Cucamonga Valley

The Cucamonga Valley is a region of southwestern San Bernardino County and northwestern Riverside County, in southern California. It is located below the San Gabriel Mountains in the Inland Empire region.

Geography

It is a region of the eastern Pomona Valley and western San Bernardino Valley. It is located between Los Angeles and San Bernardino.

The Cucamonga Valley AVA, a designated American Viticultural Area, is in the valley region. It was a major site of wine production in the late 19th through mid−20th centuries, before regional urban expansion with land development and suburbanization spread into the area.

Cities

Demographics

The demographics of the Cucamonga Valley have been shifting in recent years. The population of European Americans, who once constituted a large majority, is on the decline while the population of Latinos and African Americans is growing . Unlike most of Southern California, there is not a particularly strong representation of Asian Americans in the Cucamonga Valley, although it is steadily increasing. The city of Rancho Cucamonga has the highest population of Asian Americans in the Cucamonga Valley, at 9.0% of the population.

Frank Zappa

Frank Vincent Zappa (December 21, 1940 – December 4, 1993) was an American musician, songwriter, composer, record producer, actor and filmmaker. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa composed rock n' roll, jazz, jazz fusion, orchestral and musique concrète works, and produced almost all of the more than sixty albums he released with his band the Mothers of Invention and as a solo artist. He also directed feature-length films and music videos, and designed album covers.

Zappa was a self-taught composer and performer, and his diverse musical influences led him to create music that was often difficult to categorize. While in his teens, he acquired a taste for 20th-century classical composers such as Edgard Varèse, Igor Stravinsky, and Anton Webern, along with 1950s rhythm and blues music. He began writing classical music in high school, while at the same time playing drums in rhythm and blues bands; later switching to electric guitar. His 1966 debut album with the Mothers of Invention, Freak Out!, combined songs in conventional rock and roll format with collective improvisations and studio-generated sound collages. He continued this eclectic and experimental approach, irrespective of whether the fundamental format was rock, jazz or classical.