Yahritza Y Su Esencia

Growing up in Washington’s Yakima Valley, a fruit-growing agricultural region dotted with small towns and apple orchards, Yahritza Martínez and her four siblings were surrounded by Mexican music. Latinos make up more than half of Yakima County’s population, and many of them are migrants from Mexico’s western state of Michoacán, where Yahritza’s parents are from. Her father and her uncles played in a band, and her oldest brother, Armando or “Mando,” now 24, joined when he was about 10. Yahritza would always sing around the house: “She’d even sing her ABCs with so much feeling,” Yahritza’s older sister Adriana remembers with a laugh. But there’s one day that everyone in the family remembers: Mando was practicing songs on his keyboard when suddenly, everyone heard a big, impressive voice jumping in to join him.