STORY AND PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK

The Wood River Orchestra will present music exploring mortality and magic with a little mariachi music thrown in in its free concert on Sunday at the Community Campus.

The free “Music of the Macabre” concert starts at 4 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 2, at the Community Campus in Hailey.

Coming on the heels of Halloween and Dia de los Muertos, conductor Brad Hershey has prepared a program that includes Camille Saint-Saëns’ Danse Macabre, Charles Gounod’s Funeral March of a Marionette, and from Edvard Grieg’s Peer Gynt suite The Death of Åse and In The Hall Of The Mountain King.

He’s also included well-known mariachi tunes, such as La Negra and La Llorona in honor of Dia de los Muertos.

“Because Halloween is on Friday and Day of the Dead on Saturday and Sunday I thought we would try to represent aspects of both cultures while taking a moment to remember those who are no longer with us,” he said. “ ’La Llorona’ is a song about loss and grief. ‘Remember Me’ is from the popular animated film “Coco.”

Hershey began delving into the world of mariachi music last spring when he spent one trimester teaching mariachi music to a dozen Wood River High School students.

“I teach guitar at the high school and a lot of the students are into Spanish music—both older traditional mariachi tunes and contemporary ones, as well,” he said. “I thought it might be a good way to connect with a part of the community that is not as interested in  the Beatles. We ended up performing some mariachi standards with the school orchestra in the spring and, eventually, I’d like to do it again.”

Mariachi music is generally performed by a string band with trumpets and sometimes percussion. The string instruments include violins, a big bass guitar and a vihuela, which is a little smaller than a guitar, tuned like a lute and sounds like a ukulele. Sometimes there is even a small version of the harp, Hershey said.

Songs run the gamut from love songs to more tragic songs about loss—"similar to what you have right here in bluegrass music,” he added.

Mariachi music features unique rhythms you don’t necessarily see in other genres of folk music, which can be difficult to learn for those who have not been exposed to it, Hershey said

“It’s been a learning curve for me because I didn’t grow up listening to the music. And I’m just starting to learn how to speak Spanish. But it’s challenging in a new way, and that’s pretty exciting.”

Orchestra members are also excited about trying something new, Hershey said.

“We’re just excited to do something different,” he said. “The mariachi standards on our program have challenged the orchestra in new ways. We’re excited to celebrate Halloween in a way we’ve never done before and we’re excited to play these mariachi tunes.”