{"id":1357,"date":"2026-05-22T19:13:44","date_gmt":"2026-05-22T19:13:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/denvermovingchronicle.com\/?p=1357"},"modified":"2026-05-22T19:13:44","modified_gmt":"2026-05-22T19:13:44","slug":"a-latino-grocery-store-in-delaware-turns-its-produce-aisle-into-a-music-stage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/denvermovingchronicle.com\/?p=1357","title":{"rendered":"A Latino grocery store in Delaware turns its produce aisle into a music stage"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<div>\n<div>\n<ul><\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><strong>NEW CASTLE, Del.<\/strong> | A neat stack of 79-cent bananas and rows of colorful fruit flanked the bilingual alternative pop band Luna Luna as they performed for a small audience at a Latino grocery store in northern Delaware.<\/p>\n<p>The show was part of the monthly Mercadito sessions put on by the Fiesta Fresh Market, a family-owned store in the Philadelphia metro-area city of New Castle, far away from the massive music industry hubs typically associated with artistic opportunity and exposure. But the excitement of new music, paired with the colorful, unassuming stage, has rapidly engaged an international following for the 2-year-old store \u2014 with up-and-coming bands traveling from far away to perform, and tens of thousands tuning in online.<\/p>\n<p>Jose Luis Aguilar Garcia, one of the store\u2019s owners, hopes the series highlights the persistence of joy and creativity in Latino communities at a time when they\u2019re often only brought up on the news in the context of immigration crackdowns, he said.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Tiny Desk Concert inspired<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<p>Jose Luis Aguilar Garcia has worked with both food and music for most of his life.<\/p>\n<p>Born in Mexico, Garcia grew up in an apartment adjacent to where he would eventually open Fiesta Fresh Market. Garcia worked at farmers markets and grocery stores since he was a teenager, and ran a photography and videography company that also produced regional Mexican music like mariachi, corridos tumbados and banda.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe did a lot of quincea\u00f1eras, weddings, that sort of thing. Music was always like something I wanted to do as a passion project, but especially here in Delaware, there\u2019s really no industry for that,\u201d Garcia said.<\/p>\n<p>In 2023, an artist on Garcia\u2019s label \u2014 DannyLux \u2014 was invited to perform at NPR\u2019s Tiny Desk Concert, a semiprivate music series filmed in the middle of the radio station\u2019s bustling Washington, D.C., bureau, and then distributed to a massive following on YouTube. It was then that Garcia realized the special appeal of an unconventional, acoustic setup.<\/p>\n<p>With the capital his label got from producing DannyLux\u2019s music, Garcia opened the store in 2024 with his sister and father. And eventually, he used his experience with the Tiny Desk Concerts at the store too, merging the two otherwise disparate aspects of his life.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Showcasing culture<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Garcia initially hoped the shows would attract business, but it was hard to sell local artists on performing in such a quirky context, Garcia said.<\/p>\n<p>But soon, the premise caught on. All of the acts in an April show had heard about the small store on social media before they were asked to perform.<\/p>\n<p>While the shows initially featured almost exclusively the Spanish-language music that Garcia produced with his label, the Mercadito sessions now showcase a broad range of artists and genres.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI found that super interesting that no matter who the artist was that was playing, people would gather to hear,\u201d Garcia said.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Global audiences<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Luna Luna, which has earned recognition from outlets like Billboard and Rolling Stone, was one of three bands performing at the late April show. It was a vastly different from the other stops on their sprawling United States tour.<\/p>\n<p>Large pi\u00f1atas hung from the ceiling above the group as they performed \u2014 a vastly different ambiance from the stages and lights that normally set the scene for Luna Luna\u2019s hypnotic, indie-pop ballads. The performance was illuminated with the fluorescent grocery-store lighting, which customers used to shop in the background as Luna Luna sang in both Spanish and English.<\/p>\n<p>The unconventional platform was part of the appeal for lead singer Kavvi Gonzalez, along with many in the series\u2019 rapidly growing fanbase, for whom the unique venue evokes a kind of nostalgia.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI actually grew up shopping at stores like this, so to be able to play in one is kind of crazy,\u201d said Gonzalez, who was born in Colombia and moved to Texas when he was 6.<\/p>\n<p>The charm is in the surprising romance of the mundane, Gonzalez said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTo see people just actually be shopping around and just living regular life while we\u2019re doing a performance here, you know, it\u2019s cool. It\u2019s combining real life and music culture,\u201d Gonzalez said.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/denvermovingchronicle.com\/?p=1351\">Girls Tennis: 2026 All-Colorado League teams<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/denvermovingchronicle.com\/?p=1353\">Colorado GOP governor primary: Establishment favorite vs. MAGA candidates<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/denvermovingchronicle.com\/?p=1355\">The balikbayan box: The way Filipino Americans have sent love all the way back home<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NEW CASTLE, Del. | A neat stack of 79-cent bananas and rows of colorful fruit flanked the bilingual alternative pop band Luna Luna as they performed for a small audience at a Latino grocery store in northern Delaware. The show was part of the monthly Mercadito sessions put on by the Fiesta Fresh Market, a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1356,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1101,1093,1094,1102,149,152,1103,1104],"tags":[1998,1999,2000,2001,2002,2003],"class_list":["post-1357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-0-no-apple-publish","category-0recent-headlines","category-0trending","category-1gridmagazine","category-a-town-magazine","category-sentinel-lifestyle","category-uncategorized","category-z-other-galley","tag-dannylux","tag-fiesta-fresh-market","tag-jose-luis-aguilar-garcia","tag-luna-luna","tag-mercadito-sessions","tag-nprs-tiny-desk-concert"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>A Latino grocery store in Delaware turns its produce aisle into a music stage - Denver Moving Chronicle<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/denvermovingchronicle.com\/?p=1357\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Latino grocery store in Delaware turns its produce aisle into a music stage - Denver Moving Chronicle\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"NEW CASTLE, Del. | A neat stack of 79-cent bananas and rows of colorful fruit flanked the bilingual alternative pop band Luna Luna as they performed for a small audience at a Latino grocery store in northern Delaware. 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