A Salute to Mexico : Independence Day Parade, Music Draw Thousands

It was a far cry from the “Grito de Dolores,” a call to arms by a rural Mexican priest that started Mexico’s fight for independence from Spain in 1810.

With a banner for the opera “Barber of Seville” fluttering in the background, throngs of mostly Latino residents gathered at the Music Center on Sunday to celebrate Mexico’s independence from Spain by listening to an outdoor concert that was as diverse as the people who came to hear it.

There was Eddie Santiago and his Puerto Rican salsa band, Venezuelan star Jose Luis (El Puma) Rodriguez, Mexican singer Angeles Ochoa, and Carlos Mencia, 23, an East L. A. comedian born in Honduras. Fare for the day was hot dogs and tacos, along with jokes from Mencia about yet another American culinary invention, the “enchurrito.”

An estimated 15,000 attended with their families--many arriving to celebrate their heritage only after watching the Raider and Dodger games.

“I’ll celebrate Puerto Rican independence, Mexican independence--anything--if it’s got ambiente (atmosphere) , “ said Salvadoran Eric Granadeno, 26, as he kept time to a Mexican rock band.

During the past decade, as hundreds of thousands of Central American immigrants began making their way to Los Angeles, the city’s traditional Mexican Independence Day celebrations have steadily broadened to include Central Americans, most of whose homelands celebrate their own independence from Spain on the same day as Mexico.

While the traditional Mexican fireworks, musicians, rodeos and dancers were in evidence throughout Southern California on Sunday, Central Americans also came out in force.

At 11:30 a.m., a mostly Salvadoran and Guatemalan crowd of 60,000 turned out to watch a parade through the Pico-Union district that culminated in a concert at MacArthur Park. An hour and a half later, a crowd estimated at 80,000 to 100,000 lined the streets of East Los Angeles for the 50th annual Mexican Independence Day Parade featuring floats, celebrities, bands, and “. . . politicians!” sniffed Marina Jimenez, a Mexican-born East Los Angeles resident who has attended the parade for many of the 41 years she has lived in Los Angeles. “This year, I came to hear music instead,” she said.

The concert, which a Music Center spokesman said may turn into an annual event, was preceded by a Latino awards brunch for the arts at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.

The “Viva Los Artistas” awards honored Kenny Ortega, choreographer of “Dirty Dancing;” Cuban-American pop singer Martika; actor Edward James Olmos; Joffrey ballerina Beatriz Rodriguez, and the late actress Margo Albert, a co-founder of Plaza de la Raza Cultural Center in East Los Angeles. Theater and film director Luis Valdez, another award recipient, called cultural diversity the “essence of the Planet Earth.”

As dusk settled over the Civic Center, several thousand gathered outside City Hall for a concert and El Grito de Dolores, a commemoration of the call to freedom heralding Mexico’s independence. The show featured Latino pop stars and mariachis.