[Free Latin Acapella Songs
Hanne Rylaarsdam
The latin acapellas listed here may be used in your projects in accordance with our terms and conditions, but please note the creators of any acapellas retain certain rights and are entitled to stipulate certain licence terms. Subject to our terms and conditions, you will always, at a minimum, be able to use acapellas listed here for free for non-commercial purposes.
For further details on how you can use any acapellas (including details on the specific licences granted by the creators of acapellas), please see the acapellas section of the help area and our terms and conditions. If you come across any content that is in breach of copyright or our upload guidelines please contact support.
Latin music (Portuguese and Spanish: msica latina) is a term used by the music industry as a catch-all category for various styles of music from Ibero-America,[1] which encompasses Latin America, Spain, Portugal, and the Latino population in Canada and the United States,[2][3][4][5] as well as music that is sung in either Spanish and/or Portuguese.[6][7][8][9][10]
Because the majority of Latino immigrants living in New York City in the 1950s were of Puerto Rican or Cuban descent, "Latin music" had been stereotyped as music simply originating from the Spanish Caribbean. The popularization of bossa nova and Herb Alpert's Mexican-influenced sounds in the 1960s did little to change the perceived image of Latin music. Since then, the music industry classifies all music sung in Spanish or Portuguese as Latin music, including musics from Spain and Portugal.[6]
Following protests from Latinos in New York, a category for Latin music was created by National Recording Academy (NARAS) for the Grammy Awards titled Best Latin Recording in 1975.[12] Enrique Fernandez wrote in Billboard that the lone category for Latin music meant that all Latin music genres had to compete with each other despite the distinct sounds of the genre. He also noted that the accolade was usually given to performers of tropical music. Eight years later, the organization debuted three new categories for Latin music: Best Latin Pop Performance, Best Mexican/Mexican-American Performance, and Best Tropical Latin Performance.[13] Latin pop is a catch-all for any pop music sung in Spanish, while Mexican/Mexican-American (also to referred to as Regional Mexican) is defined as any musical style originating from Mexico or influences by its immigrants in the United States including Tejano, and tropical music is any music from the Spanish Caribbean.[14]
In 1997, NARAS established the Latin Recording Academy (LARAS) in an effort to expand its operations in both Latin America and Spain.[15] In September 2000, LARAS launched the Latin Grammy Awards, a separate award ceremony from the Grammy Awards. Its organizers stated that the Latin music universe was too large to fit within the Grammys. Michael Greene, former head of NARAS, said that the process of creating the Latin Grammy Awards was complicated due to the diverse Latin musical styles, noting that the only thing they had in common was language. As a result, the Latin Grammy Awards are presented to records performed in Spanish or Portuguese,[16] while the organization focuses on music from Latin America, Spain, and Portugal.[17]
Since the late 1990s, the United States has seen increasing growth in its population of "Latinos",[18] a term popularized since the 1960s due to confusing the wrong term "Spanish" with the more proper but less popular term "Hispanic".[19] The music industry in the United States began to refer to any kind of music featuring Spanish vocals as "Latin music".[20][21][22] Under this definition, Spanish sung in any genre is categorized as "Latin".[23] In turn, this has led to artists from Spain being labelled as "Latin" because they sing in the same language.[24]
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and Billboard magazine use this definition of Latin music to track sales of Spanish-language records in the United States.[25][26] Billboard however considers an artist to be "Latin" if they perform in Spanish or Portuguese.[27] The RIAA initiated the "Los Premios de Oro y Platino" ("The Gold and Platinum Awards" in Spanish) in 2000 to certify sales of Latin music albums and singles under a different threshold than its standard certifications.[28] Billboard divides its Latin music charts into three subcategories: Latin pop, Regional Mexican, and tropical.[29] A fourth subcategory was added in the mid 2000s to address the rise of Latin urban music genres such as Latin hip hop and reggaeton.[30]
The term "Latin music" originated from the United States due to the growing influence of Latino Americans in the American music market, including pioneers Xavier Cugat (1940s) and Tito Puente (1950s) and accelerating in later decades.[4][5] As one author explained the rising popularity from the 1940s: "Latin America, the one part of the world not engulfed in World War II, became a favorite topic for songs and films for Americans who wanted momentarily to forget about the conflagration."[31] Wartime propaganda for America's "Good Neighbor Policy" further enhanced the cultural impact.[32] Prez Prado composed such famous pieces as "Mambo No. 5" and "Mambo No. 8". At the height of the mambo movement in 1955, Prez hit number one on the American charts with a cha-cha-ch version of "Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White".[33] El manisero, known in English as The Peanut Vendor, is a Cuban son-pregn composed by Moiss Simons. Together with "Guantanamera", it is arguably the most famous piece of music created by a Cuban musician.[34] "The Peanut Vendor" has been recorded more than 160 times,[35] sold over a million copies of sheet music, and was the first million-selling 78 rpm single of Cuban music.[citation needed]
The Brazilian bossa nova became widespread in Latin America and later became an international trend, led especially by Antnio Carlos Jobim.[36] Rock en espaol became popular with the younger generation of Latinos in Latin America,[37] for example the Argentine band Almendra.[38] Mexican-American Latin rock guitarist Carlos Santana began decades of popularity.[39] By the late 60s, the boogaloo boom was coming, and boogaloo musicians such as Prez Prado, Tito Rodrguez and Tito Puente[40] released boogaloo singles and albums. Most of the other groups were young musicians such as Pucho & His Latin Soul Brothers and Joe Bataan.
Early examples of boogaloo were 1966 music by Richie Ray and Bobby Cruz. The biggest boogaloo hit of the '60s was "Bang Bang" by the Joe Cuba Sextet in 1966. Hits by other groups included Johnny Coln's "Boogaloo Blues", Pete Rodrguez's "I Like It like That"(1967).[41]
Salsa music became the dominant genre of tropical music in the 1970s. Fania Records was credited for popularizing salsa music, with acts such as Rubn Blades, Hctor Lavoe, and Celia Cruz expanding the audience.[42] In the late 1970s, an influx of balladeers from Spain such as Julio Iglesias, Camilo Sesto, and Raphael established their presence on the music charts both in Latin America and the US Latin market.[43] In 1972, OTI Festival was established by the Organizacin de Telecomunicaciones de Iberoamrica as a songwriting contest to interconnect the Ibero-American countries (Latin America, Spain, and Portugal). Ramiro Burr of Billboard remarked that the contest was considered to be the "largest and most prestigious songwriting festival in the Latin music world".[44]
In the 1980s, the Latin ballad continued to be the main form of Latin pop music, with Juan Gabriel, Jos Jos, Julio Iglesias, Roberto Carlos, and Jos Luis Rodrguez dominating the charts.[45] Salsa music lost some traction, and its rhythm slowed with more emphasis on romantic lyrics. This became known as the salsa romantica era.[46]
In the Regional Mexican field, Tejano music became the most prominent genre and one of the fastest-growing music genres in the United States.[48] On January 10, 1990, EMI Latin bought Bob Grever's Cara Records, beginning the golden age of Tejano music.[48][49] Tejano music's growth exploded,[50] as journalist Ramiro Burr put it "a stubborn brushfire spread over the horizon", the genre converted radio stations to play Tejano music.[51] This garnered the attention of record labels across the United States who were eager to expand their rosters.[50] In 1991, Warner Nashville created Warner Discos specifically for Tejano artists crossing over into country music while Arista Nashville erected Artista Texas with the same objective.[52] Other labels such as PolyGram Latino and WEA Latina began deliberations to exclusively sign Tejano acts, while Fonovisa began signing Tejano musicians.[53] These incentives helped expand performers' fanbases beyond Texas and the southwest.[54] It also brought the genre to territories unfamiliar with the genre.[51] The golden age is generally considered by journalists to have ended on March 31, 1995, when Selena was shot and killed.[54][55] Tejano music set five consecutive years of sales and concert attendance records from 1990 to 1995.[48] Mario Tarradell of The Dallas Morning News wrote that the singles from Amor Prohibido elevated Selena to success on Latin radio whose promoters had not previously taken the singer seriously.[56] By 1994, Tejano acts were effortless selling 100,000 units of their albums, while La Mafia and Selena were the two most commercially successful Tejano artists.[51] Selena's music led the genre's 1990s revival and made it marketable for the first time.[57][58][59][60] Tejano music is believed by Jose Behar to have hit Mexico "like an atomic bomb" by 1994.[51] While Tejano singer Emilio Navaira decided on a crossover into American country music, preparations began for Selena's crossover into American pop music.[61] The singer was fatally wounded after a confrontation with Yolanda Saldivar, a friend and former associate of the singer's fan club, and boutiques.[62] Her unfinished crossover album, Dreaming of You (1995), became the first mostly-Spanish album to debut and peak at number one on the US Billboard 200 chart.[63] Tejano music suffered and its popularity waned following Selena's death, and record labels began abandoning their Tejano artists while radio stations in the United States switched from Tejano to Regional Mexican music.[64]
795a8134c1