Artistic expression is fundamental to the ancient Jewish practice of creating community while living in diaspora. On the eve of LA’s traditional Latino independence day celebrations, the Skirball invites adults and kids alike to spend an afternoon and evening in its oasis, making new, cross-cultural friends as you enjoy Latino music, attend dance workshops, participate in panel conversations, taste traditional Latin bites, and visit our museum exhibitions.

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Taper Courtyard

• Community organization tables
  All day
  Meet with Refugee Children Center, Community Power Collective, and more local groups.
   
• Face painting, temporary tattoos, and crafting activities 
  3:00 pm
   
• Renee Goust performs
  3:45–4:45 pm
   
• Vivir Quintana performs
  6:15–7:15 pm
   
• La Verdad performs
  7:45–9:15 pm

Ahmanson Hall

• Collective Songwriting with Martha Gonzalez: Sounding a New World
  3:15–4:30 pm
  When practiced in community, songwriting is a powerful exercise in consensus building and collective knowledge production. Experience this transformative process alongside Martha Gonzalez and members of Quetzal, the GRAMMY Award-winning Chicano rock band from East L.A. No music experience necessary—just bring an open heart and an open mind.

Founders Courtyard

• El Mercado Farmer's Market
  All day
  Featuring Latino products and antojitos for purchase.

Haas Conference Center

• Free legal information clinic, En que les apoyo? How can I help?, Sponsored by Bet Tzedek
  4:00–5:30 pm
  Bilingual
  Legal experts available to answer questions regarding immigration-related matters.

Herscher Hall

• Dance Workshop with CONTRA-TIEMPO: Moving Fear Into Joy 
  4:00–5:00 pm
  A joyous community dance jam led by CONTRA-TIEMPO activist dance theater for participants of all ages and skill levels. Dancers will lead participants through Afro-Latine ancestral movement technologies such as salsa, rumba, samba, and hip-hop grooves, embodying joy as a tool to build community and restore hope.

Hollander Library

• El Marchante record store
  All day                           

Magnin Auditorium

• Panel Conversation: Can Music Change Minds?
  5:00–6:00 pm
  Bilingual
  It used to be that Spanish-language artists had to perform in English to succeed in the U.S. Today, they can sing in their native tongue and top the charts. But with increased visibility, does increased industry equity follow for Spanish language artists? In an era of division over immigration—when so many love Latin music that crosses borders, but question Latin people who do—can music bring America together? Songwriter and producer Edgar Barrera and activist, musician, and Chicanx-Latinx studies professor Martha Gonzalez will discuss how Latino music transcends borders. Moderated by Emilio Morales, Founder, La Banda Elástica magazine.

Mexican-American singer-songwriter Renee Goust seeks to make historically underrepresented groups visible in Mexican music. Her songs "La cumbia feminazi" and "Querida muerte (No nos maten)" are well-established gender equality hymns in Latin America. Her music has been praised by Billboard, Rolling Stone, and El País. Renee has also performed at renowned venues like El Zócalo in Mexico City, Lincoln Center and the Guggenheim Museum in New York.

Vivir Quintana is a Mexican singer-songwriter known for her powerful voice and socially charged lyrics that blend folk, regional, and ranchera music. Her song “Canción sin miedo” has become a global feminist anthem, and she collaborates with organizations advocating for human rights. Quintana’s music has appeared in films and series like Mujeres Asesinas (2024), Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022), and Noche de fuego (2021). In 2023, she was named a Spotify EQUAL Ambassador, and Forbes México recognized her as one of the 100 most creative Mexicans. In 2024, the Recording Academy named her one of its Leading Ladies of Entertainment. 

La Verdad is the West Coast's premier Latin music ensemble and they truly live up to their name. La Verdad is a collective of world-class musicians embodying the truth of the Los Angeles Latino experience. Collectively led by award-winning singer-songwriter Gabriel Gonzalez (Quetzal, Boogaloo Assassins), they boast a traditional and original repertoire that spans the scope of Latin American route music, including salsa, cha-cha, boogaloo, funk, cumbia, Latin soul, and more.

​​Edgar Barrera is an in-demand songwriter, producer, and musician originally from the Mexico-United States border. Barrera has collaborated with many of the biggest names in contemporary Latin music, including Bad Bunny, Peso Pluma, Shakira, and Grupo Firme. He has won twenty-four Latin GRAMMY Awards and one GRAMMY Award, including Producer of the Year in 2021, 2023, and 2024, and Songwriter of the Year in 2023 and 2024. As a songwriter, he has won thirty-eight BMI Awards, making him one of the most awarded writers in Latin music. 

CONTRA-TIEMPO is a bold, multilingual Los Angeles-based activist dance theater company that champions compassion, confidence, and joy by creating communities where all people are awakened to a sense of themselves as artists and social change agents. The company creates a new physical, visual, and sonic vocabulary that collages salsa, Afro-Cuban, hip-hop, and contemporary dance with theater, compelling text, and original music to bring dynamic multi-modal experiences to the concert stage.

​​Martha Gonzalez is a Chicana artivista (artist/activist) musician, feminist music theorist, and Associate Professor in the Intercollegiate Department of Chicana/o Latina/o Studies at Scripps/Claremont College. Born and raised in Boyle Heights, Gonzalez has received various fellowships including a Fulbright Garcia-Robles, Ford Fellowship, Woodrow Wilson Fellowship, and USA Fellowship, as well as the MacArthur Fellowship in 2022. Her academic interests have been fueled by her own musicianship as a singer/songwriter and percussionist for GRAMMY Award-winning band Quetzal. Gonzalez’s first manuscript Chican@ Artivistas: Music, Community, and Transborder Tactics in East Los Angeles was published by the University of Texas Press in 2020 and translated into the Spanish Language in 2024 by Interpec. 

​​Emilio Morales is the founder, publisher, and art/editorial director of La Banda Elástica. A Mexico City native, he’s lost count of the years he’s lived in Los Angeles. Under his direction, LBE has won several awards for design and content. Morales is the creator and executive producer of LBE Radio and the popular YouTube series Hecho en Casa, in which bands and solo artists perform sets in his living room studio. In another life, he was a graphic designer for the Los Angeles Times and a guitarist and songwriter for various L.A. rock bands.