Andino Suns with El Leon & The Strangers
“Social processes can be arrested by neither crime nor force. History is ours, and people make history.” – Salvador Allende
Andino Suns grew out of the desire for Andrés Davalos to recreate the music he’d grown up listening to at home. His parents were exiled to Canada when a fascist dictatorship took over their homeland, Chile, in the early 70s. Though they found peace in Canada, Andrés’ parents missed terribly the way of life from which they had been violently uprooted. They continued to surround themselves with their Chilean culture, passing it down to their children through stories, traditional Andean music and folk dances, and media. It’s no surprise then that a worldview of political activism, hope, and love, underpins the music of Andino Suns.
The folkloric music of his childhood marked Andrés indelibly, and by 2009 he had written a handful of Spanish songs with traditional Andean influences. He recruited his friend, Andrés Palma, also a son of Chilean exiles who were similarly uprooted to Canada.