Nydia Rojas.

• Author: Holston, Mark

(Arista Latin 18823-2)

Credit Rojas, a sixteen-year-old California native who has been honing the art of mariachi balladry since her early childhood, with energizing the customarily conservative genre with a remarkable album that honors the music's rich tradition while injecting invigorating contemporary values.

In a storybook-like manner, Rojas became entranced by the style at the tender age of four when she viewed the film Nosotros los pobres, starring mariachi icon Pedro Infante. Living in Guadalajara at the time, she learned the lyrics to the film's theme and has remained fanatically loyal to the music since, launching her professional career as an entertainer in Los Angeles-area Mexican restaurants at the age of nine and polishing her talent as a featured vocalist with the all-female band Mariachi Reyna de Los Angeles. Concerts in the U.S. Southwest and Mexico, including the Mariachi USA Festival at the Hollywood Bowl, winning three consecutive global talent contests on Spanish-language television's...