For more photos, click here.
Born and raised in Mexico, Abel Rocha was introduced to the folk music of Mexico at an early age by his father and uncle, performing with them as early as 6. His father was a member of a popular regional group
called Lacantun. From them he learned the intricacies of Argentinian song forms and the Mexican hupango, the joropo and the sone.
A master of the Venezuelan harp, guitar, huapanguera, quatro and many native instruments of Mexico, Venezuela and Argentina. Prior to forming Correo Areo in 1992, he played concert tours thruogh the U.S.,
Canada and Mexico with the group Quetzalcoatl. He has also recorded sundtracks for the films American Me by Edward James Olmos, V. I. Warshawski, and the TV series Antagonists.
At 13, he was drawn to Andéan music and learned Mestizo or Criollo rhythms, a blend of Indian, African and European
influences. Music from Argentina and Chile became an au courant rage in the Seventies amongst the small community of traditional music lovers. Abel eagerly absorbed all he could from
the records and tapes that he scavenged from Mexico City's record bins. After learning the ropes in several folk ensembles, Abel entered Mexico City's Anthropological University and began
specializing in the musical forms native to the Veracruz, Michoacan and La Huasteca regions. He spent years listening to rare tapes, sitting in his room,
practicing and practicing, teaching himself. Through his friendship with Manuel Diaz, a Venezuelan anthropologist and musician, Abel learned the music of the plains of Venezuela.
Later still, he studied classical guitar and then briefly became a guitar instructor before joining up with
Troveros in 1985, the band that transmuted into Quetzalcoatl in 1987. While touring extensively in the United States with
Quetzalcoatl, Abel met Madeleine. They formed Correo Aéreo in 1992. Madeleine started playing violin at the age of five at her own insistence. She studied violin under Mary West and was featured repeatedly as a
soloist with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra at the Minneapolis Summer Music Festivals. She has also played with the Children's Theater of Minneapolis. At the age of nine, she was the Concert Mistress of the
Minneapolis Youth Symphony and Assistant Concert Mistress of the St. Paul Youth Orchestra. Around that time she started sneaking in LPs of world music artists. After leaving home at the age of thirteen and
busking on the streets she co-founded Gypsy dance and music troupe, Kithara at the age of sixteen with Terrence Karn. Kithara toured nationally for several years playing concerts, festivals, schools and
streetcorners like Gypsies do. Madeleine also studied flamenco dance with Susanna de Palma and Ado Cie and Barat Natyam with Raja Ram.
Madeleine is a violinist, percussionist and singer. From her own cultural
heritage of Spanish, Sephardic Jewish, Gypsy, French and Russian influences, she honors the impact these traditions had on the creations of cultural forms in Latin America when they were combined with
African and native Indian traditions. 
Madeleine then attended the California Institute of the Arts. She studied classical violin with Yoko Matsuda of the Sequoia String Quartet and played in the Gamelan Orchestra under
the direction of Poc Chocro. She studied ballet with Mia Slovenska of the Russian Ballet and contemporary dance with Donald Byrd, Gus Solomons, Jr., Bela Lewitsky, members of Martha Graham and Merce Cunningham Companies and
Indonesian dance with Nyoman Wenton. She also started performing in theater productions, both avant-garde and classical.
In Minneapolis, Madeleine started performing with the Palace Theater Company, an avant-garde Physical Theater Ensemble, and productions at the Minneapolis Institute of the Arts, and the Walker Arts Center with the cutting edge theater group, The Creation Company of New York. For two years, she performed with the original Steppenwolf Theater Company in Chicago. In New York, she studied acting under Uta Hagen, Carol Rosenthal and Rochelle Oliver. Madeline Barchevska directed her in Strindberg's The Stronger. Madeleine had a featured role in the Boston PBS production of Irony, aired on PBS television and at the Guggenheim Museum.
Moving to the Southwest, Madeleine was part of the Compost Theater Group in Santa Fe, New Mexico, conducting guerilla theater warfare in the shadow of Los Alamos, birthplace of the first atomic bomb. Madeleine was also heavily involved with the world music community. In Santa Fe, there was Indian, Flamenco, Middle Eastern and African music creating a small but potent scene.
In 1990, Madeleine was performing in an all-female touring production of Beckett's Waiting For Godot, directed by Karen Grassle (Little House on the Prairie). Abel was in Santa Fe touring with Quetzalcoatl. They met at flamenco parties and other musical gatherings and they co-founded Correo Aéreo in 1992.
Copyright © 1999 Correo Aéreo
Site design and hosting provided by BNS, Inc and Moyra