Mariachi Vargas de Tecalitlan

Most mariachis will play a pasodoble or two in a set; an entire album of them is something of a rarity. But this marvelous music -- slightly macho, slightly romantic, slightly melancholic -- hails from Spain and is the iconic bullfighting music. (It also sends ballroom dancers into fits.) Mariachi Vargas lock horns with the music and come out the winners, evoking both old Mexico and old Spain effortlessly, while implicitly serenading a sport which is drawing the ire of 21st-century animal rights activists.