To ask you for Spanish music recommendations?

[LimaLemur]

Hi all,

It’s me again - posting for traffic! (Some of you might remember me from last night’s “got a song stuck in my head” thread which has now been resolved, with huge thanks to you all!)

I studied Spanish at uni, but have forgotten quite a bit of it, so recently started having lessons as I’d love to get back into it and properly start enjoying and appreciating it.

I think finding some Spanish music to listen to would be a great way of getting back into it. Does anyone have any recommendations, please?

Thanks!

Ricky Martin - She Bangs
The only Spanish music anyone will ever need

Juanes! I’m playing a lot of one of his recent songs, La Plata and his album Mi Sangre (which is pretty old now), is great. I also like Shakira’s Spanish language stuff. I love La Bicicleta which she sings with Carlos Vives. He’s also great, as is Alejandro Sanz.

Paco Pena - flamenco guitarist and so much more
Joaquin Rodrigo Concierto de Aranjuez

Enrique Iglesias, Becky G, Juanes, Shakira, Juan Luis Guerra. I second Carlos Vives.

Not sure if it's the music you were looking for but there was a lovely programme on radio4 extra called The Sound of Magnolias, (here is a link which may or may not work: mowww.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00n5404 ) about a Spanish composer and his work, with extracts from his music.

Beautiful music, very emotional, I think.

Bamboleo?

Rodrigo y Gabriela are my favourite

If it's flamenco, the grandaddy of them all is sabicas. Other notable ones are Vicente amico, paco de luca, paco Pena, tomatito.

For salsa you can't go wrong with the fania guys, so people like hector lavoe, willie colon, ruben blades, Celia Cruz etc.

Try Spotify. There are playlists for everything there including lots of different styles of Spanish music like salsa, son etc.

Rodrigo y Gabriela are fab, but aren’t they mainly instrumental?

Not sure if they're still popular or cool but I used to love La Oreja de Van Gogh. She sings really clearly so you can understand the words. Rosas makes me cry still

Ooo!

I can’t spell in Spanish so apologies in advance.

Celtas cortos - cuantame un cuento is a great album with interesting songs.

Mecano - aidelai - highly recommended!

The above work for me before going on holiday.

It's hard to say without knowing what music you like. Find the top 40 charts of Spain or Mexico on youtube, and listen through until you hit on something you like. Once you find one or two songs, you should be able to find more by that artist or have recommendations come up on the youtube sidebar. Or you could also get a spotify playlist from that song.

Thanks, everyone - these are great ideas! :)

I like Selena. She was Mexican- American but most songs are in Spanish.

Selena Quintanilla is who I mean, from the 90s.

Alvaro soler. Sofia is my toddlers favourite song and I must admit I love it too

Manu Chao.

Ooh good shout about Manu Chao, AskMe - thanks! I really like his French stuff.

Silvio Rodríguez, Mark Anthony. The list goes on.

Juanes for me too - catchy, which will really help you practice without any effort.

Esteman is one of my favourites, love Juan Luis Guerry, Juanes, Enrique Iglesias.

Del castillo!

Maluma?

You could download an app from a Spanish radio, Cadena Dial only plays Spanish music. You could also listen to some conversational Spanish while the radio presenters are talking.