Associated Press
[Source: AP]
When Natalia Lafourcade sat down to craft “Cancionera,” she never expected to discover an alter ego that would lead her down a pathway of artistic enlightenment.
She had always worn her heart on her sleeve through her lauded career, but with “Cancionera,” Lafourcade finally felt she was able to stop holding back, lean into the “spirit of play” and showcase all her multitudes on her 12th studio album, out Thursday.
“Cancionera (the character) challenged me and asked, ‘Who are you, really?’ ‘Who do you think you are?’ and ‘Are you much more than what you tell yourself? I mean, if you are who you think you are, because, in reality, you are many different things. So it opened up huge possibilities,” said Lafourcade, whose answers have been translated from Spanish. “Cancionera” translates to “singer” in English.
Lafourcade, who has four Grammys and 18 Latin Grammys to her name, felt it was time to step into Cancionera’s duality and the varied energies: “earthly energy, volatile energy, romantic energy … they all became a part of her world, and I didn’t want to interrupt as they began to manifest,” she said.
The 14-track album transports listeners within the trifold theatrical walls of the Golden Age of Mexican cinema — an era spanning the 1930s to the 1950s when the Mexican film industry cemented its role as a dominant force across Latin America and received international acclaim, creating stars like Pedro Infante and Maria Félix and introducing surrealist styles of filmmaking.
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