On Tuesday, the Napa Valley Register reported that in a community forum that evening, BottleRock organizers Latitude 38 met with Napa residents to announce Festival La Onda, explaining that it follows requests from the sizable local Latino population for a specialized music festival. The festival’s website also promises local and regional Latin cuisine, specialty beverages, a spa, a silent disco and other amenities similar to BottleRock.
The announcement follows several trends, foremost among them the massively growing popularity of Latin music — especially in California, where nearly 40% of the state’s population is Latino. It also capitalizes on BottleRock’s on-site infrastructure for a second weekend of music, which has become routine at festivals like Coachella. And, in Napa, it follows this year’s inaugural Sabor Y Ritmo festival, with a lineup of Latin music acts, held at Silverado Resort in September.
Whether Festival La Onda will attract the large crowds of BottleRock, which organizers estimate at 120,000 people across three days, will be dependent largely on the performers. Going by some already announced tour dates, it may be safer to predict who won’t be part of the lineup than who will. Gloria Trevi performs at the SAP Center in San Jose on Feb. 3, making it unlikely she’d return for Festival La Onda. Likewise, Pepe Aguilar will be at the SAP Center on July 19, and Hombres G on June 29.
