KUTX Austin

Drop-In on us at the @longcenter Lawn with our friends @kutx on Thursday, May 21 🤘🏽🤘🏽 You can grab your FREE ticket (yup, FREE!) starting Monday at 10am at longcenter.org !! 👉 See y’all there! 🎟️ RSVP on Monday, May 18 @ 10:00 AM CT 🎟️ Public RSVP Ticket link: /4336 #Fastball #KUTX #TheDropIn #Austin

This Week in Texas Music History, a bandleader dubbed El Indio claims the orquesta tejana crown. On May 17, 1929, bandleader and saxophonist Isidro López was born in Bishop, Texas, in Nueces County. Commonly known as “El Indio,” a nod to his father’s Mescalero Apache ancestry, López was a major innovator of the orquesta tejana sound as well as ranchera, conjunto, and bolero styles. López grew up in a family of migrant cotton workers and attended high school in Corpus Christi where he also thrived as a young boxer. His early musical experiences included stints with the father of conjunto music, Narciso Martínez, and orquesta bandleaders Balde González and Juan Colorado. López recorded his first song, “Digale,” at Armando Marroquin’s Ideal Records studio in Alice in 1954, and he founded his first band in 1955, a group with 16 members. López’s was considered the premier orquesta well into the 1960s, and his work paved the way for a new generation of stylists and bandleaders like Sunny Ozuna and Little Joe Hernández, who often opened for and looked up to López. He recorded for a handful of Texas record labels, including sixty singles for Ideal and several full-length records, including the LP Canta, which featured one side of ranchera tunes and boleros and López’s jazz work on the flipside. Isidro was a core artist on the orquesta circuit in South Texas and appeared on Domingo Peña’s Corpus Christi-area television show, including a notable performance with another South Texas music legend, accordionist Steve “El Parche” Jordan. An elder statesman of the genre, Isidro López was honored in his later years by various music heritage organizations and inducted into the South Texas Music Walk of Fame. Written by Alan Schaefer and voiced by Jason Mellard from the @centerfortxmusichistory at Texas State University. Edit: @allthingstq

On our Mother’s Day special, @confuciusjones ’ mom shared how a Batman soundtrack had him in a choke hold. Hear this and all episodes of The Breaks or wherever you get your podcasts 📹: @unittinu

On a very special Mother’s Day show of @thebreakskutx , @freshxknight ’s mom talks about his quiet path to being front and center. Here this and all episodes of The Breaks in kutx.org or wherever you get your podcast 📹: @unittinu

Get ready to MOVE this Friday, May 15, at Girard Kinney Park (fka Mueller Lake Park) when @theanimeros join us for the season finale of our free, family-friendly concert series, ROCK THE PARK! Plus, a set by fellow groove master DJ Jester the @filipinofist to get things started! Get details about parking, food, and all the dos and don’ts at /rockthepark 🤘 See you there! ✨Rock the Park is curated by KUTX and our Sunday-evening kids’ show @SparetheRock Spoil the Child, and presented by @Dell_Childrens Medical Center, part of @AscensionSeton ✨ @muelleratx 🎶 #kutx #kutxrockthepark

Hot damn! 3 days. 3 worlds. Armadillo Live at Central Machine Works, benefitting KUTX. June 5, 6, and 7. ⚘ Friday: Hippie Cowboy Ball. Costumes encouraged. Holy Wave • Annabelle Chairlegs ⚘ Saturday: Old Austin Day. Kids crafts. Austin music memorabilia swap and buy. The Rock & Roll Playhouse plays Music of the Armadillo. White Denim • Arc Iris • Gran Moreno ⚘ Sunday: Cosmic Revival Brunch Uncle Roy & Spice • Greyhounds Activities on activities on activities. All ages. All weekend long. Suggested $9.89 donation at the door for KUTX 98.9 FM, the 100% community-supported Austin Music Experience. Poster by Mishka Westell.

Getting Far Out at Austin Psych Fest 2026⚡️

Celebrate the one who made ya with @confuciusjones and @freshxknight when they bring their moms on for a special Mother's Day edition of @thebreakskutx ! This Saturday May 9 at 10 p.m. only on KUTX.

It’s Mother’s Day weekend, so we’re celebrating with a very special show. This Saturday we will welcome our mothers to join us on air to talk music and well…us! Hear this special The Breaks Mother’s Day show Saturday 10pm on @kutx 98.9 and kutx.org

This Week in Texas Music History, let’s meet a National Champion Lady Fiddler from North Texas. On May 2, 1923, country songwriter Ruby Nell Allmond was born in Fannin County. She hailed from a musical family, performing in church from the age of four and forming a band with her siblings in high school. She established herself as a distinctive player in North Texas and Oklahoma and soon joined a trio with fellow fiddlers Georgia Slim Rutland and Howdy Forester. In 1948, Allmond won the title National Champion Lady Fiddler at a contest in Greenville and expanded her horizons with a new, fuller band. By 1950, this group would garner greater visibility, campaigning for U. S. House Speaker Sam Rayburn and appearing on the program Big D Jamboree. She still held a day job, though, as a bank teller in Bonham, where she would work from 1956 to 1988. Allmond credited that job stability with freeing her up to focus on songwriting. Allmond’s process was to compose songs in her head during her bank shift and then go to her neighbor Audra Brock’s house in the evening to record in a makeshift home studio. By 1968, Allmond and Brock were confident enough in their work to strike out for Nashville, where they met with legendary Texas songwriter Cindy Walker. Walker saw something of her own unlikely career path in the pair and introduced them to folks at RCA. This launched a national career with regional roots, as the drive-thru teller from Bonham topped the charts with songs she wrote for Dottie West in 1968 (“Reno”), Stu Phillips in 1969 (“Speak Softly, My Love”), and Ferlin Husky in 1971 (“I Mustn’t Pass This Way Again”). From those chart-topping years on, Allmond worked at the bank, wrote her songs, fiddled around North Texas, and made a twice-yearly business pilgrimage to Nashville to renew contracts and royalty agreements. Her two albums came only posthumously, Today I’ll Think About the Rain and A Little Home Cooking, a fitting capstone to a unique country career. Written by Avery Armstrong and Jason Mellard from the @centerfortxmusichistory at Texas State University.

IT’S BACK!!! Your favorite summer concert series is returning for another season of free live music and good vibes. Come hang with us and @kutx all summer long. Check back tomorrow for the lineup drop, and sign up for Drop-In updates at the link in our bio 😎 The Drop-In, a Levitt VIBE Austin Music Series is supported in part by the Levitt Family Foundation. Visit levitt.org to learn more.

Everyone has complaints about the city they live in, but when it comes down to it, Austin can be pretty great. From the sense of community to the spots that feel like home, here are the best things about Austin, according to KUT and KUTX staffers. What’s your favorite thing about Austin? Tell us in the comments below. Video produced by Victoria Brooks ⭐: Chelsey Zhu Jerry Quijano (@jquijano ) Fresh Knight (@freshxknight ) Elizabeth McQueen (@elizmcqueen ) Confucius Jones (@confuciusjones ) Trina Quinn Matt Largey