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San Antonio Band Challenge Aims To Show Off Young Artists, Feed The Hungry

San Antonio band member plays a backyard performance.
Baldemar Esquivel
San Antonio band member plays a backyard performance.

A San Antonian who just graduated college recently found himself doing an interesting project for his hometown. He's Matthew San Martin, a recent graduate of Austin's St. Edward’s University.

"I graduated with a degree in communication with the focus in digital media and journalism," he said.

He doesn't think San Antonio music gets the attention it deserves, so he proposed an interesting way to shine a new light on it.

"I thought of an idea of having a compilation album of young up-and-coming San Antonio musicians covering other San Antonio musicians," San Martin said.

By that he means not performing their own music, but doing other bands' music. And, each band can only be covered once, so once a group chooses who they want to cover, no one else can cover that band.

Credit courtesy Madison Cuenca
Matthew San Martin

Plus, there's a twist:

"And in the effort to keep things exciting and keep everybody's creative juices flowing during these uncertain circumstances, I'm encouraging the artists involved in this project to cross genres and to really explore all of the music that San Antonio has to offer," he said.

That embrace of different genres could have some interesting results.

"By all means, if a mariachi band wants to cover a metal band, that's fair game," he said.

San Martin believes this stretch into new territory will be good for all involved.

"I really do think that you do need to step out of the comfort zone, and you really just have to put your own twist, put your own flavor to these songs," he said.

Twenty-one bands have already committed, and the results will be for sale, to benefit the San Antonio Food Bank. If you want to take part in the project find out more on Twitter at @xsanmartinx.

Jack Morgan can be reached at Jack@TPR.org and on Twitter at @JackMorganii.

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Jack Morgan can be reached at jack@tpr.org and on Twitter at @JackMorganii