Tag Archives: festival

San Miguel de Allende, Uncategorized

FASMA2025 is more than a festival; it is a feast served up by local arts and culture groups

Read the latest on FASMA 2025 here.

The third edition of the San Miguel de Allende Festival of the Arts (FASMA2025) is coming in August and will offer more than 100 events from scores of local arts and culture organizations.  Music, theater, opera, film, dance, literary and plastic arts programs will be presented in many of San Miguel’s finest venues, Aug. 1-17.

Individually, these are the kinds of events for which this city is famous around the world.

Collectively, this is an opportunity for San Miguelians to sample the many lively, beautiful, and inspiring performance programs that make up the fabric of this community.

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photography, Rants and raves, Reviews, San Miguel de Allende, Writings

Free festival lets maestros take San Miguel’s ‘new’ 1875 pipe organ at Templo de la Tercera Orden out for a spin — and the public is invited along for the ride

After today’s concert in the Temple of the Third Order on Calle San Francisco, the maestro David Soteno Jimenez from Metepec in the State of Mexico had nothing but praise for the nearly 150-year-old pipe organ on which he performed.

“It is magnificent,” he enthused. “You see that it has only one keyboard and yet it has such a range of sound.” His one observation was that the stops that provide the keyboard its range take a bit of muscle to pull out — not an easy feat when your fingers are rolling a glissando down the keys.

He laughed as he mimicked a tug of war with the instrument, then showered it with more love.

Soteno Jimenez is the first artist from outside of San Miguel de Allende to “kick the tires” so to speak on the recently installed organ.

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photography, Writings

Gallery: San Miguel’s Night of the Catrinas – not quite a parade, definitely a promenade

Gaily costumed and made-up men and women just sort of filtered into the plaza last night in twos and fours. If there was a grand parade from any of the private Catrina parties around San Miguel de Allende, it was after I left.

By 8 p.m., I’d seen enough. And what I saw was delightful.

(Catch up with Thursday night’s official parade here.)

There were lots of traditional Catrinas and Catrines but there were spinoffs, too. Like the two cowboys, the bishop, the woman in the illuminated cape, and the tyrannosaurus rex. Yes, a dinosaur. It is just that kind of year.

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Colonia San Antonio, photography, San Miguel de Allende

Humbling exercise in devotion, just a step beyond the front door — Our Lady of Guadalupe has her day

I’ve said it before: You want magic in San Miguel de Allende? Then just step out your front door.

Today, it was the arrival of the procession honoring Our Lady of Guadalupe. The cavalcade of the holy and horses turned onto Callejon San Antonio at noon sharp and proceeded to walk in stops and starts toward the Parroquia de San Antonio de Padua.

Progress was halting because there were hundreds of people attempting to fill the already busy square for the celebration of the Mass.

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Colonia San Antonio, photography, San Miguel de Allende, Uncategorized

In Colonia San Antonio: Los pequeños locos make my day

This thing about San Miguel de Allende is you just never know when a parade might break out.

Like this morning.

I was on my way to Pilates. (I know this woman who rocks at teaching floor Pilates. …) As I turned off Calle San Antonio and headed down Calle Allende there was a distinct change in the atmosphere. People of the parental type were hanging on the corners near the church and all looking down the street.

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San Miguel de Allende

Catrinas and Catrines are coming to life in San Miguel de Allende — for Halloween!

IMG_8219Day of the Dead is ramping up in San Miguel de Allende.

Some stores are draping their entrances in beautiful floral designs. Marigolds are everywhere. Altars to loved ones who have passed away are being erected in household doorways, on staircases, and in the cemeteries and parks.

And, of course, the Catrinas and Catrines are beginning to come alive.

Last week, the only Catrinas in town were in store windows and displays — and they are beautiful. Now, their walking and talking embodiments are hitting the streets!

At least, the face painting is going on all over San Miguel — especially in Centro where outdoor art studios are set up in the streets and scores of people are waiting their turn for the magical transformation to take place.

Here are a few pictures from this afternoon in Centro! Continue reading →

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