Michael "Mijail" Martinez

Born in the heart of Texas and Raised in rural New York, Michael “Mijail” Martinez is a singer-songwriter living in blended words. Wielding a Spanish guitar and three-row accordion, he weaves elements of Americana, Latin folk music, and French Louisiana to  create unique songs with strong roots. Drawing on his mixed Lousiana-creole and Hispanic heritage, he is part Texas-troubadour, part New York-folkie and 100% roots music. 

Getting his start as a teenaged street performer singing in three languages, he started making a a career being pulled into Mexican restaurants to sing serenatas to patrons; also working for local labor organizers singing to migrant workers in the cornfields and vineyards of the Finger Lakes.    In his youth he began to drift around the country and later the world singing a range of styles in  including rancheras, Country classics, Cajun staples and old flamenco songs. Eventually relocating to San Antonio,  he has been spotted on stages in theaters, in cantinas, house shows, and street-corners and subway tunnels from NYC to Barcelona; Mexico City to New Orleans. 

Together with his band The Cantina Ramblers or solo he writes and  performs in English, Spanish and French, putting on a show as fitting for an intimate listening room as a dark dance hall. Sweetness and fire abound as he explores love, death, longing, sensuality and solitude using the tools fo a wandering troubadour, His demo EP “Carnaval Blues en Nueva York” is available on all platforms.