It is the romantic voice of an entire generation, an Italian accent in stories that have spanned decades to sell 70 million records, becoming an icon of melodic song since its origins, when in 1993 it won the San Remo festival with La solitude, a song that He recorded in Spanish as La Solitude. And Laura Pausini has turned Spanish into her “other language,” as she defined it in Seville, where she went to collect the Person of the Year award, the award with which the Latin Grammys honor an artist’s career each year, and that In the past 23 editions, only two women had received it, Gloria Estefan and Shakira.
Last night Pausini joined this select group at a gala dinner that leaves the US for the first time to be held in the Andalusian capital, and which served as a prelude to Thursday’s 2023 Latin Grammy Awards. An evening that featured surprises such as the interpretation of the artist’s songs by Alejandro Sanz, Ana Mena, India Martínez and Malú, who sang Volveré con tí and La Soledad. From his table, Pausini recorded everything with his mobile phone with tears on the edge of his eyelids while the versions, with ad hoc arrangements, drew emotional moments such as the version of As if we hadn’t loved each other that Christian Nodal and Mon Laferte did, impeccable on voice and guitar, while Pausini followed him sitting on the floor in front of the stage, with her arms resting on the boards.
On a stage decorated with enormous fans of lights, a large orchestra provided instrumental accompaniment to the artists who followed one another for an hour and a half: Vanesa Martín and Carín León sang Son Amores, Fonsi and David Bisbal did the same with Inolvidable, while Pablo López and Antonio Orozco performed Half-Truths on piano and Beret together with Danny Ocean made a reggae version of Se fue. The star of the night, meanwhile, walked around the tables like a bride newly married to the love of her life. She distributed kisses, hugs and congratulations without forgetting to thank each and every one of the artists who performed. She also thanked her father Fabrizio, present in the room, “he gave my mother what made me here, congratulations on that night dad!” she said between the laughter of the audience and the suffocation of her mother. It was shortly before the end, when the 2023 Person of the Year took the stage to sing a medley of her greatest hits that ended a cappella, in a full-fledged display of her vocal power.
“I am the most Latin Italian in the world,” confirmed last night the author of hits like Se fue, En Cambio No or Amores Stranges, just as she did the day before at a press conference with a heartfelt memory of Rafaella Carrà, who died two years ago. “I have felt adopted by all of you like a daughter, a sister, someone in the family environment,” she said last night. A communion that is confirmed with the new award, recognition not only of a musical career but also of his humanitarian commitment, which has taught him “to respect differences, it is difficult, but we would achieve it if we did not put the word hate in front of us, which It is the word of this millennium.”
Parallel Souls talks about respect, her new album and the first where her emotions are not the protagonists. “They are true stories, it is the first time I have dedicated an album to someone other than myself,” he commented, highlighting the story behind Flashback, which began when a girl called him on the radio during a live interview to explain that her father He abused her. “I want to send a message of hope to sick children, abused women” and all the people who suffer in this world. She dedicates an album to them that aims to “put the word love at the center of our lives, not the love of couples, but the union between different people.”
The “different”, the one who is not part of the majority, has been Pausini’s companion since she was a child, which has made her an icon of the LGTBI movement. “When I was little I was fascinated by meeting someone who wasn’t like me, and when I met them I saw that they were the same as me,” she explained with a smile to remember that she was already working to make them visible in the 90s, “I made a clip where a couple of men who kissed, and caused a lot of commotion, especially in my country.” An awareness that has led her almost from the beginning of her career to border on gender in her songs, “I have always written about love but without sex, because when there are love stories they have no gender.”
About to start a new tour, Pausini reaffirmed his bond with the Spanish language, a language he learned from his father, a humble musician in a piano bar, with whom he began singing as a teenager. “In summer tourists asked me for songs in their languages ??and my father taught me songs by Gloria Estefan, bossa nova, in English, in French. My father did the literal translation for me, and he taught me that with songs you talk to people.” This knowledge was recalled at last night’s gala, where videos of Pausini in duets with Charles Aznavour, Michael Bublé and Phil Collins were seen. A learning that pushed her, when she was only 18 years old and asked to translate La Solitude into Spanish, to tell her record company “I want to record the entire album in Spanish.” From that experience “I saw that I liked to interpret my lyrics in other languages,” a habit that she has maintained for 30 years in various languages. The only exception is English, a language she used on the 2002 album From the Inside, but which she later abandoned due to differences with her representatives in the United States.
With Spanish the opposite has happened, “I have even dreamed in Spanish, that made me realize that it is my other language. It was in the late 90s, one day I woke up speaking Spanish with my partner.” That is why she affirms that she does not see herself “singing only in Italian, I feel Latin, I will never abandon Spanish.” That is why she affirms that she does not see herself singing only in Italian, “I feel Latin and I will never abandon Spanish”, a commitment that adds to the one she has with her own voice: “I will never use autotune, when you appear in public they need to hear your voice “, because “there is a lot of work, a lot of study and passion to improve what is a gift, I don’t know how to cook, I know how to sing.”
