Episode six features Salsa music and dance in Philadelphia, Prima Ballerina Evelyn Cisneros, Tejana music pioneer Lydia Mendoza, and the father of Chicano music, Lalo Guerrero.

John Santos
John Santos is one of the foremost exponents of Afro-Latin music in the world today. He is known for his innovative use of traditional forms and instruments in combination with contemporary music, and has earned much respect and recognition as a record and event producer.

He has performed, recorded and studied with acknowledged masters of the Afro-Latin and Jazz idioms such as Cachao, Dizzy Gillespie, Tito Puente, Lazaro Ros, Armando Peraza, Eddie Palmieri, Patato Valdés, Francisco Aguabella, Orestes Vilató, Rene López, Max Roach, Walfredo de los Reyes, Milton Cardona, Roberto Borrell and Chocolate Armenteros.

This experience has provided a solid foundation for Mr. Santos' ground-breaking work in bringing together styles, rhythms, concepts and artists from different generations.

Evelyn Cisneros
Evelyn Cisneros began her training as a ballerina at the age of seven and a half. She continued to study at the School of American Ballet and the San Francisco Ballet School. Her career began at 16 with the San Francisco Ballet, and she has been dancing with that company for 20 years. She has performed locally and internationally, making guest appearances in Spain, Mexico, and Cuba. She has been and continues to strive to attain perfection in technique and artistic expression. Her desire to dance has developed into a passion that is very internal, very personal, and very essential.

She has most recently been honored as one of the Most Gifted Women in San Francisco. Ms. Cisneros is also very active in the community and supports organizations such as the School of Creative Arts, Children's Hospital, and KQED.

Lydia Mendoza
Lydia Mendoza, known as la alondra dela frontera ("the lark of the border"), made her first recording in 1928 as a member of her family-based Cuarteto Carta Blanca, which Leonora Mendoza, her mother, managed. In her four-decade career as a soloist, she usually accompanied herself on a twelve-string guitar and was considered a uniquely artful and dramatic interpreter of Spanish-language songs. Among her most famous singles were "Mal Hombre" ("Cold-hearted Man"), a song she said she got off a chewing-gum wrapper from Monterrey, Nuevo León, and "Delgadina," which expressed a critical view of a father's questionable intentions toward his daughter. Lydia Mendoza was honored in 1982 with a National Heritage Award from the National Endowment for the Arts, inducted into the Texas Women's Hall of Fame in 1985, and became the first Tejana admitted into the Conjunto Hall of Fame in 1991.

Lalo Guerrero
Lalo Guerrero is rightfully recognized as the "Father of Chicano Music" because no other Chicano artist has come close to writing and recording more great songs in virtually every genre of Latin music, including salsa, norteña, banda, rancheras, boleros, corridos, cumbias, mambos, cha cha chas, socially relevant songs, swing, rock & roll and blues. He has also created children' s music, comedy songs and parodies, in addition to being a world-class singer. Generations of children in Mexico and the U.S. grew up with his Ardillitas (squirrels), and his parodies such as, "Tacos for Two," "Pancho Claus," "Elvis Perez" and "There's No Tortillas," have brought laughter to Chicanos and Anglos alike. His songs about Cesar Chavez and the farm workers, the braceros, martyred journalist Ruben Salazar, and the plight of illegal aliens, have chronicled Chicano history and inspired his people.

He has performed all over the United States, Mexico and in Paris, France. He has received countless awards, including being declared a National Folk Treasure by the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C., the National Endowment of the Arts Fellowship, the Nosotros Lifetime Achievement Award and the National Medal of the Arts, presented by President Clinton. He has been invited to the White House three times, by Carter, Bush and Clinton.