Chicano folk singer performs at Cornell May 16

MOUNT VERNON — Cornell College will host guitarist Chuy Negrete performing the folk music of his native Mexico on Tuesday, May 16, at 6:30 p.m. in the Rathskeller of The Commons. Admission is free.

The son of migrant farm workers who later settled in Chicago, Negrete has become a leading musicologist and interpreter of Mexican and Chicano music. Through concerts and workshops nationwide, he takes his audience on a musical journey of his heritage. He has been called “the Chicano Woody Guthrie” by historian and radio host Studs Terkel.

Negrete is founder and director of the Mexican Cultural Institute in Chicago.

His visit is sponsored by Cornell’s Office of Intercultural Life, the Organization for Latino Awareness, the Performing Arts and Activities Council, the Lecture, Artists, Cultural Events Consortium and programs in ethnic studies, Latin American studies and sociology and anthropology.