Selena Quintalla was a popular singer in Tejano music and the Mexican American culture. This week’s blog post will be dedicated to her passing which occurred on March 31, 1995. Now if you don’t know Selena please go to your Facebook and unfriend me or Twitter and unfollow me. But seriously, most hispanics should have seen the Selena movie starring Jennifer Lopez or at least heard someone say ANYTHING FOR SELENNNASSSSSSSS!
The actual Selena Quintanilla yes I know
Anyways, the young and beautiful Selena Quintanillia started singing at a young age. Around the age of 9 or 10 she became the lead singer of her family band Selena y Los Dinos.
Selena y Los Dinos would play anywhere they were accepted; festivals, weddings and quinceaneras across Texas. The band included her brother Abraham on bass and her sister Suzette on drums. Selena’s father Abraham who use to be a former musician was the manager and producer of the group.
Now Selena was a popular singer in Tejano music. Tejano music literally means Tex-Mex and originated in South and Central Texas. Selena grew up speaking English, but her father taught her to sing in Spanish so she could resonate with the Latino community. She learned the lyrics phonetically at first, and eventually learned to speak Spanish fluently.
Just Selena being fine
Selena became very popular with Tejano music fans, and at the 1987 Tejano Music Awards, she won both “Best Female Vocalist of the Year” and “Performer of the Year.” Her 1990 album, Ven Conmigo, was the first Tejano record to achieve gold record status, meaning it sold more than 500,000 copies. In 1992, Selena took enough of a break from her hectic schedule to marry Chris Perez, the band’s lead guitarist, that April.
Her recordings continued to have strong sales, and she won the Grammy Award (best Mexican-American album) in 1993 for her album Live. In 1994, she and the band played numerous tour dates in New York, California, Puerto Rico and Argentina. Amor Prohibido was released that same year, and went gold.
After the success of Tejano music Selena was going to tackle the US market with an english album that she would hope would give her some success in this market. Sadly, she wouldn’t live to see the day. Selena was shot by the President of her fan club Yolanda Saldivar. This would be the end of Selena’s short life she was only 23 years old. Her death sent shockwaves through the Latino community and many of her fans across the globe mourned the death of Selena.
Now if we ever make that technology where we are able to travel back in time. Selena would be one of those people you want to save. Her life was just starting who knows what she could have done by the year 2014. But I guess we’ll just have to live through her music and the film which isn’t bad at all not to mention J-Low plays Selena.
Anyways I will end this blog post by saying Selena was a strong positive figure in the Latino community and its sad to have had her life end so shortly. Here’s to you Selena ❤
David Rejoles Deportes y diversion 