Mexican Detroit

In the late 1910s and early 1920s Detroit became a hub for Mexican and Tejano migration. Many came to work on sugar beet farms before taking factory jobs. Those born in Texas that were of Mexican descent identified as Tejano. New immigration restrictions in 1929 greatly reduced immigration from Mexico. Throughout the Great Depression thousands of Mexican U.S. citizens and immigrants were repatriated or forcefully deported. It was not until the late 1930s and 1940s that Mexicans and Tejanos began to return to Detroit. They brought with them their culture and musical styles that originated in northern Mexico and Texas in the 1920s and 1930s. The most popular style, the conjunto, pairs the accordion and the bajo sexto, a twelve-string bass guitar, with such European musical styles as the waltz, the mazurka, and primarily the polka.

[Back]: World-class Tejano groups called conjuntos frequently played at clubs and dances across Detroit and other cities, including Adrian, Pontiac, Saginaw, and Lansing. Local radio stations, such as WMZK, WQRS-FM, WSAM, and WDET, aired recorded and live Tejano music. Throughout the 1970s, WMZK broadcasted from the Las Vegas Bar six days a week. Record stores, such as Roy’s Records on Vernor Highway and the Texas Music Company in Delray, stocked their shelves with Tejano music. In 1964 Martin Solis Jr., one of Detroit’s Tejano music pioneers, permanently settled in Michigan and established himself with his conjunto, Los Primos. He was inducted into the Tejano R.O.O.T.S. Hall of Fame in Alice, Texas, in 2017. Solis and his peers were a symbol of ethnic and cultural identity for those in the Southwest Detroit community.