The Sonic Trace map, sonictrace.org is live!
Over the past year, we’ve been documenting immigrant communities across Los Angeles. We have gathered 200 stories inside La Burbuja – our portable soundbooth, produced seven documentaries and made two short films – with a third in production. Visit sonictrace.org and click on the radio icons to hear broadcast stories. Within the pop-up window click on arrows for …

The Chapin Breakfast, served only once a month at Santa Cecilia’s church.

Long before the concept of a pop-up restaurant was even established in 2009 by a certain audacious, Los Angeles French chef, Santa Cecilia’s Catholic Church had already mastered it. In 2001 to be exact, when the South L.A. church’s congregants of various ethnic backgrounds formed four different volunteer cooking groups, as a way …

This week, we will be launching Sonic Trace’s interactive story-telling map on sonictrace.org! Stay tuned to facebook, twitter and our blog to explore the stories of Los Angeles that we’ve gathered this past year.
For the past year, the Sonic Trace team has been hard at work documenting pockets of LA that become gateways into villages and towns across Mexico and Central America. You …

Mexican Chef with Boyle Heights YouthThe somber cafeteria at White Memorial Hospital in Boyle Heights is perhaps the last place in Los Angeles you would expect to find Aquiles Chavez, the high profile, Mexican celebrity chef that has his own show on the Utilisima network (Mexico’s equivalent to the Food Network). But last week, the Mexico city-born chef that sports dreadlocks and a handlebar …

 
Anayansi Diaz-Cortes is an award-winning independent producer for public radio in the US. This year – as part of AIR’s Localore  initiative – she moved from New York to Los Angeles to work with KCRW to create the documentary and transmedia series, Sonic Trace. @SonicTrace_KCRW
 

 
Eric Pearse Chávez is an independent radio producer, and co-creator of the Localore project, Sonic Trace. His work has aired …

Sonic Trace is KCRW‘s story-telling project that begins in the heart of Los Angeles and crosses into Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.
Are you or your parents from Mexico or Central America? Do you have Angeleno relatives, friends, colleagues or neighbors that came from those regions? Do you know why they left? What made them stay? Did they go back?
We want to know what …

The Sonic Trace team is currently embedded with La Burbuja – our portable sound booth – at Santa Cecilia Church in South LA. Every Sunday we gather dozens of interviews asking people why they left their country of origin, why they stayed in LA, and about the importance of going back. We also document many of the church’s activities. At Santa Cecilia Church, the …

KCRW’s Sonic Trace is part of Localore – an initiative produced by the Association of Independents in Radio (AIR). You may have heard a version of that line in all our crediting. So, what does it mean?
In short, ten producers were given the enormous task to ‘incubate’ at public radio and television stations across the country and innovate, collaborate and help take the …

If you grew up Latin American (or Spaniard) and Catholic, the Chrismas season isn’t over yet. This morning probably finds you celebrating with goodies left by the Reyes Magos, and having a wonderful sweet bread called Rosca de Reyes for breakfast with a huge cup of hot chocolate, atole or champurrado to wash it down. January 6th is El Día de Los Reyes Magos …

KCRW DJ Raul Campos talks about his parents’ home in the Maravilla projects in East LA, and how many of his high school peers were phonetically challenged when it came to pronouncing his name.

Photo by Eric Pearse Chávez
Our sonic profile series was recorded inside La Burbuja – Sonic Trace’s mobile recording booth. They aired everyday on KCRW’s Morning thru the holiday season. KCRW’s Sonic …