The Academia de Música del Palacio de Minería was founded in 1978 with three guiding goals:

1. To perform music at the highest level of excellence.
2. To present monumental works—pieces of large orchestral forces or great technical complexity—that had never been heard in Mexico.
3. To commission new music from Mexican composers.

To achieve these objectives, several ensembles were formed. The most important was the Orquesta Sinfónica de Minería, which brought together exceptional performers from Mexico and around the world and offered summer seasons when most orchestras were on break.

The orchestra’s first artistic director, Jorge Velazco (1978–1984), invited León Spierer—then concertmaster under Herbert von Karajan at the Berlin Philharmonic—to lead advanced training courses.

Engineer Javier Jiménez Espriú, founding president of the Academia de Música del Palacio de Minería (1978–1984), reflects on those early years:

“The Academy performed in various venues, including the Palacio de Minería itself. Yet the summer season in Sala Nezahualcóyotl, supported by UNAM, quickly became a truly transcendent cultural touchstone. 
When I spoke with friends such as the poet Rubén Bonifaz Nuño, the historian Miguel León Portilla, and the singer Plácido Domingo, they all told me that Minería was an extraordinary event in the history of Mexican art.”