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Felix Contreras and Anamaria Sayre on The Latino Newsletter Podcast
It is the last day of Week 119 of The Latino Newsletter (yes, we took Wednesday off), and if you are a fan of the original podcast we launched in 2024, you know we haven’t dropped a new episode since June.
As a small team, we had to pivot and complete American Colony, so when we had 16 episodes (8 in English, 8 in Spanish) deep in production, something had to give. At that moment, what gave was the final episode of The Latino Newsletter Podcast’s second season.
We have good news to share.
Episode 20 is out!
Hosted by Michelle Zacarias, the conversation features Felix Contreras and Anamaria Sayre of NPR's Alt.Latino, talking music, generations, and El Tiny — NPR’s annual Latino Music Month takeover of Tiny Desk, which is back now since, you know, it's September again.
They talk about their cross-generational friendship as co-hosts, what streaming has taken from music discovery and what it's given back, and why El Tiny matters to artists who've spent decades being told their music belonged in a small corner of the record store.
Give it a listen on our site or, better yet, just watch it on video on our YouTube channel.
The team did fantastic work to set this up and handed the baton to me to complete production — one of the reasons we didn’t publish this past Wednesday. Their professionalism and dedication to Season 2 were on full display. It was an incredible season.
What Comes Next
This is also a moment to tell you what comes next. The plan is simple: The Latino Newsletter Podcast stays open and topical. It’s where we talk about Latinidad in the moment — culture, music, the news of the week, whoever we want to sit down with.
Meanwhile, as we said in Episode 8 of American Colony, we will have our video episodes lined up, starting on September 23 and going into October. We’ll keep seeking funding for a second season, but we also won’t forget about The Latino Newsletter Podcast. You can give here anytime to keep us going.
The response to American Colony has been extraordinary. People we admire and respect, whose opinions we take seriously, have gone out of their way to tell us the work mattered. We know we have something real, and we want to make a Season 2.
I stay hopeful because that is all that I know.
The Latino Newsletter is an independent nonprofit journalism outlet and production company. Give now to support our work.
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What We’re Reading
Thanks to everyone who submitted news this week. It was a busier week than usual, so we couldn’t fit them all, but keep sending them to [email protected].
Latinos de Aquí: If you are an early fan of The Latino Newsletter, you know that our first big production was the Latino Election Project with the fabulous team at New England Public Media. So we're thrilled that NEPM announced earlier this week the launch of a new Latinos de Aquí video series that will expand bilingual storytelling in Western Massachusetts.
Here is the trailer.
More Puerto Rican Stories: From our friends at the Center for Puerto Rican Studies at Hunter College (CENTRO), the CENTRO Out Loud podcast series is out. Its first season, The Unheard Tapes of Frank Espada, “highlights never before heard interviews recorded by photographer, community organizer, educator, and activist Frank Espada (1930-2014) from 1979 to 1981 as he traveled across the United States photographing Puerto Ricans living in the diaspora,” according to CENTRO’s media release.
Julio Ricardo Varela is the founder of The Latino Newsletter. He is also its current part-time publisher and executive director. He wrote, edited, and published this edition.
Consider donating to The Latino Newsletter. Any contribution, no matter how small, helps keep this newsletter free and accessible to all. ¡Gracias mil!