Luz Elena Mendoza (of Y La Bamba)

Y La Bamba frontwoman Luz Elena Mendoza returns to themes of searching and metamorphosis in her newest works. Her clarity of voice is intimately tied to a renewed musical approach, which Luz attributes to a greater self-awareness that developed through recent collaborations with singer-songwriters Edna Vazquez and Lila Downs, as well as an exploration of mariachi, cumbia, and Latin pop with Calexico’s Sergio Mendoza—no relation—on a collaborative 2015 album released under the name Los Hijos De La Montaña.