Cris Plata

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From Fields to Stage / Del Campo al Escenario

Maia A. Surdam

A dual-language biography, written in English and Spanish, traces a talented Mexican American musician’s journey from farm fields to performance stages.

216 pages, 7 x 9, 42 color and b&w photos, 3 maps
Paperback: $12.95 | ISBN: 978-0-87020-638-2
Ebook: $9.99 | ISBN: 978-0-87020-639-9
Publication Date: 4/7/2014

In English and Spanish

Reading Level: Ages 8–14, Grades 3–8

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Description

Raised among Mexican and Mexican American farmworkers, singer-songwriter Cris Plata spoke Spanish, ate Mexican food, and heard Mexican music played by family and friends. He also spoke English, went to school with mostly white children, and grew familiar with mainstream American culture. Throughout his youth, the Plata family lived the life of migrant farmworkers, moving from southern Texas to Indiana to Arkansas and Florida, before arriving in rural Wisconsin in the mid-1960s. While hardships—from poor working conditions and low wages to racial prejudice—were constant in Cris Plata’s upbringing, so too was the music that bonded and uplifted his family. After long days in the fields, Cris’s family spent their limited free time playing and singing songs from Mexico and South Texas, and music would be the course that Cris chose to follow in his life. This dual-language book shares the Platas’ story of migrant farming, music, and family amid the constant change and uncertainty of migrant life.

Cris began strumming a guitar when he was just five years old and soon learned to master the guitar, accordion, and mandolin. Today, he writes his own music, performs songs in English and Spanish, and records albums with his band, Cris Plata with Extra Hot.

Following his journey from migrant worker to accomplished musician, Cris Plata: From Fields to Stage / Del Campo al Escenario explores how a migrant, and the son of a Mexican immigrant, decided to make Wisconsin his home. Young readers will also learn about indigenous Mexican culture, Wisconsin agriculture, and the Chicano rights movement.

Author Bio

Maia Surdam

Maia Surdam is an educator, historian, and nature enthusiast who lives in Madison County, North Carolina. A first-generation college graduate raised in rural Michigan, she earned her PhD in US History from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and has been engaged in studying and teaching about the past ever since. For her dissertation, which focused on the history of Mexican and Mexican American migratory farm laborers, she did archival research at numerous institutions and conducted oral histories with former migrant laborers and farmers, including Cris Plata.