Es uno, dos, tres: Mexican folkloric dance gets footing in Southern Nevada

Tuesday, May 4, 2004 | 8:34 a.m.

When dancer Ixela Gutierrez came to Las Vegas in 1995 she was surprised by the lack of Mexican folkloric dance groups in the area's growing Hispanic community. There was dancer Martha Luevanos, who arrived 20 years prior and formed Ballet Folklorico Mexico de Martha Luevanos.

There was Dance del Carrizo, a family that performed traditional dance as a group. But there was little else.

So Gutierrez, a traveling folk dancer from Mexico City, formed Mexico Vivo Dance Company, a close-knit group of men, women and children, to perform folk dances from all over Mexico.

Today she has company. Nearly a dozen groups have formed. Some meet as many as three nights a week to practice.

May is high season. Dance cards are full with Cinco de Mayo, Mother's Day and spring festivals converging around the same time.

Rehearsals are repetitious. Dancers have full-time jobs, and the schedule seems grueling. But nobody seems to be complaining. In fact, ask just about anyone about their dedication and their eyes twinkle.

"Something happens," Gutierrez said after rehearsal last week. "It's kind of like we are in love. Once you are in it, you plant a seed in your heart and you start to do something good for your community.

"All these groups are creating a big cultural movement."

Within that movement the heritage is passed to new generations, and dance teachers are keeping children too busy for drugs, gangs and crime.

"We try to involve the parents with making the costumes or the programs so it becomes a family thing," said Gerardo Luevanos, Martha Luevanos' 25-year-old son. "My mother taught the parents when they were children and now she's teaching their children. A lot of the parents who were students say, I remember when.' And those are the things they want to pass down to the kids. I had my first presentation when I was 3 years old."

Compared to cities in California, Texas, Arizona and Colorado, there are few folkloric dancers in Las Vegas. But the tradition spreads and new pockets form as the community grows in numbers and further from its home.

"The Mexican immigration is a constant immigration," said Irma Wynants, culture specialist at the Winchester Community Center. "They need that support to adapt. When you move, you're losing something that is precious. You want to hold onto it as tight as you can. New is exciting, but scary."

Wynants, who is from Michoacan, was working as a travel agent when she joined Mexico Vivo, an experience that led her to a Nevada Arts Council program that rescued, promoted and preserved the traditions of local communities.

Later she took a position as the assistant to the Las Vegas folk arts coordinator, and got to watch the groups grow.

"Before Ixala they had Mexico folkloric dances, but it stayed in the Latin-American community," Wynants said.

Today dancers perform at schools, community centers, libraries, auditoriums and festivals. Some travel throughout the Southwest. This year Mexico Vivo will travel to Greece to perform.

Other groups, such as Patzcuaro United, a group of male construction workers from Michoachan, which formed last year, are just getting started.

Marco Villanueva, the group's leader, said the teacher lives in Mexico, and often the group learns the dances from tapes and videos purchased in Mexico City.

"My parents, my family dance over there so we know the dance," Villanueva said. "Everybody is happy when they see the dance. We got a lot of families who don't have papers. They can't go to Mexico.

"We try to teach it to kids 6 to 12 years old. Probably in a few years, they'll be dancing themselves."

Keeping it clean

Another group, Xyachimal, formed last year to promote Mexican culture in Las Vegas and to keep children away from drugs and gangs, a common mission among some folkloric groups.

"With kids there's guns, drugs, prostitution," said Jose Fajardo, who founded the dance group Tepuchcalli in 1996 with his cousin Miguel Hernandez. "You can teach them a new way."

Fajardo is originally from Guadalajara. A friend's murder in Los Angeles led him to drinking and depression. As part of his recovery Fajardo returned to dance. He hopes his work will continue.

"I am 44 years old," Fajardo said. "One day I need to say goodbye. I can't dance no more. One day I want one of these kids to say, 'I will continue.' They're going to be continuing what I'm starting."

Gerardo Luevanos said his mother's former students who now bring their children help to continue the tradition. The nature of Mexican folkloric dance demands time and interest, he said.

"In Mexico, there's a dance for every area," Luevanos said. "Imagine in the United States, every state having 10 to 20 songs representing that state. That's how Mexico is.

"In Chihuahua, close to Texas, the music is loud and they wear cowboy hats. If you go to the south of Mexico you get a more tropical kind of music. It's relaxed, more calm."

Throughout Mexico, Luevanos said, "There's hundreds of different costumes and types of music. Each song has a particular meaning. Mexican people, they like to remember their homeland. I think that's what keeps it alive -- that and people like to watch it."

Sharing the culture

Elvira Perez has noticed the growth in both groups and audiences. Ten years ago, she said, there was only one major Cinco de Mayo celebration where folkloric dancers were featured.

"Now it's everywhere," Perez said. "It's really evolved."

Perez's mother was from Senora and her father was from Zacatecas, but she learned little of her heritage growing up in a sedate surfing community in San Diego.

It wasn't until she moved to Las Vegas in high school that she became fully acquainted with her heritage and became involved with Mexican folk dance.

Perez married, then had children. When her former dance teacher was killed in a domestic dispute, Perez decided to form a group, called Tradiciones, to carry on the tradition. It includes Perez's daughters and girls age 5 to 15. The dances they learn are mainly from Jalisco and Veracruz.

The group performs at elementary schools, at Mormon churches and last year at the Hispanic Day parade in October. For Cinco de Mayo, Tradiciones will perform at a local senior center.

Most of the girls have Hispanic backgrounds.

"The dance is so beautiful," Perez said. "It gives them a sense of pride. It makes them feel special in their own way."

The rehearsal

Wearing black tops and white-mesh skirts, a dozen girls dance in unison at Rafael Rivera Community Center during a Mexico Vivo rehearsal.

"Es uno, dos, tres, quatro," instructor Reyna Esquivel tells the young girls over the music.

Turning in circles, their hips sway, their hands pull at their skirts. They speed up until the smaller girls are lost in the blur of mesh and cotton, and the line for the water fountain grows longer.

Gutierrez turns from her computer to observe their footwork. She knows who is good, who will someday dance in her teenage and young adult group, and maybe even become teachers to a new group of dancers.

"There are a couple little girls," Gutierrez said. "They come early and stay all night."

Her older dancers rehearse after the young group. The men are construction workers. The women are college students and professionals who don't mind the commitment. Some are still in high school.

"It's very hard," Gutierrez said of Mexico Vivo's three-day-a-week rehearsals. "They really do a sacrifice. The men are construction workers. They work hard. But at the end of the day they come here. They learn the dances.

"We have more than 100 dances. Every time, we change. That way we don't get bored. It's very positive. They really set goals and they follow through. It teaches discipline. We advise each other and motivate each other."