Banda El Recodo returns to the Ventura County Fairgrounds on Nov. 20, nine years later

The Mazatlán institution, founded in 1938, comes back to the same grounds it last played in 2017, with Banda Los Recoditos on the bill.

The last time Banda El Recodo played Santa Barbara and Ventura, it was July 14, 2017, at the Ventura County Fairgrounds. Nine years later, the band comes back to the same grounds. Banda El Recodo plays the Ventura County Fairgrounds on Friday, Nov. 20, with the show starting at 7 p.m., and Banda Los Recoditos joins the bill.

The date was announced Oct. 15, and tickets are through the Ventura County Fair. The fairgrounds setup holds 2,000 for this one, which is a compact crowd for a band of this stature.

Banda El Recodo is about as foundational as banda music gets. Clarinetist Cruz Lizárraga formed the group in Mazatlán, Sinaloa, in 1938, naming it after El Recodo, the small town north of the city where he was born. Lizárraga died in Mazatlán in 1995, and his son has led the band since, taking it on extensive international tours. The Sinaloan press still describes it as the legacy that carried banda music to ears around the world.

The opening act is family, in a way. Banda Los Recoditos grew out of a group of young music students in Mazatlán in 1989, some of them children of musicians in El Recodo's band. The name was settled at a 1989 street-naming event honoring composer José Ángel Espinoza "Ferrusquilla," when Lizárraga and Ferrusquilla agreed on Banda Sinaloense Los Recoditos. It became known as the first youth band on Mexico's Pacific coast.

A band formed in 1938, coming back to the same grounds nine years later.

What has changed since 2017 is how the two bands travel. For much of 2026, El Recodo and Los Recoditos have been touring the U.S. together on the 90's Banda Tour package, which played the Coachella Valley's Acrisure Arena in April and stops including Nashville in May and Milwaukee in August. A July report noted both bands had U.S. work visas and had been on the road for months before heading into Canada. They also have a Mexico City date at Domo Care on Nov. 14, which puts Ventura less than a week later.

For Ventura County, where banda has deep roots in Mexican and Mexican American families, a fairgrounds night with both of these names is a reunion as much as a concert. The 2017 show will be a memory for some in the crowd; for younger fans, this may be the first chance to see El Recodo's brass up close, and the Recoditos set beforehand is no warm-up act.

It is a Friday night in late November near the water, so bring a jacket, give yourself time to park, and arrive for Los Recoditos. Then let the tubas and clarinets carry the rest of the night.

Sources: Banda el Recodo (Wikipedia) (en.wikipedia.org); Banda El Recodo: el legado sinaloense que llevó la música de banda a los oídos del mundo (Luz Noticias) (luznoticias.mx); Banda Los Recoditos (Fonovisa) (fonovisadisa.com); 90's Banda (Acrisure Arena) (acrisurearena.com); Concierto: Banda El Recodo, Banda Los Recoditos & Banda Zeta – 90’s Banda Tour (Plaza Mariachi) (plazamariachi.com); Banda El Recodo y Banda Los Recoditos llevan su música a Canadá (Publimetro) (publimetro.com.mx); Ventura County Fair (venturacountyfair.org); Banda El Recodo at Ventura County Fairgrounds (JamBase) (jambase.com)