· Agua Prieta, Sonora
Respirando el sonido dentro de la madera
Lilian Calleja Ansástiga says, “If I could inhale music, I would.” Music isn’t something she learned so much as something she absorbed. Long before she had the vocabulary for harmony or form, she remembers lying against a guitar, while she listened to the plucked string’s vibrations fill the fragrant wood.
Calleja, 33, was born in Mexico City, but grew up in Agua Prieta, Sonora. At home, there was always music. Her parents played guitar and mandolin; relatives sang and passed songs down through generations. Music filled their homes, gatherings, and long hours of dancing and conversation. That environment led her to the guitar, the instrument she calls her “instrumento madre,” chosen as much for its presence in her home as for how it connected with her.
Calleja learned from her father and from performing in a family church choir, where each member had a role. By her early teens, she was already directing. But even as she learned to play, she felt something was missing. No one around her could fully explain how music worked. They knew the rules without knowing why. “Nobody could explain it to me,” she recalled, describing the questions that followed her through childhood.
That gap became her motivation. Calleja decided to become a teacher. She wanted to be someone who could offer the insight she had been searching for. She studied music at the University of Sonora, where she specialized in classical guitar, and discovered musical analysis: the process of breaking music apart to understand the structure. It was a turning point. For the first time, she could connect intuition with explanation.
During her studies, she discovered the Baroque period and composers like Johann Sebastian Bach. She developed a lasting fascination with the sense that freedom, experimentation and creativity can exist within structure.
Like many working musicians, Calleja’s career has developed across multiple roles. She’s as likely to perform in a rock show as at a classical recital. She teaches students at different levels and works in recording and production. This range is less a choice than a necessity. Making a living in music, she explained, often means “doing a little of everything.”
Teaching, however, has remained central. Influenced by mentors who emphasized patience and attention, she focuses on helping students. She especially enjoys working with the students who are often overlooked. She recalls helping a pupil who struggled to speak begin to sing with confidence, a transformation she sees as proof of music’s greater impact.
Calleja is also candid about the challenges of being a woman in music. As the first woman in her program at the University of Sonora to graduate in classical guitar, she spent much of her time in spaces dominated by men. That experience formed her perspective on access and representation. It strengthened her belief that talent alone doesn’t determine opportunity.
During the pandemic, she worked on a recording project with Cuban guitarist Joaquín Clerch. As a recording engineer, she followed scores in real time and identified errors during sessions. The demanding role confirmed her musical and technical skills. The experience marked, in her words, “a before and after” in her career.
Calleja continues to juggle performance, teaching, and production while returning to classical guitar with fresh focus. The work is demanding, but it reconnects her to the questions that first drew her to music. For her, the goal has never been just to play; it’s to understand and to help others understand.