Tom Lea, native son of El Paso, was a prolific illustrator, artist, war correspondent, muralist and writer. Annually the Tom Lea Project places an event honoring him in a different Texas city, and the Orchestra of New Spain has been chosen in 2021 to focus on Lea’s illustrated historical novel, The Hands of Cantú, a tale of the original horse whisperer who in the late 16th century trained the Spanish horses imported to Mexico, thence to the U.S. Southwest. The Renaissance and Baroque music that the orchestra will present is directly linked to those horses and the same period in Spain.