Selena: La Reina de Tejano

Celia might be compared with US jazz vocalist Sarah Vaughan in her ability to bring vocal techniques to a primarily instrumental music, but she has a more essentially popular appeal than any jazz singer. Seemingly indestructible vocally, Celia continued a full schedule of concerts and recordings throughout the 1980s and beyond. She received a Grammy award for the album Ritmo en el corazón, recorded with conga player Ray Barretto, in 1990, as well as an honorary doctorate from Yale University.

pop music because other artists had already broken the barrier of this new trend of genre combinations. Selena was making a crossover to dance music similar to Paula Abdul or Madonna.

The main character in the film “Selena” is a woman named Selena. Everyone else in the movie is a sub character that plays off of the role of Selena. The movie is about Selena’s life and the movie begins with her as a little girl and ends with her as a Mexican-American pop star loved by both the Mexican and American communities. Selena goes from being a young girl who’s band is compromised of her brothers and sisters to a mega star known by fans all over the world. As Selena became more successful she faced many obstacles in her career. First, Selena had to learn Spanish in order to sing in Spanish to connect with the Mexican community as her father felt she had the best chance to make it big if she tried to appeal to the Mexican community. Once she became a huge star with her Spanish singing music, she then did a crossover album in English, which helped to make her a pop star worldwide. Since Selena was Mexican-American, not Mexican, it was an obstacle for her to be seen as authentic by the Mexican community. Selena’s second big obstacle was that she was a woman. Mexico is traditionally a male dominant society and before Selena there had never been a Spanish singing female to evolve into a superstar. In the movie, Selena overcomes both of these obstacles and she does become one of the greatest

However, the first person she told was her father. She knew he would be furious that she disobeyed his orders but instead of just running off with Chris, she came back to the family. Selena and her father sat down and talked until they both came to an understanding about their feelings and actions. In American culture, when a teenager is told she can’t be with the man she loves, it tends to be the norm that two will run away together and not come back to the family. America focuses more on the individualized identity while Mexican-Americans care most about the familial identity. Martin and Nakayama had a Mexican-American student and the student actually explained in depth how their culture identifies as more familial rather than individualized or spiritual:

could you Imagine what it would be like to grow up as a performer in a world that didn’t even except female Tejano singers? Can you imagine how much courage and work it would take to make it to the top? That’s was Selena Quintanilla Perez had to go through. Selena was born in Lake Jackson, Texas on April 6th, 1971 to Abraham and Marcella Quintanilla. Abraham was a shipping clerk for a chemical company and Marcella was a housewife. Abraham being a well respected Mexican musician, who only sang English songs, and had his career ruined because of that. American people didn’t respect him because he was Mexican, and the Mexican people did not respect them because they sang English songs. By the time Selena reached age 10, it became very

In conclusion, I told you a little bit about Selena. Maybe you knew some of it,

So in 1987 she won the “Best Female Vocalist of the Year” and “Performer of the Year” and in 1990 her album called “Ven Conmigo” was the first Tejano record to achieve gold record status. That means that more than 500,000 copies were sold. All of this is according to biography.com She got married to Chris Perez in 1992 this is while she was on a break with her musical career. She won the Grammy Award in 1993 and in 1994 she released “Amor Prohibido” and it went gold that same year. You have probably heard this song because it is still popular today in the Spanish Community. Selena was shooting to the top. She had received so many awards in

On April 16, 1971 in Lake Jackson, Texas, a little girl named Selena Quintanilla – Perez was born. She was born to Abraham Quintanilla Jr. and Marcella Quintanilla. Selena Quintanilla- Perez has 2 siblings named Abraham Quintanilla 3rd and Suzette Quintanilla. Mrs. Quintanilla- Perez was an American singer, songwriter, spokesperson, actress, and a fashion designer. She was also known as the Queen of Tejano music and to the media outlets they called her “Tejano Madonna” for her clothing choices. Selena Quintanilla- Perez was raised as a Jehovah’s witness. When Selena Quintanilla was 6 years old her father discovered her talent at sing. Her father told the People Magazine that her timing, her pitch was perfect, I could see it from day one. Mr. Quintanilla Jr. opened up a restaurant where the kids performed a lot. Her family moved to Corpus Christi, Texas and that’s when Quintanilla Jr. became the manager to Selena y Los Dinos and began to

On May 6 of that same year, Selena Quintanilla released a new album titled “Entre a Mi Mundo”. It ascended to the #1 spot on the U.S Billboard Regional Mexican albums chart! People started calling her the Queen of Tejano Music and many said that she was the Mexican Madonna because of her glamorous outfits. When Selena Quintanilla was finally nominated for a Grammy in 1994, she wore a gorgeous white beaded dress which in the end was donated to the Selena Museum.

Since that moment Chris felt like he had a special connected with Selena. Once they were on tour they kept a secret relationship going on nobody knew about this relationship. Little by little everyone in the band started finding out about the relationship except Selena's father the manager of the band. Chris went through some rough time while he was in the band which he got in trouble with the law. Abraham, Selena's father found out since Chris told him about the incident. Chris's life went back to

Selena Quintanilla-Perez you may or may not heard about her. If you have you know she was known as the queen of Tejano music or known by the media the Tejano Madonna. Even though her life was cut short she continues to live in the hearts of Latino and American community. Selena is a pop icon that has influence me and others because she broke a lot of barriers and had a major impact on the Latino community.

Selena’s talent was distributed to a larger audience and was no longer confined to the walls of the family business when Primo Ledesma, a disc jockey, who hosted a weekly Spanish-language radio show, drifted into Papa Gayo’s for a listen. Lesdema recorded Selena singing, telling her father, Abraham, that “she was going places” (Patoski 42). There were numerous responses and intrigues about the new voice that was played when Ledesma broadcasted the tape on his show the following day. The incident with Ledesma was the beginning of the fame Selena would come to know. After Papa Gayo’s was shut down due to foreclosure, the Quintanilla family went bankrupt as well. This hapless circumstance came to be the initiation of Selena’s musical career: Selena recounts, “Basically, my musical career started when my family went bankrupt, and had to resort to music for money” (Patoski 43-45). The Quintanilla children hit the road, performing throughout southern Texas as Selena y Los Dinos with their father Abraham as their manager. Their venues consisted of weddings, cantinas and honky-tonks, and even when the audience was less than ten people, the group never passed up an opportunity to perform; the family’s means of survival lied in those performances (“Selena”).

There are fans that comment on her YouTube videos, expressing their love for her and her music. Some of her fans had the opportunity to actually meet her and describe her as being close to her roots who worked hard and achieved her goals. She was nice to everyone she met regardless of their station in life. And, of course, she also made great music. For these reasons, she has become a role model to millions of people around the world. She was viewed as a positive, humble person and it was clear that it was not just the music but the person who made an impact. EMI President Jose Behar reflected on Selena shortly after her passing “When I think of Selena nowadays, what comes to mind is not her musical career, even though it was enormously successful and remains so more than two months after her death. Rather, I think about how much I miss this special person, who was so caring, so warm. I am convinced if she had lived Selena would have been a major, major star in the Anglo record world”. Selena was always passionate about her community and making the world better so before her death, she helped numerous organizations. After her death, her family created The Selena Foundation and it was established in May 1995 to receive the donations that people were sending out to her family after her death. Her family decided to use the generous amount of money being sent to them to help students receive a better education because it was something that Selena

Celia Cruz born Ursula Hilaria Celia Caridad Cruz Alfonso, a female Cuban singer born October 21, 1925 in Havana Cuba was one of the most influential figures in Latin music. She started her musical career in her native country in the late 1940’s early 1950’s performing for various Cuban radio shows and traveling with the orchestra accompanying the dancing group “Las Mulatas del Fuego.” Her big break came in 1950 when she joined “La Sonora Matancera” the most famous orchestra in Cuba at the time. Celia traveled all over Latin America in the 1950’s with “La Sonora” gaining great success in countries like Venezuela and Mexico. She recorded various albums with the orchestra and gained great popularity during that time with songs like “Caramelo”, “Burundanga”, and

Selena Quintanilla was such an amazing person inside and out more known as the queen of tejano music. She won the hearts of many people young and old in the little time she was here on earth. Blessing many people with her contagious smile, and positive upbeat attitude. Selena has always had where to pull from when it came to being musically talented. Her father Abraham Quintanilla played in a band called Los Dinos which means the boys in Spanish. He had to give his life up as an artist because he got married and had his first kid. Therefore he had to find a better support system for his family. So when he saw that Selena had talent he focused all his goals and dreams on her. Therefore selena had to make a lot of sacrifices and not live a normal childhood.