Jose Alfredo Jimenez

Are Los Camperos de Nati Cano the world's best mariachi? That's how it looked during its set at the Universal Amphitheatre's mariachi festival on Saturday. The Los Angeles-based group deservedly earned the night's only standing ovation for a performance that was perhaps the best one seen during these last few years of mariachi fever in L.A.

The complacent acts that routinely dominate the Latin charts could have learned something about the real thing Monday at the John Anson Ford Amphitheatre. The emotionally charged performances by Los Angeles group Quetzal and Mexican-American singer Lila Downs demonstrated what quality Latin pop should sound like. Both Quetzal and Downs--sharing the bill in a benefit for listener-sponsored radio station KPFK-FM (90.7)--make music that's easy on the ears and deserves wider exposure.

Juan Gabriel is one of the most prolific and influential composers of today's Latin pop, continuing the tradition of such romantic Latin classicists as Armando Manzanero, Agustin Lara and Jose Alfredo Jimenez. His compositions had been performed by a wide variety of musicians, from Rocio Durcal to Julio Iglesias to the Mexican rock band Maldita Vecindad. But much of the Mexican superstar's concert on Friday at the Universal Amphitheatre seemed like just another Las Vegas revue.

Although it ran an hour overtime, the fourth annual "Por Amor a Mi Tierra" mariachi festival Saturday at the Universal Amphitheatre still managed to undersell its biggest act. Placing Mariachi Vargas de Tecalitlan, arguably the world's best ensemble of its kind, at the beginning of Part 2 created an imbalance from which the evening never quite recovered.

As a performer, Lupillo Rivera goes beyond the call of duty when it comes to entertaining his fans. An indication of his zealousness came halfway through the singer's performance Friday at the Universal Amphitheatre, when a luxurious bed was brought onstage, complete with a young, negligee-clad woman. Rivera looked at her with a mischievous glint in his eyes.

Re "Million Dollar Theater Set to Reopen," April 8: I've always believed that the Million Dollar Theater [on Broadway at Third Street in downtown L.A.] is special. My parents met there back in 1958. They were married just three months later. Then, when I was a little girl in the late '60s, my parents took us to see the great Jose Alfredo Jimenez and singer Sonia Lopez perform there. Sometimes before the show, we would eat at Clifton's, where my sister, Lupe, and I would eat the green Jello and admire the mural of the Spanish senorita.

Tijuana's Orquesta de Baja California returned to Southern California on Saturday night under the care of new (as of August 2004) music director Angel Romero -- best known as a distinguished member of the guitar-playing Romero family. The locale was a large gallery within the Museum of Latin American Art in Long Beach -- not exactly your ideal music space.

"Create fame and go to sleep" is an old Mexican saying that can be applied to Jose Jose's performance on Friday at the Universal Amphitheatre, where he was the star attraction at an erratic but generally enjoyable Latin music concert benefiting World Vision. In his 40-minute segment, the Mexican singer, accompanied entirely by backing tapes, concentrated on his most recent hits--such as "Un Hotel En Lugar de Corazon" ("A Hotel in the Place of a Heart") and "Amnesia"--in a colorless performance.

A judge, citing a lack of evidence, has freed two former Salvadoran military officers and an industrialist jailed three years ago in a highly publicized probe into right-wing kidnapings. Judge Juan Hector Larios on Friday ordered the release of former Lt. Rodolfo Lopez Sibrian, former Maj. Jose Alfredo Jimenez Moreno and industrialist Orlando Llovera Ballete. Larios also canceled arrest warrants for five other people, including a former army colonel.

When Los Super Seven opened its show Wednesday at the House of Blues with the raucous "Compay Gato," the performance was a little too hesitant to capture the sheer magic of the the formidable Latin music collective's new recording. Entitled "Canto," Los Super Seven's second album is an instant classic, the kind of record that probably will be regarded with the awe reserved for the timeless sides of a Tito Puente or a Jose Alfredo Jimenez.