Dressed in dark blue mariachi outfits, moving their batons up and down and strumming guitars in unison, Bonita Vista High’s Mariachi Los Barones de BVH performed for the first time at BonitaFest on Saturday, Sep. 21 at BVH. Their performance brought laughs and cheers from the audience with songs like “El moño colorado” and “Cielito lindo,” featuring solos from guitarist and senior Carlos Chavez and violinist and junior Alicia Verdugo.

“We decided to present for the first time to the community that we have a sound program at Bonita Vista [High and that] the students there are practicing hard. It was a good time to present to the community and also to get support from the community,” BVH Mariachi Instructor Guadalupe Gonzalez said.

As the four-song program progressed, Gonzalez felt the community did provide the support that he wanted. Performing for the Bonita community was also what made this performance stand out amongst the usual events Mariachi Los Barones de BVH participate in.

“I feel like [performing at Bonitafest is] more special because we’re doing it at the school, we have our community supporting us rather than when we go to a different school and it is just other parents and other students,” Harmonia Section Leader, viola player and sophomore Jaidy Leyva said.

On the other hand, students at BonitaFest called out encouraging cheers aimed at specific performers, something only possible with an audience of familiar people. This positivity from the crowd was only one factor that made Chavez pleased with the overall performance.

“I feel like we did pretty well even though there was a bit of wind that was blowing into the mikes and things like that. Besides that, it was pretty good. I feel like [the community showed support],” Chavez said. “We had a good reaction from the crowd during the concert; it was pretty nice.”

As the first performance of the school year, Gonzalez stated his group was “practicing hard,” with many being new to Mariachi Los Barones de BVH. They will have more time to prepare for their next performance which is in December, but Gonzalez and Leyva both plan on participating in BonitaFest again in 2020.

“We will have a lot more [at Bonitafest next year], because this year, we had less than two months to prepare but I have new members in this group starting from zero. They did a very good job, [they were] amazing,” Gonzalez said.