Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens & Big Bopper Exhibit Launches at Final Venue From the Night They Died originally appeared on ...

From Slash’s guitar to Buddy Holly’s final tour relics, Surf Ballroom’s “Not Fade Away” immerses visitors in the stories that ...

The Silhouettes featured Ritchie Valens — “the fabulous Lil’ Richi and his Crying Guitar!!” — at a 1958 appearance at the San Fernando American Legion Hall in Southern California.

Ritchie Valens was rescued from obscurity by a 1987 movie, “La Bamba,” that finally put the Southern California teen’s story ahead of Buddy Holly and the Big Bopper, the two older singers ...

Ritchie’s producer, Bob Keane, came to the Valens home with a test pressing of what was probably “Come On, Let’s Go,” which they played as they sat on Ritchie’s bed.

Books about Valens, though, have been scarce. The only biography was 1987’s “Ritchie Valens, the First Latino Rocker” by Beverly Mendheim, who struggled to turn her research into a narrative.

Murrieta resident Bob Munson, 79, shows his personal photographs of his junior high and high school friend Ritchie Valens Monday, Feb. 15, 2021 which were taken in the spring of 1957.