Mexican composer turns fire and ritual into a musical journey of renewal

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexican composer María Leonora prepares for each concert as if she’s gearing up for battle.

Her makeup has a tribal edge. Her clothes are arranged in layers she sheds as the show unfolds. An amulet over her belly button serves as protection.

“I look into the mirror and I sort of go to war,” she said prior to a recent presentation in Mexico City. “I brace myself to walk through the fire and whatever happens happens.”

Her 2025 performances were conceived as chapters connected by a common thread. She called the series “Through All the Fire,” believing that both music and flames carry a powerful renewal quality.

“A fire can burn and destroy,” she said. “But if you make it through, you can be reborn.”

That same idea of heat and renewal is present in the ambience of her shows. Her concerts draw inspiration from a pre-Hispanic steam bath known as a “temazcal,” which played a significant role in Mesoamerican social and religious life.

“You may suffer as you enter a temazcal, but you put up with it,” she said. “You sweat and your ego cracks. Even if you don’t want to, heat breaks you.”

Temazcales had a ritual function and a cosmological significance for Mesoamerican cultures, wrote archaeologist Agustín Ortiz in a publication from Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History.

Built in stone or adobe structures, each bath could hold dozens of people and produced steam by heating stones before dousing them with water.

“The temazcal was seen as the Earth’s interior and as a passageway between the world of the living and the underworld,” Ortiz wrote. “It was conceived as an entrance to the ‘beyond.’”

Most of them were located near ceremonial ballcourts, underscoring their connection to the game’s ritual dimension.

Temazcales remain in use today, but their earliest forms have been found in Maya cities such as Chichén Itzá and Palenque, and in sites like Tlatelolco and Teotihuacán in central Mexico.

María Leonora encountered music’s healing power at age 16.

She embraced punk rock as an adolescent going through a rough patch. And after learning how to play the drums, she first set foot on a stage.

“I was able to transform so many things just by playing and standing in front of an audience,” she said. “I can honestly say it saved my life.”

From then on, she spent years playing with other musicians and engaging in different genres.

In “Through All the Fire,” she interprets a wide variety of songs in an attempt to make her audiences move from darkness into a sense of renewal.

“Music is a powerful tool that can connect you to Earth, to life, to the universe and to other people,” she said. “It’s a means for you to dig up and find things about yourself.”

She describes her shows as “immersive concerts,” meaning that sound, lights and visuals play a role in shaping the attendees’ involvement.

“We want the audience to feel enveloped in the experience of each song,” said producer Diego Cristian Saldaña. “In the emotions and specific sensations the music triggers and that we’re intentionally seeking.”

That intention comes through in how audiences describe the experience.

In a video released by Mexico City’s Ministry of Culture in late November, a young man who had seen María Leonora’s performances on three occasions said each experience had felt deeply gratifying. Another woman mentioned she felt exhausted ahead of the show but left full of energy, wishing to get on with her life.

“We constantly encourage people to actively participate,” she said. “To dive into an internal journey.”

“Through All the Fire” starts with her voice inviting the audience into crossing the “salt circle,” which means to leave behind the outside world.

As the lights remain warm and subtle, her first song talks about love. Then the repertoire moves to a breakup. The pain brought by separation reflects on the stage.

As the show evolves, María Leonora explores deeper emotions, and she gradually removes her makeup and takes off layers of clothes. Then the climax comes.

“As my character is exhausted, to the ground, it starts to breathe again,” she said. “The moment comes to walk through the fire, as you would do in a temazcal.”

To liberate themselves with her, attendees are encouraged to howl, scream or engage in whatever ritual they feel they need. Once free from what weighs on them, they sing.

“Our last song is like a first ray of light,” she said. “You can look back into your life and move forward toward luminosity.”

Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

Mexican composer Maria Leonora performs her series she calls “Through All the Fire,” at the Sergio Magaña Theater in Mexico City, Friday, Nov. 28, 2025. (AP Photo/Claudia Rosel)

Mexican composer Maria Leonora performs her series she calls “Through All the Fire,” at the Sergio Magaña Theater in Mexico City, Friday, Nov. 28, 2025. (AP Photo/Claudia Rosel)

Mexican composer Maria Leonora performs her series she calls “Through All the Fire,” at the Sergio Magaña Theater in Mexico City, Friday, Nov. 28, 2025. (AP Photo/Claudia Rosel)

Mexican composer Maria Leonora performs her series she calls “Through All the Fire,” at the Sergio Magaña Theater in Mexico City, Friday, Nov. 28, 2025. (AP Photo/Claudia Rosel)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Republicans are increasingly concerned that immigration enforcement is becoming a political liability in the upcoming midterm elections after two people were killed by federal agents during President Donald Trump’s crackdown in Minneapolis.

Although few are willing to publicly break with the president, there has been a crescendo of criticism as Republicans nudge the White House to change course. A looming end-of-week funding deadline has brought the issue to a head in Congress, with Democrats vowing to block Homeland Security funding without significant changes and Republicans struggling to find their footing.

“This is about regaining the trust of the American people on this issue, and I really think we’re losing on an issue that we should be winning on,” Sen. Thom Tillis told reporters on Capitol Hill.

The North Carolina Republican is retiring at the end of his term, making him more willing to talk candidly than other members of his party who are reckoning with outrage over the Minneapolis deaths while also trying to avoid getting crosswise with Trump.

But others are also speaking out after Alex Pretti, 37, was killed Saturday, just weeks after Renee Good, also 37, was fatally shot.

“The administration has lost control of the narrative,” said Jason Roe, a Republican strategist working on midterm campaigns. He said, "We can’t get out from underneath what’s happening in Minneapolis.”

Historically, the party in control of the White House loses ground in Congress during the midterms. Republicans have also struggled in elections without Trump on the ballot, a pattern that continued last year in New Jersey and Virginia.

“Democrats are really, really mad and they cannot wait to go vote,” said Roe. “And I just am not seeing that in any polling I’ve seen on the Republican side.”

For Republicans uneasy with the administration’s enforcement tactics but reluctant to criticize Trump directly, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has become the focal point for their anxiety.

“I think you have a secretary right now that needs to be accountable to the chaos and some of the tragedy that we have seen," said Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who said Noem should step down. She added that "we need clarity and accountability for the chaos and tragedy we have seen.”

Trump has said Noem is “doing a very good job” and would remain in his administration. Democrats said she should be impeached, although they lack the necessary clout on Capitol Hill to achieve that while Republicans have the majority.

Immigration has been one of Trump's signature issues, and voters were even more likely to accept his hardline stance in 2024 than they were in previous campaigns. Republicans remain overwhelmingly supportive of his work on immigration, according to a Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research survey conducted in January.

Tillis, who has also called for Noem to be replaced, said the president is jeopardizing that.

“He won on a strong message about immigration,” Tillis said. “And now nobody’s talking about that. They’re not talking about securing the border. They’re talking about the incompetence of the leader of Homeland Security.”

The concerns have spilled into Maine, home to one of the nation’s most competitive Senate races. Sen. Susan Collins, who is up for reelection, said Tuesday that she had asked the administration to pause the surge of immigration enforcement operations in her state and Minnesota.

Lawmakers are using the Jan. 31 deadline for passing government funding legislation as a pressure tactic to inflict change. Trump has already signed into law six of the 12 annual spending bills for the current budget year, but six more still await approval in the Senate, including funding for Homeland Security.

A growing number of Senate Republicans have said they would be open to Democrats’ demand to separate Homeland Security funding from the broader package for further debate, while advancing the remaining bills.

Other Republicans have struck a more cautious tone. First-term Sen. Ted Budd of North Carolina said on social media that while he supports Trump’s immigration goals, he was hopeful that the president's decision to reshuffle personnel in Minnesota would lead to “orderly and systematic operations” focused on the most dangerous offenders.

There's been a noticeable tone shift at the top following Pretti's death Saturday. In an interview late Tuesday, the president told ABC News that he hoped the presence of border czar Tom Homan — who this week replaced the Border Patrol's Gregory Bovino as his on-the-ground point person — would allow for “a little bit more relaxed” and “de-escalated” operation in Minneapolis.

But Trump reacted angrily when Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said he wanted Homeland Security to end its operation “as quickly as possible," posting on social media that the mayor was “PLAYING WITH FIRE."

Kinnard reported from Columbia, S.C., and can be reached at http://x.com/MegKinnardAP

President Donald Trump speaks during the launch of a program known as Trump Accounts at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium, Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2026, in Washington.(AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem speaks during a news conference at Federal Emergency Management Agency headquarters, Saturday, Jan. 24, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, is surrounded by reporters following a closed-door Republican meeting on spending legislation that funds the Department of Homeland Security and a swath of other government agencies, at the Capitol in Washington, Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., speaks with reporters following a closed-door meeting with fellow Republicans on spending legislation that funds the Department of Homeland Security and a swath of other government agencies, at the Capitol in Washington, Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)