Essay on Selena Quintanilla: Queen of Tejano Music & Tragic End at 23

Introduction

Selena Quintanilla was a great Latin recording artist popularly known as Queen of Tejano Music. She was killed at the age of 23 by the president of her music club. She made her first debut in the recording industry in the early '80s and later went ahead to become an award winner of recording artists in the renowned Latin music industry. The albums were Selena Live and Amor Prohibido. In the year 1995, she was murdered by the pioneer of her fan or music club. The last album of Selena, Dreaming of You, was later released in 1995.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

Selena was born on date 16th the year 1971 in Texas, a place called Lake Jackson. Her father was called Abraham Quintanilla, who is also reported to have been a musician. He went ahead and produced one of his family's group called Selena Y Los Dinos. Selena came of age speaking English, but the father taught her to sing in Spanish so as to resonate with the members of the Latino community. She first phonetically learned the lyrics and learned how to speak Spanish fluently. She then began performing as a young child. At the age of 10, she became the best singer in the whole family band. The musical groups were then beginning to play clubs and weddings in their native Texas language. The people featuring in the band were her brother Abraham playing the bass guitar and a sister called Suzette playing drums. She was recognized as the Queen of Tejano, Mexican music that embodied styles like country and western. At times she was being referred to as the Mexican Madonna because of her sexy dancing moves and outfits.

These recent days when the name Selena comes forth, most people would frequently imagine Selena Gomez. But those who were born before 2000, are acutely aware of the one and only Queen of Tejano Music, Selena Quintanilla. She captivated and inspired the whole world with her unbelievable voice and a dedicated, positive spirit in music. Her death anniversary has always been honored as Selena Day.

Reasons Why Selena Quintanilla Is Interesting And Worthy Of Researching

First, Selena used her music to bring together the Latino community. Despite her being Mexican born America, Selena began to bolster her career in the industry dominated by Spanish-speaking music in a genre called Tex-Mex. Selena was popularly recognized to be coming up with her own twist to Tex-Mex, bringing together Latino communities across the United States with her music. Selena's music shed light on the great Latino consumer market, one that had never been witnessed earlier.

Secondly, Selena was an entrepreneur. She had a great passion in fashion despite her unbelievable talent in singing and dancing as well. She not only started designing her performing costumes, but also a clothing line. At the peak of her career in the year 1994, she opened up a new Boutique called Selena in Corpus Christi, Texas. The boutique had a hair salon. Towards her death, she worked on a perfume line.

In addition, Selena did not forget her culture or roots. Though she crossed over English-market music, still English remained her first language. The lyrics of her songs were composed in Spanish through phonetics. With her successful attributes in the Spanish-music industry, Selena came to believe that getting to learn fluent Spanish language was unbelievable. In a couple of few years, the Mexican-American singer fully learned to speak fluent Spanish and started to attend many interviews with Spanish radio and television programs.

Moreover, Salena conquered the American dream. Though Selena did not live to the fullest of her expectation, there is an immense contribution that Selena accomplished in the music industry before the age of 23. She actually conquered the American Dream. Her family did not have a lot of wealth when she was young, but instead had a big vision of not giving up on their dream. Through the joint support of the family, they were privileged to establish the biggest Latina superstars ever created, with one of the most unending legacies that continue to grow exponentially (Bostock, Lyman, pg287)

Selena's Albums

Ven Conmigo(1990)-it was the first Tejano record to gain gold record followers or status, to mean more than 500000 copies were sold. Live! (1993) she became the first female artist to bag the Grammy for the best American-Mexican Album. This album hit No.2 on the displayed Top Latin Albums chart Billboard. Amor Prohibido (1994), Selena and the band team played countless dates of the tour in New York., Puerto Rico, Argentina, and California in the year 1994. Amor Prohibido was released and went viral that same year. Another one was Dreaming of You (1995). Soon after the release of this album, Selena proceeded to put more effort into her first English -language album, which she believed would have elevated her at the peak of American pop music charts. Unfortunately enough, she failed to see its success. The album was later released after her death and automatically became a wide hid. It was the album number one hit on top of the Billboard Top 200 in the month of August date 5th the year 1995 (Muniz, Janet pg12). The made the first-ever Spanish-language album to appear on the top of the chart. Some of her popular compilations albums are All My Hits Todos Mis Exitos (1999) and 12 Super Exitos (1994).

Selena's songs

Selena made 7 songs hit No. 1, and fourteen more other songs dominate the top 10 on the chart of Hot Latin Songs. Dreaming of You was ranked number 22 on the chart of Hot 100 Songs. Other songs include No Me Queda Mas. I'm Getting Used to You, Bidi Bidi Bom Bom, and I Could Fall in Lov, El Chico del Apartamento 512,Que Creias, Baila Esta Cumbia, Amor Prohibido, Tu Solo Tu,etc.

Selena's Awards

In the year 1993 , she bagged a Grammy for the Best American-Mexican Album for her album called Live at the 36th Grammy Awards. She was also famous among the Tejano music fans. At the Tejano Music Awards, she bagged both the Performer of the Year and Best Female Vocalist Award of the Year.

The death of Selena

She was shot dead in Corpus Christi, Texas , on date 31st month of March the year 1995. She was by then 23yrs old. The death came as a huge blow to the Latino Community, and her devoted fans all over the world mourned her bitterly. Yolanda Saldivar, the pioneer of the Selena fan club, was reported to have killed the slain Singer. Yolanda had been the managing director of Selena's boutique found in San Antonio. The two did meet in one of the hotel rooms to discuss issues or concerns that Yolanda was embezzling some huge cash according to court findings, unfortunately when Yolanda shot her dead. Yolanda later claimed the heinous act was accidental. She was late sentenced life imprisonment after proved guilty in the month of October 1995. She will be on parole in the year 2025.

Selena's Admirable Legacy

The success of Selena's persona and music has thrived for many years. She was honored posthumously with the star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on November date 3rd the year 2017, proclaimed as Selena Day by Mayor Eric Garcetti in Los Angeles. The same year, the famous reality star called Kim Kardashian West also put on as a Tejano singer to honor her homage to music legends during Halloween. In February 2019, State Representative of Texas Ann-Maria passed a bill that would mark Selena's birthday APRIL 16th as a holiday. That same year, San Diego State University also introduced plans of beginning a new course called Latinx Media Representation and Selena.

Conclusion

Selena's life history became a topic of 1997 film titled as Selena, which inspired Jenipher Lopez as the superstar of Tejano and James Edward as her father. Lopez later became the first Latina actress of the year to bag $1 million just for a movie role and was nominated a prestigious Golden Globe Award for performance. Selena's hubby Perez Chris, published a book in the year 2012 about his good time with Selena, To Selena, With Love. He did plan to put the book into a TV series form. The Netflix publicly announced that it was soon coming up with a scripted series about the celebrated singer's life, with the family being the topmost executive producers. Selena. The Series -Part 1, with Walking Dead's Christian Serratos to begin in 2020.

Works Cited

Bostock, Lyman, et al. "aPPendix b famous civilians sHot in tHe united states." Private Guns, Public Health (2017): 287.

Muniz, Janet. "Bidi Bidi Bom Bom: The Audiotopias of Selena Across the Americas." LUX: A Journal of Transdisciplinary Writing and Research from Claremont Graduate University 3.1 (2013): 12.