By Arden Berry | Arts & Life Editor
Due to a timing conflict with the July 19 World Cup final, The La Fiera de Ojinaga and Los Pescadores del Río Conchos concert will be rescheduled to April 11, 2027.
Jason Cook, Baylor vice president of marketing and communications, said the two bands have sold well at other Texas venues, but ticket sales for this performance were slower than they should be at this point. To discover the cause, he and his team met with Hispanic leaders throughout Waco.
“As part of those discussions, it quickly became evident that the World Cup final is on July 19,” Cook said. “A light bulb went off with us … To use an analogy, we had essentially scheduled a concert on the same day as the Super Bowl, except the World Cup is even bigger than the Super Bowl. So we may need to go back to plan zero and look at dates here.”
Cook said the April date came from the men’s and women’s basketball schedules, Foster Pavilion’s full fall concert schedule and the two bands’ schedules. However, he said having a spring concert may provide a new opportunity.
“We would really like to activate the Turner Plaza outside of the Foster Pavilion and create some sort of outdoor mercado, a festival-type of experience, in junction with the concert, and it is incredibly difficult to do that in the summer heat,” Cook said.
Dr. Mito Diaz-Espinoza, president and CEO of the Cen-Tex Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, said that the Chamber coordinates Floating Mercados throughout the year.
“There is usually a diverse group of products, from food and beverages, to candles, or hand-crafted items,” Diaz-Espinoza said. “The idea for the concert would be to create a space where there are vendors set up, some music, either a DJ or some artists playing live, to create a festive atmosphere while people wait to enter or to come and be part of the festivities.”
Cook said the mercado would contribute to an overall goal of providing community engagement and expanding beyond the Christian and country genres that have dominated Foster Pavilion’s early years.
“There was a desire between Baylor and the city to make sure that we bring in artists that would appeal to the larger Waco community,” Cook said. “So we started actively looking at artists that would cater to the Hispanic community, but then we’re also in discussions with artists that may attract the African American community to Foster Pavilion as well.”
La Fiera de Ojinaga and Los Pescadores del Río Conchos are both norteño-sax bands. According to “Music in Global America” by Marc Thorman, the norteño genre developed in Northern Mexico in the late 19th century with the accordion and baja sexto, a member of the guitar family, as its main instruments. Norteño-sax is a subgenre that features the saxophone as well.
“La Fiera De Ojinaga is well known for their unmatched música norteña sound with saxophone and contagious energy on stage,” Baylor wrote in the press release announcing the rescheduled concert. “Los Pescadores del Río Conchos emerged in 1994 as a norteño sax group that caught attention in the world of regional Mexican music.”
The rescheduled concert will follow performances by Old Dominion and Braxton Keith in the fall.
According to Thursday’s press release, tickets and parking passes already purchased will automatically transfer to the rescheduled date. Ticketholders unable to make the new date may request their refund within 30 days of the announcement through the Baylor Ticket Office. Tickets are still available at the ticket website.
“We’re very thankful that we were able to get the bands to reschedule,” Cook said. “That signals to us that they want to play in Waco. They want to play at Foster Pavilion. And we were able to make it work out.”
