by Antonio Mejías-Rentas
Juan Luis Guerra (PHOTO COURTESY OF BLINGCHEES.COM)
TIED ON TOP: Two singer-songwriters Ñ a veteran Dominican who has internationalized his country’s bachata sound and a much younger Mexican who fronts a five-year-old pop band Ñ were the top Latin Grammy winners at a Las Vegas ceremony this year. Both Juan Luis Guerra and Mrio Domm earned three awards each at the Nov. 11 gala broadcast live by Univisin.
Guerra, whose career spans more than two decades, earned the evening’s top award, Album of the Year, for his hit-making A son de guerra. He commented that although the recording included danceable love songs, it also carried a message. The time has arrived for us to reclaim justice and integrity for the Latin American people, he told the audience at the Mandalay Bay Resort.
The album also earned Guerra the Latin Grammy for Best Contemporary Tropical Album. Its single Bachata en Fukuoka was named Best Tropical Song.
Domm shared two of his awards with the other two members of Mexican pop band Camila: Recording of the Year for Mientes and Best Group Vocal Album for Dejarte amar. Mientes also earned Domm the songwriter award Ñ Song of the Year Ñ which he shared with Mnica Vlez.
Other winners at the 11th annual ceremony: Spanish pop star Alejandro Sanz, with his 17th Latin Grammy, Venezuelan duo Chino y Nacho, Puerto Rican salsa crooner Gilberto Santa Rosa and Colombian hip-hop group ChocQuibTown.
Highlights included Ricky Martin performing his first single in two years Ñ Lo mejor de mi vida eres t, a duet with Natalia Jimnez Ñ and young bachata star Prince Royce, singing his hit remake of Stand By Me with the song’s creator, Ben E. King.
‘GAZPACHO’ ON BROADWAY: The cold Spanish soup that was famously tainted with drugs in the Pedro Almodvar film Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios was served at the opening party for the stage version this month in New York. Patti LuPone, Brian Stokes Mitchell and Sherie Rene Scott star in the musical, at the Belasco Theatre through January.
A recipe for gazpacho, a pivotal plot element in both the fi lm and musical, is projected on the Belasko curtain for the production.
ONE LINERS: Spanish director Luis Garc a Berlanga, a leading fi gure of his country’s post-war cinema, died Nov. 13 at 89 Shannon Tavr ez, the 11-year-old who played Nala on Broadway’s The Lion King, died from complications from leukemia while awaiting a bone marrow transplant; she was buried Nov. 11 in Queens Following complaints by members of Los Kjarkas, Puerto Rican reggaeton performer Don Omar explaining that his sampling of the Bolivian group’s Llorando se fue was authorized by EMI Music; the song gained notoriety in the ’80s when it was remade as a lambada by Kaoma, a Brazilian group that Los Kjarkas successfully sued over copyright infringement Hispanic Link.
