Grupo Montéz De Durango

Grupo Montéz de Durango earned recognition as the leading exponents of Pasito Duranguense, also known as the Durango Step, a rhythm-driven hybrid of quebradita and merengue created by Mexican-Americans in Chicago. The group achieved success across both the United States and Mexico after issuing their first album, Rama Seca, in 1997. Their core membership shifted primarily among José Luis Terrazas on drums, Alfredo Ramírez Corral handling lead vocals, Ismael Mijarez on bass, Daniel Terrazas Avila at the keyboards, Paco Lopez also on keyboards, César Ruelas on trombone, and Armando Aguirre Ramirez on tambura, supplemented by additional guest players. Subsequent releases encompassed the 1998 title Tu Mirada: Coleccion Original and the 2002 album Sube y Baja. The 2003 set De Durango a Chicago entered the Hot Latin Albums chart at number two, whereas the 2004 audio-and-video package En Vivo Desde Chicago reached the summit of that same chart. Further number-one entries on the Latin Albums tally arrived with 2005’s Y Sigue La Mata Dando, 2006’s Borron y Cuenta Nueva, and 2007’s Agarrese; another 2007 release, En Directo Desde Mexico a Guatemala, settled at number seven. Two additional projects also reached the Top Ten, while the period spanning 2005 through 2009 saw twenty-four albums land inside the Top 50. Nine titles from the same stretch appeared inside the all-genre Top 200, five of them inside the Top 50. Their dominance proved even stronger on the Mexican Regional Albums charts, where a dozen albums placed inside the Top Ten between 2004 and 2008, five of those reaching number one. In 2014 the band issued the independent compilation Presenta through the Cruz de Piedra label, which spotlighted norteño artists including Norteñisimo Zierra Azul y Rey Román alongside the group. Live performances extended throughout the United States, Mexico, and Latin America. Their last project for Cruz de Piedra arrived as 2016’s De Vuelta a la Sierra before they moved to Remex Music for the following year’s Sin Cambiar el Estilo.