THE LAST TIME John Saucedo performed on a concert stage in Canadian was back in the spring of 2010.

On a lark, “Sauce” and his buddies—Brad Layman, Taylor Schafer, Brad Hickey, and Emmett Webb—threw together an impromptu band over the previous weekend, and entered the Canadian’s Got Talent competition. The Hemphill Heartbreakers, as they were appropriately named, were the surprise winners in Junior Division competition, earning rave reviews for their cover of Alabama and becoming the instant object of affection for groupies young and old.

It was the first of only two public performances by the Heartbreakers, Saucedo told us this week, when we caught up with him in anticipation of his second appearance on a Canadian concert stage. Saucedo is a member of David Beck’s Tejano Weekend, an intriguing five-man band that will take the stage mid-afternoon on Saturday in the long-awaited return of the Canadian River Music Festival.

It’s been a long dry spell since the last festival, whose annual run was disrupted by the beastly pandemic for two years. CRMF No. 11’s day has come at last, though, and none too soon.

The organizers are ready. The fans are ready. The weather better be ready. And John Saucedo is ready to get back home, see his friends, and put on a show with his brothers in Tejano Weekend.

Saucedo has always loved music. While a student at Canadian High School, he played trombone in the Wildcat Band, which, during his senior year, was invited to perform as the Honor Band at the Texas Music Educators Association Convention.

After he graduated, Saucedo picked up other instruments, learning to play the banjo, ukulele, and mandolin, and more recently, the bajo quinto, an oversized acoustic bass guitar that has five courses of doubled steel strings, is played with a pick, and is particularly important to the distinctive Tejano music sound.

“I’ve always surrounded myself with musicians,” Saucedo said. “Whether it’s serious or not…just like in the backyard, or on the patio, you know, you get to meet people and jam and pass around the guitar.”

After a stint in college, which he decided wasn’t really for him, Saucedo ended up in Victoria where he got some training in hair school—which led, eventually, to owning and operating his own barber shop in San Marcos—and met a lot of musicians.

“I got to meet some good people, and had a little acoustic kind of band,” he said, “but it wasn’t until I moved to San Marcos, where it was a little more serious, and there’s way more musicians, and the scene is really going hard…between Austin and San Antonio. I feel like I hit the jackpot.”

Saucedo met David Beck about five years ago. Beck had worked with a dozen or more other bands, but he reached a turning point in San Antonio, “the Tejano Mecca.” Beck said his first performances were met with skepticism, but admitted, “I’d be skeptical of a tall, goofy, white boy playing this music, too. But you can’t argue with the beat…”

Saucedo was drawn to Beck’s style immediately. “I hopped on board,” he said, but after learning that he and his girlfriend were expecting, knew he had to put family first. Still, Saucedo subbed in when he was needed for the next couple of years, before coming back full-time with the group.

Tejano music was really born in Texas, and while it is heavily influenced by the Latino sound, it is a rich blend of folk, roots, rock, R&B, soul, blues, and country. Beck grew up listening to it, Saucedo said, “but it wasn’t something he had tapped into yet until he watched Selene live-taping at the Astrodome. That was the spark for it all.”

Beck’s band has carved out its own niche by playing Tejano music, sung in English—a decision, Saucedo said, that was also inspired, in part, by Selena, and in part, by the fact that Beck doesn’t know Spanish. Yet. “That’s a common theme around the band,” Saucedo said, laughing. “Most of us don’t know Spanish, but at least, we know what it feels like to play it.”

“It’s what makes us, us,” he said. “We do cover some Spanish songs, and there’s a Spanish original on the way, which I’m really excited about. We’re trying to mix it up.”

Asked if the English spin on Tejano expands their audience, Saucedo said, “You know, it does. After a show, we get a lot of, ‘Oh, man, I’ve always heard Tejano music. It’s so nice to finally be able to understand the words. We’re kind of bridging the gap.”

For Saucedo, this weekend’s appearance at the CRMF has a special meaning. “I love Canadian,” Saucedo said. “I love the community, and it’s been a long time coming. But you know, I’m coming home.”

Taking the stage at 3 pm Saturday, David Beck’s Tejano Weekend features blazing accordion, shimmering keys, cranked guitars, upright bass and drums—and maybe a touch of bajo quinto—more than enough to bridge any gap.

Austin Chronicle writer Doug Freeman described the band best. “David Beck is an admittedly unlikely champion for Tejano music, yet the former Sons of Fathers and Blue Healer founding frontman has unlocked an intoxicating inspiration. His creamy sweet tenor melts across the heavy rhythms, pining love with an almost indie-pop appeal and swooning conjunto croon.”

“The quintet rolls tight,” Freeman wrote. “Beck’s upright bass thumping and Dees Stribling’s percussion rollicking to John Saucedo’s guitar and Peter Huysman’s keys, all sliced deliciously by David Herrera’s accordion…DBTW thrills in swinging on the heavy emotion that the style unrolls, but the biggest delight may be the crossover potential that aligns Tejano more directly with Americana and country.”

If you need to know more than that, you need to be in Canadian Saturday to figure it out for yourself.

Headlining this year’s music festival is country music artist Clay Walker, whose 1993 hit single “What’s It to You” reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot Country Singles. The Vidor, Texas, native has released 11 studio albums, including his most recent one, Texas to Tennessee, featuring the hit singles, “Need a Bar Sometimes,” and “Anything to Do with You.”

Singer/songwriter Jack Ingram precedes Walker onstage. The critically-acclaimed country music artist has released 11 studio albums, one extended play, six live albums, and 19 singles during his 20-year recording career. His latest, The Marfa Tapes, was a collaborative studio album with Miranda Lambert and Jon Randall. It was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Country Album at the 64th Annual Grammy Awards.

Canadian’s day-long music festival will open at noon with singer/songwriter Seth Ward, an Amarillo native, followed at 1:30 pm by Tyler Wilhelm, whose wide range of rock, southern rock, blues, and country music has shaken the halls of some of Texas and Oklahoma’s legendary music venues. Following Tejano Weekend, Them Dirty Roses plugs in at 4:30 pm to play some quintessential southern rock and roll, rooted in the Bama clay and inspired by the likes of Skynyrd and Hank.

The Dirty River Boys will take over at 6 pm, with music that features four-part harmonies and stout acoustic/electric instrumentation, with the distinct feel of the far West Texas desert the band calls home.

MORE INFO

For more information, go online to https:// www.canadianrivermusicfestival.com/. General admission ticket sales began April 1 and will end on Friday, June 10, and are only available through the website. Early bird tickets can be purchased for $50 by Friday, June 10, after which all tickets must be purchased at the festival gate for $50 cash.