Henderson artist awarded National Heritage Fellowship

In the past 50 years, Henderson resident Suni Paz has written more than 600 songs.

Last week, she was recognized for her cultural contributions by the National Endowment for the Arts as a 2020 recipient of its National Heritage Fellowships.

Since 1982, only four other artists from Nevada have been named National Heritage Fellows.

Paz was awarded for her songwriting and performance of Latin American folk music that the NEA says has resonated as a cultural force, engaging people of all backgrounds and ages.

The Argentinian artist was one of the first artists to bring the nueva canción tradition, the “new song” music of the 1960s and 1970s, to North American audiences.

“I call them songs with conscience,” Paz says. “They are songs to open the conscience of others, to learn a little bit about others, different cultures, different instruments. I owe it to children. They opened my conscience.”

Paz says that she started teaching music to elementary school students in California, after moving there from Argentina in 1965.

“Soon, all the teachers were asking me to come to the classrooms,” the 84-year-old artist says. “The kids were in heaven. I had many beautiful experiences with that.”

Paz wrote a curriculum for teaching Latin American culture through songs, stories and dances and has recorded more than 20 albums, including 11 on Smithsonian Folkways.

Since moving to Henderson in 2009, she has performed several concerts at Southern Nevada’s public libraries for audiences of all ages.

“The last concert I had, half the library was filled with older people. Some brought grandchildren, nieces and nephews. So I bring the kids on stage and let them play with me,” Paz says.

Paz enjoys sharing Latin American instruments with children, such as the percussive güiro that can be rapped with a stick, castanets that can be clapped between two fingers, and the stringed charango, formed from an armadillo shell.

“This award is recognition for all the work I’ve done,” Paz says. “Usually you don’t know the effect you’ve had. You never recognize in the moment the love you put into the world for 50 years. I put my soul, heart, everything because I love what I do.”

Contact Janna Karel at jkarel@reviewjournal.com. Follow @jannainprogress on Twitter.