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LilaDowns is the daughter of a Mixtec Indian woman who ran away from her village at 19 to sing in Mexico City cantinas and a Minnesota-born,
Scottish-American professor who saw her singing and fell in love at first sight. Lila Downs was born in 1967 in the Oaxacan mountain town of Tlaxiaco, 7,000 feet up in the heavens. The first songs she remembers are her mother singing Lola Beltrán’s heartfelt rancheras, and her father singing Woody Guthrie’s ”This Land Is Your Land.” Her border-blurring, multicultural upbringing infused Downs with a firm worldview in support of the disenfranchised working classes and an aesthetic vision that embraces cross-cultural pollinations.Â
As a result Downs has become one of the most innovative exponents of Mesoamerican music on both sides of the border. Her lyrics are high-minded and sentient and her sound is all encompassing. By drawing on a pan-Latin palette of music as well as American folk, jazz, blues and rock, Downs and her worldly band of kindred spirits, La Misteriosa, have won accolades and a devoted following of world music fans. Known for her smoky voice and magnetic performances, Downs has created a unique body of work through CD releases such as La Sandunga (1999), La Linea/Border (2001), the Latin Grammy-winning Una Sangre/One Blood (2004), La Cantina (2006) and Shake Away/Ojo de Culebra (2008) and her Sony Music debut, Pecados y milagros (2011).
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