1	Music The duality of Alejandro Fernández; Camila’s big changes; Rodrigo y Gabriela keep it green. read more...
2	Books Legendary music producer Emilio Estefan shares his life lessons. read more...
3	Arts Franck de Las Mercedes’ project for peace. read more...
4	Film & TV Andy Garcia shares the big screen with his real-life daughter in his latest independent flick; an emerging documentarian confronts her past; Martha Higareda on DVD. read more...
5	Calendar Our monthly list of premier events. read more...
6	Picture This A new interpretation of the iconic Carmen. read more...

LATIN FORUM {music}

The Duality of alejandro fernandez

Alejandro Fernández has brought traditional Mexican ranchera into the spotlight for a new generation of fans while also achieving crossover success as a pop star. He is the master of two worlds—traditional and contemporary, public superstar and private family man.

When you’re the son of a superstar, it’s not easy to dodge the limelight. Alejandro Fernández tried, though it seems he was born into stardom. His father is Mexican megastar Vicente Fernández, the singer, producer and actor known as El Charro de Mexico. That alone creates a lot of pressure, which is probably why at a tender age, Alejandro Fernández tried to slam the door shut on the entertainment world. When he was merely 6 years old, he was supposed to join his father on stage and perform for thousands of fans. But a sea of people can be quite frightening to a child, so despite having rehearsed, he froze. And that was that. He refused to sing in public again, and eventually went on to college to study architecture.
While he was studying, he decided to give professional singing another shot after his father approached him about recording a duet. “When I was at the university, it gave me the opportunity to do both disciplines,” says Fernández. But that didn’t quite work out, either. “I tried to do both, but both were all-consuming,” he recalls. He’d stay up until 4 or 5 a.m. to work on projects, and then he started missing classes because of musical promotions. “I gave myself one-to-two years for my music career,” he says. “If it didn’t go well, I would go back to architecture.”
That would never happen. In 1992, he released his debut, self-titled album, followed by more than a dozen in the years that followed. His latest project, Dos Mundos, (Two Worlds) was released in December. The dual album—comprised of Dos Mundos Evolución (Two Worlds Evolution) and Dos Mundos Tradición (Two Worlds Tradition)—features both genres that are the specialties of the two-time Latin Grammy Award winner—pop and ranchera, a type of Mexican folk and country music.
“It had been a long time since I came out with a ranchera album. Fans were asking for it, but I didn’t want to abandon my pop fans,” Fernández explains. So, he approached his label, Universal Music Latin Entertainment, and asked, “Why not do both at the same time?”
They went for the idea. After all, Fernández is one of only a handful of artists to successfully cross over from ranchera to pop, the result of a collaboration in 1997 with producer Emilio Estefan on Me Estoy Enamorando (I’m Falling in Love), which sold three million copies worldwide.
Fernández got to work on the new pop album first. “I got together with the composers in my house, and for three days we talked and got acquainted,” Fernández says, explaining the creative process. “We came to see each other with fondness. If you open up a bit, you win over the composer and you’ll get the best material.” He says the songs came from those talks and meetings. Take for example one of the singles from the pop album: Me Hace Tanto Bien (Your Love Does Me Such Good). The song features Fernández’s typical velvety voice oozing poetic verses: “I am the leaf that the wind blows around you, and you are the air that lifts me up, that gives me strength for this love. Your love does me such good.”
While material for the pop album flowed easily, production of the ranchera was stymied, which raised doubts with the label executives. “We didn’t have a producer for the ranchera,” admits Fernández. Then came a knock at the door, literally.
Fernández was on tour, staying at a hotel, when ranchera producer Joan Sebastian showed up. He wanted to say hello and share some new material. Fernández had considered Sebastian for the album, but Sebastian had just worked with his father, and Fernández didn’t want his music to sound the same. Sebastian came prepared with 11 songs and urged him to listen. “I was scared the formula with my dad would repeat, but it didn’t,” says Fernández. “It almost didn’t happen. ... It fell from the sky.”
So what can fans expect from the dual album? “A little bit of everything,” says the singer. “It’s like being on a roller coaster, and experiencing the different emotions.” After a six-year hiatus from Mexican folk, fans will be treated to ranchera and mariachi, both traditional and material performed in a fresh way that incorporates different instruments. Pop fans will get their fill, too. Fernández admits it’s a balancing act, combining both genres, since both must be performed differently.
Earlier this year, in October, he took his “two worlds” concept and applied it to the music videos for his two singles—Estuve (I Was) and Se Me Va La Voz (I Lose My Voice). He intertwined both videos for two different songs to form one story.
As if recording music, making music videos, touring, and being a heartthrob doesn’t take up enough time, Fernández enjoys hanging out with his kids and prides himself on being a family man. He has five—three by his ex-wife and two by an ex-girlfriend.
“They’re my anchors; my inspiration for everything,” he says referring to his children. “They’re five gifts, the best gifts in life. They’re healthy and very good kids.”
And for that, he credits their mothers, with whom he says he remains on good terms. “I’m very fortunate; my exes, these women, are incredible. Our relationship is impressive. They’re very intelligent, and very good mothers.”
Citing his kids as his inspiration for both the professional and personal, he makes it a point to spend as much time as possible with them. He usually works weekends, Friday through Sunday, which enables him to be with his children on weekdays.
“I don’t have office hours. During the week, I’m at home with my kids 24 hours.” The longest he’ll go without seeing them is a month, and that’s when he’s on tour. “I want to be a good example; I want them to be proud of their dad.”

{collaborations}

Fernández has teamed up with a number of well-known artists. Here is just a sampling:

Song: Sueños
Collaborator: Nelly Furtado
Album: Mi Plan (2009) D Song: Amor Gitano
Collaborator: Beyonce Knowles
Album: Viento a Favor (2007)

Song: Eres
Collaborator: Written by Fonseca
Album: Viento a Favor (2007)

Song: Hay más
Collaborator: Tenor Mario Frangoulis
Album: Follow Your Heart (2006)

Song: Me dediqué a perderte
Collaborator: Amaia Montero of La Oreja de Van Gogh
Album: México - Madrid: En Directo Y Sin Escalas (2005)

Song: Contigo aprendí
Collaborator: Malú
Album: México - Madrid: En Directo Y Sin Escalas (2005)

Performance: Opening Concerto
Collaborators: Tenors Jose Carreras and Placido Domingo
Event: Forum Internacional de las Culturas in Monterrey (2005)

Song: Dos corazones, dos historias
Collaborator: Julio Iglesias
Album: Noche de Cuatro Lunas (2000)

Song: En El Jardín and Si Tú Supieras
Collaborator: Gloria Estefan
Album: Me Estoy Enamorando (1997)

Song: Puedes llegar
Collaborator: Gloria Estefan, Jon Secada and Ricky Martin
Album: Theme Song for 1996
Olympics in Atlanta

tour dates

Alejandro Fernández takes Dos Mundos on the road in a tour that hits major markets nationwide.

City: Anaheim, California
Date: April 4
City: San Diego, California
Date: April 10
City: San Jose, California
Date: April 17
City: Sacramento, California
Date: April 18
City: Chicago, Illinois
Date: April 24
City: Miami, Florida
Date: May 14
City: Atlanta, Georgia
Date: May 16
City: Houston, Texas
Date: May 28
City: Dallas, Texas
Date: May 30
Source: www.alejandrofernandez.com

CAMILA’S big changes

The pop trio that captured the public with Todo Cambió returns with a new effort and a widened perspective.

By Fernando Ruano, Jr.

In the hectic year after the release of the debut album Todo Cambió, Mario Domm wanted to hit the pause button.
“Everything was happening so fast it was definitely a shock,” Domm, the lead vocalist, composer and keyboardist of the Latin pop band Camila recalls of those crazed days in 2007. “You kind of wish you could slow down since everything around you is going 100 miles an hour.
“What we do for a living offers us the ability to express ourselves and create so many beautiful things, but it can be a grind, as well.”
The challenges of an extensive Latin American tour and the prospect of disrupting the success of an album that would go on to sell 500,000 copies in the U.S., not to mention gain a revered status in the group’s native Mexico, made taking a break impossible.
“The demands [of the music industry] are obviously something you can’t control,” says Domm. “We’ve just always made sure it hasn’t affected our work as musicians.”
Usually encouraged by their record labels to capitalize off the initial flourish of a successful debut, artists are generally prodded into producing a follow-up album almost immediately. But that wasn’t the case with Camila, which recently released Dejarte De Amar, its long-awaited second effort.
“It was our decision to settle in and really think over our next step,” Hurtado says, explaining the unusual four-year wait after their debut effort. “We recognize our responsibility to our fan base and what they expect of us, so we wanted to be sure of every detail.”
Todo Cambió, their first album that included the smash-hit title track and Abrazame, opened the doors to instant stardom for the then-virtually unknown Domm, vocalist Samo and guitarist Pablo Hurtado. Domm had started his career in the early 1990s as a producer and songwriter and has composed for Sin Banderas, Reyli and Kalima in recent years, but his bandmates were initially unfamiliar to mainstream audiences.
The Mexican trio instantly captured the hearts of young and old alike in 2006 with their sultry R&B delivery and well-orchestrated melodies. Hurtado’s light guitar riffs over the melody-driven vocals provided by Domm and Samo were a hit with their mixed fan base in venues all over Mexico, Chile and Puerto Rico.
“Imagine if one day you’re sitting recording music, and from one minute to the next you’re performing in front of thousands of people and traveling to places you never dreamed of visiting,” Samo says.
Rather than conform to the norm and pump out another quick release, the band insisted on a breather after an intense couple years—even getting an extension from their label for the release of Dejarte De Amar.
The album, which Domm says the band started contemplating during its 2007 tour but never found time to develop, is composed of 11 songs band members selected from three dozen compositions they co-wrote. “Every song you write is like a child to you—it comes out of you,” says Domm. “So the process of choosing one over the other is always a difficult one—and there are always disagreements along the way.”
A far cry from Todo Cambió, the band’s most recent production is heavier on arrangements and offers a more distant sound, in part due to the vocal maturity of Domm and Samo.
The album, born out of a vacation in Rome and shortly after Domm suffered a break-up in his relationship, wasn’t easy to complete, though he says it was cathartic. “I was going through a difficult time emotionally [and] I found writing and playing music to be like a cleansing for me,” he says. “The difficult part was sitting down with these guys at the end of the day.”
However many times they may have clashed heads in studio, their individual skills are clearly on display in the album, especially in the heart-breaking and touching Alejate De Mi and Me Voy. Samo’s interpretation is filled with emotion and Domm draws out lyrics with gusto, making for a unique contrast and tender sound. The pair offers more of the same in Mientes and Besame as Hurtado adds tightness with long guitar riffs.
“You listen and you listen and when there’s nothing left that you feel you can change to make it sound better, that’s when you know, OK, you’re done,” says Domm. “And I think we’ve done this in this occasion.”

{forever young}

After putting out more than 20 albums, generating12 million in album sales, and starring in tours and telenovelas, Chayanne is nowhere near calling it a day.
“One of my goals is to feel a personal growth with each album that we launch, to be happy with what we are creating, and, most importantly, to always be hungry for more,” he told Hispanic last summer.
Officially his 22nd album, his latest, No Hay Imposible, is set to drop February 23 and remains true to the ballads and upbeat pop standards that made him famous. However, adhering to the classic formula hasn’t made him irrelevant. Far from it.
In fact, today that optimistic sound marries well with his album’s message of overcoming adversity: Nothing is impossible. For longtime fans, there is comfort in the fact he is always there, and even new listeners can find inspiration in his solid presence.
In addition, Gabriel: Amor Inmortal, the Mega TV series starring Chayanne as a vampire, is being released on DVD February 9. The boxed set will include all the series’ episodes, behind-the-scenes footage and music videos with songs by Chayanne and his co-star, the Venezuelan legend Jose Luis Rodriguez, known as “El Puma.”

keeping it green

Rodrigo y Gabriela look beyond the world of music to promote a vegan lifestyle in an effort to heal the planet.

By Dave Gil de Rubio

A pair of acoustic guitarists whose roots can be traced to the plugged-in sounds of Metallica, Overkill and Slayer, the Mexican duo of Rodrigo y Gabriela appears to be a musical oxymoron. They earned enormous commercial success with their 2009 album, 11:11, which included such diverse guest appearances as fellow acoustic guitar impresarios Strunz and Farah and Testament axe-wielder Alex Skolnick. Their profile through by such wide-ranging exposure as Starbuck’s and Jools Holland’s Annual Hootenanny to having their music featured on Monday Night Football. But rather than simply bask in the limelight, Rodrigo y Gabriela are using their success to tout the positive environmental impact of veganism, an extension of vegetarianism that avoids all animal products, including dairy, eggs, fur, leather, wool, down, and cosmetics or chemical products tested on animals.
“To relate all these environmental issues to your diet ends up being a crazy thing to many people, but actually it’s not crazy,” says Rodrigo Sánchez. “All the information is there and it’s related to a meat industry that not only pollutes and creates all these massive environmental issues but also takes food away from a lot of people who could be fed with grains grown for livestock. Hunger is a big issue. Kids are dying every five seconds and it just seems like the world is upside down. We have to do something on a personal level to make something happen and to create awareness in people’s families and communities.”
Rodrigo y Gabriela are spreading the word via B Major, a blog recently launched on their website. On it are links that promote healthy and life-sustaining food choices as well as videos of the pair playing around the world as a ticker at the bottom of the screen displays a constant crawl of information. One such posting finds them playing by the ruins in Athens as the ticker displays facts like “For every pound of meat you would not eat, you would save anywhere from 2,500 to 5,000 gallons of water.”
A vegetarian since the age of 18 but a recent convert to veganism, Sánchez says straightforward information sharing is best. “I think the problem is that you when you go to most of these websites, a lot of information is overwhelming and in your face,” he says. “People just freak out and go somewhere else. ... There’s a massive amount of information on these sites that people are too lazy to read. We’ve got to find something easier and that’s what we’re trying to do.”