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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.  His band 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 then upcoming documentary "Chicano Rock: The Sounds of East Los Angeles" 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 and again in 2009, 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.com, 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).  In 2006, Mark Guerrero hosted his own internet radio show called "Chicano Music Chronicles" on www.crnlive.com.  He did 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 was also a consultant on an exhibit called "Songs of Conscience, Songs of Freedom" at the Grammy Museum which opened in the fall of 2008 and ran for a year.  Mark appeared in the documentary "Chicano Rock: The Sounds of East Los Angeles," which premiered on PBS nationally in December of 2008.  He also performed and was a talent coordinator on a PBS special "Trini Lopez Presents Latin Music Legends," which aired in June of 2009.  In February of 2009, Mark reunited his teenage band Mark & the Escorts to perform at "Blowout 2009" on a bill with 13 bands.  In April of 2009, Mark reunited his 70s band Tango to perform at East Los Angeles College for an event celebrating the new edition of the book "Land of a Thousand Dances" by David Reyes and Tom Waldman.  In 2010 Mark is doing concerts with Frankie Garcia's Cannibal & the Headhunters, Redbone, and his own Mark Guerrero band.  He's also continuing to do lecture/performances at universities and other venues.

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