NEWS Staff Report
The Texas Conjunto Music Hall of Fame & Museum’s (TCMHFM) annual winter charity dance is just a few weeks away, and tickets to one of San Benito’s most anticipated events are still available.
The 15th Annual Noche de Ronda Scholarship Dance is on tap for Saturday, February 10, 2024. The charity dance will be held from 8 p.m.-midnight at L&H Events Center, 220 W. Stenger St., San Benito.
The evening’s live performers are Rio Grande Valley favorites, Conteno and veterans of the regional music scene, Los Halcones del Valle.
Tickets are $30 each and tables seating eight can be reserved in advance. Concessions will be open throughout the evening featuring snacks, sodas and set-up options available for purchase. Attendees can bring their own bottle (wine or liquor) or beer (BYOB).
As posted on the TCMHFM’s Facebook page, tickets to the dance have been sold to museum visitors and conjunto fanatics from as far as the Midwest.
The TCMHFM is also accepting prizes, gift cards, and monetary donations — to be used towards the purchase of prizes — through February 5, 2024. Prizes will be awarded at the dance.
The benefit dance funds scholarships awarded to San Benito High School’s Conjunto Estrella graduating senior members.
For tickets or for more information, contact TCMHFM Director Patricia Avila at (956) 245-5005.
The TCMHFM is a 501c3, non-profit organization.
Founded in the year 2000, the TCMHFM, located at 402 W. Robertson St., San Benito, in the Resaca City’s iconic Azteca building, works to promote, preserve, archive, document, and display the history of regional conjunto music by honoring those who create it.
Detailed information on the instruments used to birth the music genre, their cultural origins, and stories of San Benito’s legendary music institutions such as La Villita Dancehall and the Rio Grande Music Company, home of Ideal Records, are among the museum’s featured exhibits.
Within the exhibit space are the accordions of conjunto pioneers such as Narciso Martínez, Pedro Ayala, Ricardo Guzmán, Enrique Vela, Mario Montes and Gilberto Pérez.
Also on display is an old bajo sexto donated by Ramiro Cavazos, a leather jacket on loan from the family of Mario Montes, a suit and pair of shoes donated by the family of Ruben Vela, a set of drums donated by Higinio Guzman, and an electric Fender bass on loan from Hector Barron of Los Fantasmas Del Valle.
One exhibit is dedicated to accordionist Narciso Martínez and bajo sexto player Santiago Almeida, considered the “Fathers” of regional conjunto music. Ethnomusicologists credit them with fusing European accordion rhythms with Mexican roots musica ranchera (ranch music).
As representatives of what has been called, “working man’s music,” premier conjunto personalities, and their spirits, live on at the TCMHFM, located in the heart of San Benito, considered by many as the birthplace of conjunto music.
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