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Mark
Guerrero Bio
Mark
Guerrero grew up in East Los Angeles graduating from James A. Garfield High
School, East L.A. College and Cal State L.A., where he
earned a B.A. in Chicano Studies. The son of the
late legendary singer/songwriter Lalo Guerrero began performing at age 13
with his rock band Mark & the Escorts, who often shared
the bill with storied eastside groups such as Cannibal &
the Headhunters, The Premiers, The Blendells, and Thee Midniters, and was included on the
album "West Coast Eastside Revue" along with
the aforementioned groups,
and others. Mark & the Escorts also recorded two
45 rpm singles in 1965 on GNP Crescendo Records, "Dance
with Me" and "Get Your Baby." Mark then led the popular East L.A. group
The Men From S.O.U.N.D. and at the age of 21 wrote and"
recorded his first single for producer Lou Adler of the
Mamas and the Papas and Carole King fame. His recording
career continued with two singles on Capitol Records as
a solo artist in 1972, "Rock & Roll Queen" and "I'm
Brown" and an album for A&M Records in 1973 with his
group TANGO, which was re-released on CD in
Japan in 1990.
Mark's
"Pre-Columbian Dream" was recorded by Herb Alpert on the 1983 album
"Noche de Amor" and his "Fernando, El
Toro," a tribute to
Dodger pitcher Fernando Valenzuela, was recorded by his
father. The latter song was used twenty years
later on an ESPN documentary on Fernando called "Fernandomania."
The two Guerrero's collaborated on numerous
songs recorded by the elder songwriter and Mark has
written and performed songs featured in the television
productions, "Murals of Aztlán," about L.A.'s Chicano
muralists, and "L.A.: An Artist's View," which profiled
L.A.'s artists for the city's bicentennial. Both
programs included segments on legendary Chicano artist,
Carlos Almaraz. In 1989, Mark
recorded and co-produced an E.P. entitled "On The
Boulevard," which was released on the Eastside Landmark
label and contained four Mark Guerrero original songs. In
1992, Mark wrote and performed tribute songs for the
aforementioned Carlos Almaraz at the Bing Theater at the
L.A. County Museum and for his father, Lalo Guerrero, at
his tribute concert at the McCallum Theater in Palm
Desert, California. Other guests at the Guerrero event
included Edward James Olmos, Cheech Marin, Paul
Rodriguez and Cesar Chavez.
In 1994, Mark
co-produced an album entitled "Fifties
Flashback" with
pioneer Chicano rocker Chan Romero, whose song "The
Hippy Hippy Shake" can be heard on the Beatles' "Live at the
BBC" album. Mark has recorded with Harry Nilsson, backed
Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Eric Burdon in a live concert,
and participated on Los Lobos' 1994 Grammy nominated
"Papa's Dream" L.P. In 1998, he performed with his
father and Tex Mex legend Flaco Jimenez at the Cite de
la Musique in Paris, France, which was followed by a
series of about a dozen concerts with Lalo between 1998
and 2000. Highlights in this series of concerts
included performances at
the Getty Center in Los Angeles and in Lalo's hometown
of Tucson, Arizona. Two of Mark's
recordings were included on the "Chicano Alliance" CD in
1998, which also includes tracks by Tierra, El Chicano,
Malo, Little Joe, and others. In 2002, Mark started
a new band as a vehicle for his original material called
Mark Guerrero & Radio Aztlán. They performed at the Galaxy Theater in Santa
Ana, CA and The Hop in Puente Hills, CA on the bill with Malo and
Tierra, as well as a concert at La Placita Village in
Tucson, AZ. In 2003, they performed again in
Tucson and at the Gene Autry Museum in Los Angeles with
Thee Midniters. The latter concert was to
publicize the upcoming documentary called "Chicano
Rock," in which Mark appears. Since then Mark
Guerrero & Radio Aztlán have performed at venues
such as the John Anson Ford Amphitheater, the Latin
Oldies Festival at Arrowhead Stadium in San Bernardino,
the Grand Ballroom of the Kodak Theater in Hollywood, the Dodge
Theater in Phoenix, AZ, the Fox Theater in Tucson, AZ,
and the L.A. County Museum of Art. In 2003, Mark Guerrero
performed
as a member of the legendary Native
American/Chicano band, Redbone. In 2004, two of Mark's
songs were recorded by legendary Chicano singers; "Oh
Maria" by Trini Lopez and "Rockin' Like There's No
Tomorrow" by Chan Romero. Mark played lead
guitar on the recordings of both songs. In 2004
and 2006, Mark visited Liverpool, England and performed
at several venues, including the legendary Cavern Club,
with Liverpool musicians from the Beatle era, including
Kingsize Taylor & the Dominoes and members of Faron's
Flamingos and the Undertakers. In 2007, Mark
performed with El Chicano at the Gibson Amphitheater in
Studio CIty, CA on the bill with War, Tierra, Little Joe
y La Familia, and Los Lobos for a benefit to help
rebuild the auditorium for his alma mater Garfield High
School in East Los Angeles.
Mark Guerrero is
mentioned in "The Folk Music Sourcebook," published by
Alfred A. Knopf (1976), "Barrio Rhythm" by Steven Loza,
University of Illinois Press (1993), "Riot On the Sunset
Strip" by Dominic Priore, Jawbone Press (2007), and featured in
"Land of a Thousand Dances," by Tom Waldman and David
Reyes, University of New Mexico Press (1998). He's
also featured in and wrote and compiled the discography for
"Lalo, My Life and Music," by Lalo Guerrero
and Sherilyn Meece Mentes, University of Arizona Press
(2002). Mark also
hosts a popular website, www.markguerrero.net, which gives information on his
music, as well as Chicano music in general. The
articles he's written on Chicano music artists have also appeared in various websites,
newspapers, and magazines, including "Traditional Music
Maker" in England. Mark has spoken at colleges on
Chicano music and wrote an entry on the same subject for
the two volume "Encyclopedia of
Latino Popular Culture," published by Greenwood
Publishing Group (2004). Since, December 2005,
Mark Guerrero has been hosting his own internet radio
show called "Chicano Music Chronicles" on
www.crnlive.com.
He has done shows, with the artists in studio, on Trini
Lopez, Chan Romero, El Chicano, Tierra, and many others.
Mark was music supervisor and provided his
song "The Ballad of Lalo Guerrero" for a documentary on
his father called "Lalo Guerrero, the Original Chicano."
The documentary, produced by his brother Dan, aired on PBS in the fall of 2006. In 2007,
Mark Guerrero was a consultant and served on the
advisory board for the Experience Music Project, a major
museum in Seattle, Washington. Mark provided
artifacts and interviewed a
dozen Chicano musical artists for an exhibit at
the museum called "American Sabor : Latinos is U.S. Popular
Music," which opened in October of 2007. The interviews will also be a part of a
permanent oral history archive at the museum. Mark
was also interviewed for the archive. Mark is
also a consultant on an upcoming exhibit at the Grammy
Museum due to open in the fall of 2008.
Click
here
to go to Mark Guerrero Resumé

Contact me at: info@markguerrero.net
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