Oh, oh, oh! A scream echoed across the stage of Carnegie Hall. It was not a cry of lamentation. Much less pain. It was an invitation to live, to love, to dance. It was the visa that the Mexican Natalia Lafourcade gave to a packed audience as a ticket to cross the border of happiness in times of war, of walls that separate, of ultra threats, of hatred that divides. “How beautiful life is!” shouted the one from Veracruz and the cry was not of regret, but of love.
Lafourcade, the Latin artist with the most Grammy awards in history, closed a spectacular year with a concert in that mythical hall in New York, an almost sacred place where all artists want to succeed. The concert also turned it into an album that brings together live that memorable night in his career: Natalia Lafourcade Live at Carnegie Hallwhich was released to the public on platforms such as Spotify this December, which opens itself to uncertainty. The album has been produced by the Argentine Cheche Alara, with whom the singer had already worked on Museshis tribute to traditional Latin American music and winner of the Latin Grammy in 2017 for Best Folk Album. The Veracruz woman continues firmly the path she has traced since then, on an intimate journey to rescue the musical traditions of a continent that oozes music, from Mexico to Cuba, passing through Venezuela and even Uruguay.
The message of the night at Carnegie Hall was clear: why suffer, if you don’t have to. The beautiful sound of a piano opened a concert of almost two hours, in which Lafourcade sang old songs from the soul with new arrangements and new works for a dedicated audience. He followed the piano Of all the flowersthe song that gives its name to the album released in 2022 with original tunes and a cocktail that brings together the smooth rhythms of folk and jazz, the seductive warmth of bolero and cumbia and the unbridled eroticism of samba and bossa nova. If heartaches are part of life, why take them bitterly? Of all the moons we looked at / there are only a few memories left / when we laughed / when we had each other / in the streets of Madrid, drunk we went without a fixed direction. Lafourcade sang of the memories of love with a soul grateful for what he had experienced. Deep feeling, as only Mexicans know how to express it. Oh, oh, oh!
Not everything in life is crying about past loves. And even less for toxic relationships, for loves that consume you, like that boyfriend who once told her that she would never record an album alone. From nostalgia for what was lost and the brokenness, the Mexican went on to demand loneliness, the need to heal, to step aside, to heal. Lafourcade had an appointment to attend to with herself and she shared it smiling with her audience. An appointment to find your right place, a space that would allow you to appreciate the little great things, like the sunsets, that glow of colors that paints the sky of Veracruz. Forgive me if I cried, cried and cried while dancing / I had old pains to attend to from that past / so I returned to that necessary silence / to listen to the heart speak of the truth. Come on, give yourself a break, because sometimes love can also be overwhelming.
That girl who in 2000 regretted not having movie stars like Gael García, has been transformed into a cult singer-songwriter. From the saccharine pop that intended to be groundbreaking, she has become an artist of caliber, who imposes her style, whether when she borrows a song from someone of the stature of Agustín Lara, or when her own sounds come out of her head. Lafourcade has converted his studio in Veracruz into a laboratory, something like a Buendía-style alchemy workshop. From there comes a vast musical repertoire that he perfects with each new project. It is not for nothing that the Mexican has enthralled critics and the American Academy of Music, which applauds her and rewards each of her works. Anyone who has followed Lafourcade’s career step by step can assure that his music has earned a prominent place on the podium of Latin American poetry. No noise. Not even shouting. Without reggaeton or lying corridos.
Lafourcade’s is pure elegance. Beauty. To comfort your soul, as they would say in Mexico, write, for example, hummingbirda hymn to that tiny bird that makes the world flourish when it drinks. The song is an invitation to embrace life and turn your back on fears. When you feel that the infinite world opens before your wings / inside your chest you lose your breath / ask the sky to make you fly / And if you feel vertigo in the flight / that the fire is lit inside your chest / ask the universe, in your entire being sweet freedom. About this song, the artist has said that it is an important message “in these times that humanity is going through.” “The importance of taking care of our heart and allowing the soul a free path in happiness and confidence towards life.”
And what better way to be happy than dancing? Lafourcade said on his night at Carnegie Hall that his heart was beating out of his body with emotion and to stop it he made his audience dance, led by the Cuban Omara Portuondo, who for some years has been his traveling companion. Cuba and its son on the floor, linked with the son jarocho from Veracruz. “Just look at what we have here!” said the artist excitedly when announcing the Cuban, who dazzled with that you got me used. “Subtlely you came to me like temptation,” sighed the famous singer under the chords of the arrangement prepared by Lafourcade and his musicians for her night of triumph in the sacred New York venue. One more triumph for the Mexican, unstoppable in her career and her search for beauty. Oh, oh, oh, she cried excitedly. And the cry was not of lament, but of love.