubs and hubs: N.Y.’s SOBs, L.A.’s HOBs, backyard BBQs, Very Be Careful has tamed the beasts within or unleashed the ones without, helping to popularize the beauty of the 1950s-1970s sound of Colombian vallenato and cumbia.
hellotones is a Bronx-born and bred DJ, championing the Latin-American dance genre of Cumbia under his title “El Hijo de PueblaYork.” Honoring the legacy of his familial Poblano roots as well as his NYC upbringing, hellotones flys the PueblaYork flag and the bandera Kumbiambera proudly with his signature style of mixing Cumbia! Through his two party series’ “Por Las Sombras” and “Kumbiatazo,” hellotones broke his sound into the scene; now invited to bring his “Kumbias mezcladas como nunca antes” everywhere from electronic clubs to bailes sonideros! Beyond just Cumbia, hellotones’ taste-making is solidified in the New York City underground as a part of Like That Records; and as one of two minds, alongside Marvelito, behind Brooklyn’s most one-of-a-kind club space: Dominican restaurant-turned-club on weekends: Mi Sabor Cafe. In 2023 hellotones followed up his 2021 Boiler Room appearances with a proper Cumbia mix featured on Boiler Room’s SYSTEM Mix series, and brought Cumbia to the historic Webster Hall to open up for Chicano music icon Cuco in March.
This event is supported in part by the LA County Board of Supervisors the Department of Arts and Culture, LA County Supervisor Hilda L. Solis (First District), CHIRLA, and AARP.
