By: Fredwill Hernandez
A few days leading up to BottleRock’s inaugural La Onda [Latin music] festival, there was a buzz and excitement throughout the community, primarily among downtown Napa’s Latin music lovers, including myself, who were highly anticipating the start of the music festival held in Napa Valley, CA, on Saturday, June 1 and Sunday, June 2. The festival featured a very impressive line-up. The two-day Latin music festival’s diverse and multi-generational roster included Maná, Fuerza Regida, Alejandro Fernandez, Junior H, Farruko, Eslabon Armado, Café Tacvba, Los Ángeles Azules, Mon Lafertye, Gabito Ballestero, Danna Paola, Yahritza Y Su Escencia, Maldita Vencidad, La Arrolladora, Éden Muñoz, Ximena Sariñana, Siddharta, Yng Lvcas, and Gera MX.
The two-day festival was the brainchild of Dave Graham, who along with partners Justin Dragoo, and Jason Scoggins, makes up Lattitude 38, the company that has produced and brought to life the BottleRock music festivals for ten years. Lattitude 38 has a head start based on analytics and data, and knew among other things that Napa’s population is made up of 41 percent Latinos, with the vast majority being Mexican. Is my opinion that this data and previous knowledge were taken into account when deciding to launch an all-Latin music festival.
“There are some great Latin music festivals out there, but none of this scale in Northern California. We live in a wonderful diverse region, but our Latin communities and those who love Latin music have not had a multi-day festival to call their own. We’re excited to be able to provide that with La Onda,” said Dave Graham, Partner and CEO of Latitude 38 Entertainment who produced and brought the festival to life.
La Onda also featured Aztec ceremonies and Mariachi performers, including Mariachi San Francisco, and a youth group, Mariachi Del Valle, with 16 members. It showcased, among other beverages and brands, featured 10 local wines from Latino-owned wineries such as Aldina Vineyard, Bazán Cellars, Ceja Vineyards, Honrama Cellars, MaCo Vineyards, Maldonado Vineyards, and Rebledo Family Winery. All of these are members of the Mexican American Vintners Association (MAVA), a group that promotes Latino owned and produced wines. If you were one of the lucky 65,000 who attended the two-day festival, it quickly became evident that Lattitude 38 had done their homework and everything they had planned worked.
Another big difference, in my opinion, was that the La Onda Latin music festival seemed to have way more sponsors than you typically see, or that I’ve seen, at other Latin music festivals. This could be due, in my opinion, to their carrying over from the BottleRock music festival, with the same infrastructure, the weekend before La Onda, or it could be that companies and brands are finally realizing, catching up, and wanting to capitalize on the importance of Hispanic demographics and our spending power, based primarily on the new numbers of the Latino GDP which is now 3.2 trillion dollars. These numbers were also published by Yahoo! Finance through a Business Wire press release for the Latino Donor Collaborative on Wednesday, September 27, 2023. “The best way to reach that demographic is through the music, Latin music in my case,” explains Fredwill Hernandez, Latin music journalist, consultant, and artist manager, who among other roles within the Latin music realm, also dubs as VP Artist Relations, Latin for the Revohloo app, which allows one to create 256 different versions of a music video, without using AI. “Everything about La Onda just felt different; things were strategically placed and positioned. I was also surprised to see the large skeleton catrinas and dog statues, which are synonymous with Mexican Dia De Los Muertos celebration that La Onda also had. Having the lucha libre wrestling matches is nothing new to other Latin music festivals; what did surprise me, though, were the lowrider show cars [from San Francisco’s Street Made Car Club], which are synonymous with Chicano and street Cholo culture. La Onda, for example, had a spa, something I’ve never seen at any other Latin music festival.”
If you walked around the family-friendly Latin music festival, one of the biggest differences, in my opinion, was that the festival did not feel like a festival. As you walked around, it felt like being at an amusement park or visiting Disneyland. This was due to everything being properly spaced out and having two main stages, along with three other areas that stood out, such as the Silent Disco, the Retumba Stage, and the Club. The Silent Disco, and the Club were big rooms with everything you would find when you attend a nightclub: the bars, dance floor, lights, DJ booth, and booths for sitting and eating. Everything seem to compliment what was nearby, and there were unique activations like a ring featuring masked lucha libre wrestlers, as well as sixty local eateries offering great food and drinks from Napa Valley, Somona County, and the surrounding greater Bay Area.
The musical lineup was top-notch, offering rock, pop, regional Mexican, Latin urban, cumbia, and Reggaeton Mexa [Reggaeton from Mexico]. Verizon, which sponsored the Regional Mexican stage — one of the two main stages – also allowed certain attendees to view the performances from their VIP viewing deck, strategically located near the stage, and allowed festivalgoers to make custom phone cases as La Onda memorabilia.
Among the acts to perform at the Verizon stage were Fuerza Regida, Alejandro Fernandez, Eslabon Armado, Los Ángeles Azules, Gabito Ballestero, Yahritza Y Su Escencia, La Arrolladora, Éden Muñoz, Nivel, Alex Fernandez, Joss Favela, and Ximena Sariñana.
On Saturday, June 1, it was interesting that young Ranchera heartthrob Alex Fernandez, the grandson of the late Vicente Fernandez, who also followed in his father’s footsteps by singing Rancheras, kicked things off as the opening act at the Verizon stage. Coincidently, it was interesting that his father, Alejandro Fernandez, was on the same bill, performing on the same stage as the headliner to close the first night.
“It’s an honor to be part of [La Onda] this very special Latin music festival, with people here in the states who probably miss our Mexican [Ranchera] music and come here to enjoy it, to be transformed, and taken somewhere else by listening to it. With my new album [Estoy A Un Trago Mas], which came out yesterday,” eloquently expressed the young, up-and-coming Ranchera singer Alex Fernandez, who stated he never set out to be a singer, it was something that gradually grew on him out of the desires of his late grandfather Mexican Ranchera singer Vicente Fernandez. “My grandfather used to tell me, ‘I would like to hear you sing. I know you can do it.’ That’s how I gradually picked it up, and then it just grew on me. The single I sang with my grandfather that launched my singing career was “Mitad Tu, Mitad Yo,” which is also a very special song my father would sing to my mother when she was pregnant with me.”
In my opinion Latitude 38 also had Gen Z’s in mind when it booked Yng Lvcas, Fuerza Regida, Junior H, Yahritza Y Su Escencia, Joss Favela, Gabito Ballestero, Eslabon Armado, and Gera MX, and a few others.
“Some of the songs I performed were “Shelby,” “Maldito Romantico,” and “Nunca Te Puedo Alcanzar,” which are based on real life experiences. I love when I perform and the crowd knows all the songs and lyrics, singing a long as if they identify with the words. I started rapping when I was fourteen years old, and we’ve been doing this professionally for ten years now,” eloquently explained Gera MX, after his electrifying performance on the La Onda stage. He also added that Mexico City, Monte Rey N.L., and San Luis Potosi are his favorite cities to perform in. ”Rich Vagos is like my baby [referring to his record label he launched in 2019],” he stated. “I launched the label with the idea of not being a boss but having a lot of leaders, and it has worked. In Mexico, we are well-known, and all the artist I have signed to the label have become a unified family. We proudly represent and sport our merch; it’s like a unified fraternity that supports and backs me everywhere I go.”
In music, sometimes success comes with the right timing. In my opinion, La Onda also capitalized on the void left by Chicago’s Ruiodofest, the three-day Latin music festival that, between 2018 [the fourth annual] through 2022 [the last year it was held], was considered by many, including myself, to be the top Latin music festival in the country, where at least 50 different Latin acts would perform during the three days.
A day after the festival ended the dates for the 2025 La Onda Latin music festival were announced, the festival will return on the weekend of May 31 and June 1, 2025.
