What started as a routine photo essay became something more as the Bridge team got to know the student mariachis and saw their confidence bloom.
I first reached out to Waco ISD in August 2025 to see if University High School’s Los Mariachi Troyanos had any performances lined up for Hispanic Heritage Month in September. My hope was to photograph them and the practices leading up to it. That was five months, 11 shoot days, and 3,818 photos ago.
What started as an idea for a short photo essay for my newsletter spiraled into a momentous undertaking for me and others on the team that created a multimedia project called “Becoming Mariachis.”
Raquel Villatoro wrote the story, and Dominic Villa produced the video for the project.
During the second practice, I learned that a group of students had an outside mariachi band called Mariachi Corazon de Oro (Heart of Gold). I also discovered that the school was waiting on the delivery of handmade mariachi suits, called trajes de charro, from Mexico.
There are three core components of putting together a months-long feature. You start with relationship-building and trust. Along the way you develop a character arc. And throughout the project, you need persistence.
I had to build trust with Waco ISD, the band director Archie Hatten IV, and most importantly, the students and their parents. During that second practice, I asked the students if I could photograph an upcoming gig they had over the weekend in McGregor, and for their parents to call me with any questions about the story, The Waco Bridge or how I work.
As time went on, my ability to check in with students, Hatten, and Waco ISD communications director Jill Anderson was as important as taking the photos. If trust is the foundation of a project, clear communication was the pillar that allowed me to build the story over time. I cannot tell you the number of times I sent an email or text saying, “I swear this is the last request, we’re almost done.” Every few weeks I would check in to see how the band was progressing.
On Dec. 1, 2025, I reached out to Hatten checking to see if the band had any upcoming holiday performances. I learned that the traditional mariachi trajes arrived that morning and would be presented to the students. I dropped everything to put in an official media request through the school district and free my calendar for the following day. At 8:15 p.m., I received approval to be at the school in the morning to photograph and film the trajes being presented to the students.
The important component of any great story is the characters. By December, Andrea Monrial, Jacob Mendoza, Jade Garcia, and Abel Serrato stuck out as passionate musicians who others looked up to and made strides in their performances. Having spent hours with them in practices and before and after gigs, I focused in on them as they tried on their trajes for the first time. The transformation from student to mariachi was instantly noticeable.
During their next performance at Ascension Providence Hospital they were naturals, floating through the crowd and interacting with the audience. Afterward, their excitement and enthusiasm radiated as they waited for the bus to take them home. The next day they donned their trajes for the first public performance during the University High Christmas Concert. The crowd saw 40 captivating mariachis on stage singing “Feliz Navidad.” They had arrived.
All that was left was one final, I promise, request for formal portraits and interviews on the stage. Then, to narrow down 3,818 photos to 320 to the final 26.
