Mariachi Arcoiris, billed as the world’s first LGBTQ Mariachi band, will woo their growing audience to Long Beach Pride this weekend.

Arcoiris means “rainbow” in Spanish, a fitting name to represent both the diversity of its members and its admirers. Together with their rainbow-colored moños and the name “Arcoiris” on their belts, the musicians are not only putting on a classical performance honoring Mexican traditions, but also representing the LGBTQ community in a setting traditionally populated by straight men.

The band will perform from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Sunday, May 19 at the Hotel Maya.

Related: Everything you need to know about Long Beach Pride, which returns to town this weekend

“At first, Mariachi Arcoiris was gonna be a one-shot thing,” said Carlos Samaniego, founder and director of the band.

In the early 2000s, Samaniego and Natalia Melendez launched the group in earnest at California State University, Los Angeles. The idea came to Samaniego after coming out as gay himself, he said. The campus turned out to be a great place to get the act started.

“Cal State Los Angeles is a very Latino campus, and a very open campus, so leadership was on board with the idea right away,” he said. “Word got around about this gay mariachi band and a manager at a gay Hollywood nightclub offered us a spot that we played at for about a year.”

But the musicians were all in their late teens and early 20s. Everyone had to finish school and go to work, leaving little time to dedicate to Mariachi Arcoiris. The band disbanded and Samaniego and Melendez wouldn’t officially bring the members back together until late 2013.

Fast forward to today: Mariachi Arcoiris has performed at venues across the country and will take their first international trip, to Spain. Their journey hasn’t been easy. Mariachi music, which originates from the Mexican state of Jalisco, features lyrics about heartbreak and romance — men singing to women, professing their desire and enticing their audience to fall in love with them. The music is also rooted in the male-dominant machista culture.

“After Arcoiris disbanded, I searched out other mariachi groups and I’ve experienced a lot of negative things in the mariachi world,” Samaniego said. “Being gay, I would hear a lot of negative things, where I was told I wasn’t good enough or they didn’t want to play with a gay man. So I thought that someday I will make this group again, with people like us, a safe place.”

Melendez, a trans woman, has become the face of the band, Samaniego said. She has been very public about her transition.

“When Carlos (Samaniego) called me, I had already transitioned and my story kind of got out there. I did some documentaries, was on TV and things just kind of snowballed for me personally,” Melendez said.

“I started transitioning through hormonal treatments, then started having surgery and it was a lot of changes happening very quickly,” she said. “And although I am so happy now, there were moments where I wondered if I was doing the right thing, especially because the world isn’t always very supportive.”

She’s hoping to help others feel comfortable within themselves and hopes Mariachi Arcoiris will be seen as a bridge for Mexican LGBTQ youth.

“I’ve always known I was a transgender woman, I knew it in my heart of hearts that’s who I was,” she said. “But then I would think, maybe I am just gay and for myself, it took a couple of years to figure it out and find that courage to live my life.”

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