Grupo Xiuhtototl (Azure Bird) consists of multimedia artist and composer Tim Hazell and colleague, lecturer and Caracol de Fuego member Nestor Vargas.

Together, they combine experimental pre-Hispanic music with influences from other cultures using instruments from ancient Mesoamerica, not to simulate the music of the past, of which we have no written record, but to evoke an artistic expression that is appropriate to our time. 

Concerts by Tim Hazell and Nestor Vargas Rivas as Grupo Xiuhtototl present an integration of more than 30 different instruments, some dating back over 8,000 years, in the manner of a classical suite. Through the use of dynamics, intense energy and spirituality, these musicians lift and transport audiences into a world of freshness, sounds of natural forces, rhythms and scents of copal. They perform in the traditional dress of Aztec artists and teachers (tlatoani).

Well-known musician Antonio Lozoya joins them on contrabass. Lozoya studied at the Escuela Superior de Música in Mexico City. He is a uniquely talented and versatile musician who has played with many jazz greats and with San Miguel's tango orchestra during the International Tango Festivals of 2003 and 2005. He is the coordinator of The Cido de Conferencias Didacticas, a series of presentations outlining the history and appreciation of jazz, and he has been an integral part of the San Miguel International Jazz Festival for many years. 

Born in Lund, Sweden, Tim Hazell is an interdisciplinary artist in the areas of painting, music, theater, education, writing and research. He is a published author, poet and columnist. His paintings are in collections in Canada, Europe, Mexico, South America, and the United States. Hazell is a recording artist and record producer of ethno-fusion and pre-Hispanic music. His music and paintings are strongly influenced by an extensive exploration of ancient civilizations, including the native societies of the Americas, and by his study of Eastern art.

Néstor Vargas Rivas has been performing his unique ethnic and pre-Hispanic music at festivals, concert halls and ceremonies throughout the state of Guanajuato and abroad for more than a decade. He uses instruments from Mesoamerica's great civilizations to weave rich tapestries of ethnic sounds. The musician, writer, radio host and lecturer manufactures his own instruments and is involved as an educator in government-funded programs that reach out to the Mexican community. Through the music, dance and traditions of his Nahua heritage, Néstor Vargas is helping to revitalize pre-Hispanic culture and reintegrate it into the fabric of modern Mexico. This versatile and multifaceted performer feels compelled to use art and music as a way to change perspectives and attitudes by promoting Mexico's living archeology. 

Hazell's oud, sitar, dulcimer and full moon, a single string variant of the cello family; Lozoya's deep rhythms and warm bass stylings; and Vargas' complement of ancient microchromatic flutes, musical stones, rain serpent (chicahuaztli), log xylophone and drums (huehuetls) represent Mexico's pre-Hispanic and contemporary musical legacy. Orchestrations for the concert are creative collaborations between Grupo Xiuhtototl and Lozoya. 

This will be an important year for the group. This spring, their debut feature-length DVD will be released. Recorded in 2005 for Provicom Productions, San Antonio, in association with Warren Hardy, the DVD is part of the "Soul of Mexico" series. Xiuhtototl is scheduled to perform at the University of Texas Faculty of Music recital and master workshop program, and for a festival of indigenous music from the Amazon basin sponsored by Tamu in Quito, Ecuador. They will premiere their new chamber music work, which incorporates pre-Hispanic instruments and traditional components of a chamber music ensemble, in two concerts for the San Miguel el Grande Pro Musica at St. Paul's Church in January 2007. This unique addition to the contemporary classical genres of Mexico is a joint collaboration between Grupo Xiuhtototl, Lozoya and Guanajuato's Ehecalli. 

Tickets for this pre-Hispanic and ethno-fusion presentation will go on sale in the Teatro Santa Ana box office, beginning the week of April 3. For more information, call José Luis Mendoza at 152-7305 after 4pm.

Pre-Hispanic concert, Grupo Xiuhtototl and bassist Antonio Lozoya 
Friday, April 7, 7:30pm, Teatro Santa Ana, Reloj 50, 70 pesos

Pro Musica trio and duo in final concerts
By B. K. Lake

The final two concerts of the San Miguel El Grande Pro Musica series offer works ranging from Mozart's transcriptions of Johann Sebastian Bach and a serenade by Beethoven to a string trio piece by Manuel Ponce, Mexico's first recognized composer of classical music, to a ragtime composition by Scott Joplin. Also on the bill are pieces by composers not as well known but who have won critical acclaim, including Gideon Klein, who died in a Nazi concentration camp; Reinhold Gliere, of the Mannheim period; and two American composers who are still active, David Ott and William Ryden. 

Performing as the Musica Viva trio are Claudia Shiuh, viola; Susan Doering, violin; and Dieter Wulfhorst, violoncello. Doering and Wulfhorst perform as the Emerald Duo.

The Musica Viva trio, from San Jose, California, opens April 8 with Johann Sebastian Bach's "Adagio and Fugue" as adapted six years after Bach died by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Next comes Mozart's "String Trio Movement in G Major," followed by Ponce's 1943 work "String Trio." Also on the program is Beethoven's "Serenade in D Major, Op. 8."

On April 9, the Emerald Duo will open with "Duo in C Major, Op. 19, No. 1," by Carl Stamitz, a prolific composer of chamber music who is among the better-known composers active during the middle decades of the 18th century at the court of the Elector Palatine in Mannheim, Germany. 

Gideon Klein, a Czech Jewish composer, wrote "Duet" in 1941, the year he was deported by the Nazis to the Terezin concentration camp. He was sent later to camps in Auschwitz and Furstengrube, where he is believed to have died in January 1945.

David Ott, born in Michigan in 1947, was nominated for the 1988 Pulitzer Prize in music for his "Concerto for Two Cellos." The Emerald Duo will play his "Conversations," written in 1998.

Reinhold Gliere, a 20th-century composer born in Kiev, wrote "Eight Pieces, Op. 39" in 1909. Noted for his works incorporating elements of the folk music of Russia, Ukraine and surrounding Russian republics, he won international popularity in 1927 with his ballet, "The Red Poppy."

The Pro Musica program will conclude with two rags, the first titled "Rag" by William Ryden, born in 1939 and a life-long resident of Forest Hills, New York. He has written over 250 rags for piano and has composed numerous concertos and rhapsodies. The second will be "Peacherine Rag," which Scott Joplin composed after moving to St. Louis in 1901, a period in which he began achieving recognition as a serious composer as well as the master of the rag. 

Tickets are available at Galería San Miguel, next to the Presidencia; Casa de Papel, Mesones 57; at the Chamber Music Festival Office in Bellas Artes and at St. Paul's weekdays, 11am to 2pm. Tickets also are on sale at the door one hour before concert time. For more information, consult the Pro Musica website at 

http://promusicasma.tripod.com 
Concerts of San Miguel El Grande Pro Musica
Saturday, April 8, 5pm, Musica Viva trio, Sunday, April 9, 5pm, Emerald Duo
St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Cardo 6, 50/100/150 pesos

Pre-Hispanic rhythms in the Biblioteca

Archaeological evidence suggests that the ancient Aztecs maintained a school of music at Tenochtitlán, their capital city. No doubt the young musicians in training studied the pre-Hispanic instruments that we find today in the museums of Mexico, instruments like the teponaztli, a type of wood drum carved from a large tree trunk, and the quiquiztli (conch shell trumpet).

These instruments and many others will be played at a recital of pre-Hispanic music in the Teatro Santa Ana of the Biblioteca Pública.

The performing ensemble is called Collar del Viento (the wind's necklace) and consists of six young musicians, ranging in age from 11 to 18 years, who play pre-Hispanic music on replica instruments. Four members of the group have been playing together for over five years. The group is instructed by two professional Mexican musicians from Pozos, Néstor Vargas and Gonzalo Gómez.

Collar del Viento will perform in costume and face paint utilizing the traditional ritualistic effects of incense, flowers and candles. After the performance the audience will have the opportunity to ask questions and examine the instruments.

Collar del Viento, Saturday, April 8, 5:30pm, Teatro Santa Ana, Reloj 50
50 pesos

Ensamble San Miguel

Is a chamber music group of local musicians. The ensemble, composed of piano, cello, oboe, flute, bass, tenor voice and soprano voice, plays almost weekly at weddings and special events organized in San Miguel. This recital concert of duets and trios highlights five of the group's musicians. Works to be performed include pieces by Schumann, Guastavino, Mabarak, Beethoven, Fauré and Dvorak.

Concert, Ensamble San Miguel 
Friday, March 31, 7pm, St. Paul's Church, Cardo 6
100 pesos