A dazzling array of heritage and culture will fill Riverfront Park Saturday as the city-organized Viva Salem celebration returns to showcase Latin American music, dance, and traditional Mexican rope artistry.
The free family friendly event runs Sept. 28 from 12-6 p.m. and celebrates Hispanic culture in tandem with Hispanic Heritage Month. It includes six dance, music and cultural performances, starting with the Enlace Cross-Cultural Community Development Project starting at noon. See a full schedule online here.
In addition to the music, dance and entertainment, there will be a number of family friendly activities such as free art workshops where participants can choose to paint either a paper mache alebrije or a clay heart. The workshops take place at 1:30 p.m. and 3:30 p.m.
Xicha Brewing will be selling beer and cider from La Xingona, the brewery’s mobile beer van, and a local food vendor named Karla Farfan will be serving up her famous Salvadoran pupusas.
Salem Health will be providing free health screenings, and there will be a number of other community resources available including Forest Grove-based nonprofit Adelante Mujeres which is dedicated to creating a more just society by empowering Latinas.
The event was created by Irma Coleman, the city’s neighborhood program coordinator, who organized the first Viva Salem last year. It’s paid for through the city’s cultural and tourism grant money and also was funded through sponsorships.
The event brings the much needed cultural celebration to Salem as the city continues to grow, Coleman said.
“It’s important to highlight the contributions that our Hispanic neighbors have brought to Salem,” Coleman said. “Salem is growing every day, we are just growing and growing, and a lot of those new neighbors that are coming to Salem are primarily Spanish-speaking folks. I think it is important to welcome them into our community and then be one community and learn about each other, learn about what we have to bring to Salem, and to help Salem grow and be the best it can be.”
Popular performers from last year are coming back, like Antonio Huerta with the Springfield-based Comunidad y Herencia Cultural. Huerta was born and raised in a cattle ranching town in the Mexican state of Jalisco, and will bring out his rope once again to give folks a tiny taste of Mexican charrería culture.
Charrería is similar to the rodeo in the United States, but finds its roots in Mexico from when the Spanish introduced horses to North America in the 1500s. Modern rodeo culture in the United States is derived from its Mexican predecessor, Huerta said.
Huerta has practiced this centuries-old tradition for nearly 25 years and said part of his desire to show it off is to perhaps inspire the next generation of charros.
“I think part of what we are trying to do is to motivate young people to learn about their cultural heritage and to experience the cultural richness of Mexican and Latin American tradition,” Huerta said, speaking in Spanish.
Huerta said he developed a foundation in charrería through his everyday life back in Jalisco.
“One grows up riding and roping animals. But for me, in those days, it was really difficult for me to get any formal training,” Huerta said. “I was always interested in that but I couldn’t afford to take classes or learn more. So, it wasn’t until I got to the United States that I was able to learn more.”
Here in Oregon, Huerta said most charros are concentrated in the Portland metro area, but there is plenty of charrería going on across the state, he said. The charrería performance begins at 12:50 p.m.
Fernando Soto, the lead singer and guitarist for the local Salem and Woodburn-based band Grupo Mparable, will also be returning this year. It’s a traditional Mexican regional band, Soto said.
Soto said the band plays a lot of covers and experiments with a variety of genres playing cumbias, corridos, and zapateados among other traditional Mexican sounds. The difference with Grupo Mparable is the band does not use traditional instruments like the accordion or the tuba. Instead, they play acoustic guitars.
Soto started the band in 2020 along with his older brother and two of his good friends right before the pandemic.
“When we got together we had all these dates planned and a bunch of club gigs already scheduled, and then everything got shut down,” Soto recalled, laughing. “It was good though because it gave us a lot of time to work on our craft and practice and rehearse as much as we needed to for whenever the pandemic was done.”
The band decided on the name Mparable to express the unstoppable force of music in their lives. The Spanish word imparable, or unstoppable, was purposely spelled wrong mainly to avoid copyright issues with bands with the same name. They also figured it looked unique and cool.
“We were just like, ‘What is something that can describe us or our ambition?’ and one thing we all agreed on is that, ‘No matter what, music is never going to stop pumping through our blood, so it’s getting pretty much unstoppable,’” Soto said.
Contact reporter Joe Siess: [email protected] or 503-335-7790.
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Joe Siess is a reporter for Salem Reporter. Joe joined Salem Reporter in 2024 and primarily covers city and county government but loves surprises. Joe previously reported for the Redmond Spokesman, the Bulletin in Bend, Klamath Falls Herald and News and the Malheur Enterprise. He was born in Independence, MO, where the Oregon Trail officially starts, and grew up in the Kansas City area.
