Speaker 1: The year is nineteen ninety aka the year of it
Speaker 1: must have been Love by Rock Sets.
Speaker 2: Or Vogue Madonna, Hello.
Speaker 1: Wow, nineteen ninety. We're talking about nineteen ninety Celia and
Speaker 1: Madonna at.
Speaker 2: The same time because it's also the year that Celia Cruz,
Speaker 2: at seventy five years young, comes the closest she ever
Speaker 2: will to return into Cuba.
Speaker 1: Since leaving the island in nineteen sixty two, Celia has
Speaker 1: seen the world. She's performed in practically every continent, filling stadiums, plazas,
Speaker 1: and concert house.
Speaker 2: But everywhere she went, her homeland was in her heart,
Speaker 2: her voice, her every dance move.
Speaker 1: So when Celia is invited to give her performance at
Speaker 1: the US Naval base in Guantanamo, it's clear why she
Speaker 1: says yes.
Speaker 2: We should also know that this is more than a
Speaker 2: decade before the base would gain its present day reputation.
Speaker 1: This was a chance to breathe the same area as
Speaker 1: she wants it as a child and as a young entertainer.
Speaker 1: At the very beginning of her journey.
Speaker 2: She arrives with a documentarian and a reporter in tow
Speaker 2: and asks to be taken to the highest point in
Speaker 2: the base. When she gets there. In her excitement, she
Speaker 2: lets out her signature phrase Asuka. They go up and
Speaker 2: Celia looks out beyond the shore across the bay to Kaimanita,
Speaker 2: a small harbor town. Celia had sung the name of
Speaker 2: this town in one of her songs, but she had
Speaker 2: never actually seen it with her own eyes.
Speaker 1: Okay, here come the tears.
Speaker 2: Celia sings for the Navy personnel stationed at the base,
Speaker 2: and before she leaves for the mainland, she stops by
Speaker 2: a fence, crouches down and grabs a fistful of Cuban earth.
Speaker 2: She puts it in a styrofoam cup and decides, right
Speaker 2: then and there she will be buried with it. Get
Speaker 2: it on, MATI got no, this is too much.
Speaker 1: Okay, I'm composed.
Speaker 2: Today.
Speaker 1: On becoming an Icon, Celia leaves us with a lifetime
Speaker 1: of psalms and soul.
Speaker 2: I'm your host, Liliana Oosquez and I'm Joseph Carrio and
Speaker 2: this is Becoming an Icon, a weekly podcast where we
Speaker 2: give you the rundown on how today's most famous LATINV
Speaker 2: stars have shaped pop culture.
Speaker 1: And given the world some extra level.
Speaker 2: Sit back and get comfortable.
Speaker 3: Because we are going in the only way we know
Speaker 3: how with buenas vias, buenasriesas, and a lot of opinions
Speaker 3: as we relive their greatest achievements on our journey to
Speaker 3: find out what makes them so iconic.
Speaker 2: By the nineties, Celia had reached that era rightfully deserved
Speaker 2: by any icon nearing retirement.
Speaker 1: H the victory lap Era.
Speaker 2: The year before her visit to Guantanimo, she had played
Speaker 2: a reunion show with les Sonora Mantanza for their sixty
Speaker 2: fifth anniversary.
Speaker 1: Wait, she didn't play with them for sixty five years.
Speaker 2: No no, no, no, no no. But the band was
Speaker 2: founded back in nineteen twenty four, before Celia joined in
Speaker 2: the fifties. But it goes to show how much Celia
Speaker 2: was a part of history. Her legacies spanned multiple eras.
Speaker 1: From the nightclubs of Cuba's yester years to the generation
Speaker 1: defining satasa of the seventies and eighties.
Speaker 2: She had also mixed it up with musicians you wouldn't expect.
Speaker 2: There's her feature on nineteen eighty eight Vassals Vasillos with
Speaker 2: the ska band Los Bamoso's Cadillacs, and she even performed
Speaker 2: with hipster icon David byrne On his debut solo album
Speaker 2: in nineteen eighty nine.
Speaker 1: And Last We Forget Our Queen was on the screen
Speaker 1: along with tele novelas. She appeared in movies like Mambo
Speaker 1: Kings alongside Antonio banderas Lucky and nineteen ninety five's The
Speaker 1: Bettest Family starring Alfred Molina and Angelica Wait for It, Houston.
Speaker 2: Okay, that's big But my favorite Celia TV appearance has
Speaker 2: to be when she taught Big Bird how to dance salsa.
Speaker 1: I thought it was so so adorbed I wanted to
Speaker 1: hug her. Ah.
Speaker 2: I love that moment. Okay, but here's the point. Semia
Speaker 2: had become a household name. Whatever home meant for her.
Speaker 2: Her voice sounded like home to millions of fans in
Speaker 2: the US, in the Caribbean.
Speaker 1: And beyond, and the accolades came pouring in. In nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety four, she was awarded the National Medal of the Arts,
Speaker 1: one of the United States' highest creative honors.
Speaker 2: She had a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame,
Speaker 2: a street named after her in Miami. Three honorary degrees.
Speaker 2: She was smartyo, and she had an asteroid named after her.
Speaker 2: There was no question she was an American ic, A
Speaker 2: Cuban icon, you know what? Fuck it? A global icon.
Speaker 1: Oh and let's not forget she got Grammys.
Speaker 2: Right you are, Joseph. Back in nineteen eighty six, she
Speaker 2: won for Best Tropical Latin Performance for Rifmo and Coresson,
Speaker 2: and then more than a decade later, in two thousand,
Speaker 2: she helped inaugurate the first ever Latin Grammys at Los
Speaker 2: Angeles's Staple Center.
Speaker 1: And she opened the ceremony with fellow Cuban icons Gloria
Speaker 1: Estefan and Ricky Martin shout out to Season one.
Speaker 2: That night, she won one of the very first Latin
Speaker 2: Grammys for her live album Celia Crusen Friends a Night
Speaker 2: of Salsa along with Vita Ponte.
Speaker 1: She would win another one the next year for her
Speaker 1: album sianpre vi Videt, which we'll talk about in a bit,
Speaker 1: but first I must point out it has a cover
Speaker 1: of Gloria Gaynor's I Will Survive Amazing.
Speaker 2: But it also just makes perfect sense one hundred percent.
Speaker 1: Celia was in New York during the golden age of disco.
Speaker 2: Do you think she went to Studio.
Speaker 1: Fifty four, Yes, I don't doubt it.
Speaker 2: I need to find evidence of this because if she
Speaker 2: wasn't there, Like what was Ian Schrager thinking.
Speaker 1: She was there? She was there, she was invited, she atty.
Speaker 2: I know she was like her and and there's got
Speaker 2: to be a picture. I feel like she would be
Speaker 2: living it up in like seventies Studio fifty four.
Speaker 1: Honey, she was the costume hair queen.
Speaker 2: And you know what, it's crazy because the golden age
Speaker 2: of disco overlapped perfectly with the heyday of salsa. And
Speaker 2: let's be honest, they both have roots and mumbo, which
Speaker 2: took New York by storm before the finan years.
Speaker 1: They moved to the beat of the same gona and
Speaker 1: it shows how natural a part of the quote unquote
Speaker 1: American music artists like Celia.
Speaker 2: Art case in point, Celia paid tribute to another soul
Speaker 2: icon that same year. Together with Mark Anthony, she joined
Speaker 2: VH one's tribute to Aretha Franklin.
Speaker 1: But Celia wasn't just reliving the glory days. One of
Speaker 1: the biggest hits of her career was yet to come.
Speaker 2: And no, it wasn't a salsa standard at all ready.
Speaker 2: It was a foray into reggathon.
Speaker 1: Oh yes, La negra.
Speaker 2: Go Joseph. That's something I'm telling you a singing contract
Speaker 2: is coming in season thirty. La Negratubao was one of
Speaker 2: just a handful of forays Celia made into reggaton during
Speaker 2: its early crossover days.
Speaker 1: And Honey, this was pre auto tune reggaeton that down
Speaker 1: and dirty shit and laveeha. She wears it like she
Speaker 1: had it custom made.
Speaker 2: She was embracing the new generation's music, just like she
Speaker 2: did with Fanya in the seventies and Joseph So you know.
Speaker 2: Dumbao came two years before Gasolina Wow.
Speaker 1: Man, seventy five years old and ahead of the trend.
Speaker 2: In Billboard Magazine, the producer and co writer of the track,
Speaker 2: Serrio George and.
Speaker 1: Producer for j Looh, Talia Evy, Queen Mark Anthony, just
Speaker 1: to name.
Speaker 2: A few, described wanting to throw something new at the
Speaker 2: Queen of Salsa. He said that of all the tracks
Speaker 2: he played for Celia, the beat for La Negraumbau was
Speaker 2: the track she had the strongest reaction to.
Speaker 1: God sounds like the cool dea who lets your do
Speaker 1: parties at her place because she likes the music. You
Speaker 1: know what I mean.
Speaker 2: I want to be that cool like I want to
Speaker 2: be that ya do you have ada like that? No,
Speaker 2: I'm that dea on la nega tumbao. Celia matches the
Speaker 2: sabiluria of old age with the braggadocio of regaton. So
Speaker 2: she yells slash raps, I don't know, does she rap
Speaker 2: kind of like a little She says, guandola hente semue
Speaker 2: your meal seli sick? Yeah boo, I mean we did
Speaker 2: really good. Are we getting a music card?
Speaker 1: Both of us? It's a duo probably okay, but translate
Speaker 1: this for us. What were you even saying?
Speaker 2: Okay? So she's basically saying, when you die, people speak
Speaker 2: better of you than they did when you were living
Speaker 2: like night and day. And then she says, say it
Speaker 2: to my face, bitch, say it to my face. When
Speaker 2: you read the song title, it's really just like, oh yeah,
Speaker 2: that black girl's got rhythm.
Speaker 1: Right when the girl comes around, everyone takes notice that
Speaker 1: girl is on her hot girl shit.
Speaker 2: But just like Asuka means more than just literal sugar boombao,
Speaker 2: in Celia's performance means more than just rhythm.
Speaker 1: Mm confidence, attitude, patience, power, and not taking no shit.
Speaker 2: She then continues these fruito biende la vida amando me.
Speaker 1: She's enjoyed her life well, but that doesn't mean she
Speaker 1: hasn't had to fight her battles.
Speaker 2: She's the boss, and maybe that's why Sechel George called
Speaker 2: her an ambassador of good music. For the use of
Speaker 2: time understatement, Let's talk about Celia's iconic.
Speaker 1: Looks, the wigs, the dresses, stop it.
Speaker 2: There's so many looks that we could reference here, but
Speaker 2: I think what people really remember is like, there's like
Speaker 2: a peacock gown that she wears. It's like blue almost
Speaker 2: kind of like the very like deep red, like burgundy hair.
Speaker 2: There's obviously like the orange dress with the feathers and
Speaker 2: the blonde hair.
Speaker 1: Wait wait, wait, but I know something about you, because duh,
Speaker 1: you're a stylist. So what what is the style of
Speaker 1: her dress called? Is it like a trumpet dress or
Speaker 1: like a mermaid dress?
Speaker 2: I love that you brought that up. So when you
Speaker 2: think of her and you think of the Celia Barbie.
Speaker 1: Her Celia dress, like, it's like, I don't know what
Speaker 1: it's called.
Speaker 2: I love that you're calling it the Celia dress. Yes,
Speaker 2: so it's called a batta kubana is what it's called.
Speaker 2: And that is that kind of like signature, very form
Speaker 2: fitting through the bodice, through the legs to the knees
Speaker 2: that then flares out almost like a mermaid style. But
Speaker 2: then you also have to have the big, billowy trumpet
Speaker 2: sleeves to match.
Speaker 1: Always the sleeves were there. It wasn't without because maybe
Speaker 1: without hey, maybe without it would be like a tango
Speaker 1: dress or a flamenco dress, because it kind of has
Speaker 1: that exactly.
Speaker 2: But that was really kind of signature to her early
Speaker 2: performance looks. And then as of course, as she got
Speaker 2: older in age, she loosened the gowns up. But she
Speaker 2: never gave you anything less than drama, drama, drama, whether
Speaker 2: it was sequence or a feather or a Peluca, the
Speaker 2: Beluca now the Belucas.
Speaker 1: Honey. She was Nicki Minaj, She was everybody. She she
Speaker 1: was the wig store. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And you know there's this famous quote at her fashion
Speaker 2: that she says, if I look in the audience and
Speaker 2: see somebody dressed better than me, I feel like I
Speaker 2: have failed. People pay good money to come hear me sing,
Speaker 2: but also to see me saying, and I should always
Speaker 2: look the part. Buntal Hereriet.
Speaker 1: She just keeps on giving and serving.
Speaker 2: She does but Joseph, we can't just talk about her
Speaker 2: looks forever. And she was serving serving me.
Speaker 1: Excall me, excouse me. What are you talking about? Of
Speaker 1: course we can or I can.
Speaker 2: Okay, yes we can, but.
Speaker 1: No, nope. She got her Grammys and we got songs
Speaker 1: to crunk until Kingdom calm. So story over, Sorry, Joseph,
Speaker 1: that's how it ends.
Speaker 2: That's not okay. After the break, the world says goodbye
Speaker 2: to Celia Cruz. In the summer of twothwo thousand and two,
Speaker 2: Semya I was playing yet another jam packed outdoor festival,
Speaker 2: Central Park Summer Stage in New York. Hold on a second,
Speaker 2: hold the phone, story time, shut your butt, tell me everything. Okay.
Speaker 2: I was not there in two thousand and two, but okay, blocked.
Speaker 2: Did you know that my first real paying media job
Speaker 2: was as a host of the show Central Park Summer
Speaker 2: Stage on NYCTV.
Speaker 1: No way, how crazy that we're talking about it, I know, And.
Speaker 2: It's one of my favorite things about New York City
Speaker 2: is all of the free concerts that come to Central
Speaker 2: Park every summer. And it also gave me my very
Speaker 2: first opportunity to cover music on television.
Speaker 1: That is really cool. Well, Okay, so you weren't there
Speaker 1: in two thousand and two.
Speaker 2: I was not.
Speaker 1: This was during one of New York's hottest summers on records.
Speaker 1: So I'm glad for you. And that is a sweaty show.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I remember these summer shows. We would be drenched.
Speaker 2: I don't even understand how Celia could put on that
Speaker 2: kind of performance. But old age hadn't slowed Celia down,
Speaker 2: at least not yet.
Speaker 1: Behind the scenes, Celia was battling breast cancer. Shortly after
Speaker 1: her summer stage performance. She would undergo multiple surgeries in
Speaker 1: August and September.
Speaker 2: Unfortunately, her medical battles would continue. In November, she was
Speaker 2: diagnosed with glioma, an aggressive form of brain cancer. The
Speaker 2: following month, she underwent surgery again.
Speaker 1: She would later reveal her diagnosis in People in Espano, saying,
Speaker 1: when the doctor told me I had a tumor, I
Speaker 1: told them, well get rid of it, which, my god,
Speaker 1: the fearlessness.
Speaker 2: Right in the month leading up to the interview, she
Speaker 2: recovered at her home in Fort Lee, New Jersey, where
Speaker 2: she says she did not shed a single tear. She's
Speaker 2: a bad bitch, And.
Speaker 1: After she recovered, she got right back into their courting
Speaker 1: booth to finish her next album, Regalo de Lalmaesumbao all Right.
Speaker 2: Baby, speaking of which in February she would pick up
Speaker 2: her fourth Grammy, winning in the Salsa Album category for
Speaker 2: lad Ne Gratienne Dumbau.
Speaker 1: Then in March, Telemono produced a blowout tribute special for
Speaker 1: Celia in Miami. Multiple generations of star seng Lorena's hits
Speaker 1: for her, Mark Anthony Victor Manuel, Gloria Stefan Tenam, a
Speaker 1: few Patti LaBelle even jumped in on Kimbarra, and Gloria
Speaker 1: Gaynor closed the sect with I will.
Speaker 2: Survive, but that's not all, folks. Then Celia joined the
Speaker 2: entire lineup on stage during a nearly twelve minute encore performance,
Speaker 2: mashing up Gimbara with her cover of I Will Survive.
Speaker 1: This huge, explosive celebration of Celia's life would be her
Speaker 1: last public appearance.
Speaker 2: On July sixteenth, two thousand and three, Celia passed away
Speaker 2: at her home in Fort Lee. She was seventy seven.
Speaker 1: Her remains were transported to Miami and displayed inside the
Speaker 1: Freedom Tower, the History the work building where refugees from
Speaker 1: the Cuban Revolution were processed in the sixties.
Speaker 2: An estimated crowd of seventy to two hundred thousand mourners
Speaker 2: lined the streets outside.
Speaker 1: Then Celia's remains were transported back and north. She would
Speaker 1: be buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx.
Speaker 2: In a short memorial for Entertainment Weekly, David Byrne would write,
Speaker 2: her voice embodied sensuality, pleasure, melancholy and spirituality simultaneously. In
Speaker 2: that one voice, you could hear millions. Sixteen days later,
Speaker 2: Celia's final studio album, Reggaalo de Lalma, was released. The
Speaker 2: album featured a mix of modernized Latin pop and traditional salsa.
Speaker 2: Two singles were.
Speaker 1: Released, Celia's other regaton banger aat Enna Fuego and rey
Speaker 1: Illora Laugh and Cry, the last song Selia ever recorded.
Speaker 2: Cuban writer Jose Kidoga called the song an appeal to
Speaker 2: live for the moment. In it, Celia sings, it's not
Speaker 2: that I remember, but that I don't forget.
Speaker 1: Get.
Speaker 2: That's forgiveness, to remember without pain.
Speaker 1: To go through what Celia went through in her life
Speaker 1: and be capable of forgiveness, I feel.
Speaker 2: Like you have to be superhuman, and we know that
Speaker 2: she was, but maybe it takes great pain to truly
Speaker 2: know how to forgive. And all throughout her career, Celia
Speaker 2: sang about that pain, about her yearning to return to
Speaker 2: her homeland.
Speaker 1: In her last song on that subject, Portia Regresso in English,
Speaker 1: in Case I never come back, she literally describes this
Speaker 1: pain as something that would kill her.
Speaker 2: Celia never got to return to Cuba, but even with
Speaker 2: the band on her music still in place, some Cuban
Speaker 2: musicians on the island would recognize her legacy. Celia died
Speaker 2: just two days after her old piano accompanist Gombe Segundo.
Speaker 1: Silvio Rodriguez, the Cuban folk singer, would remark, I imagine
Speaker 1: the two of them must be up on a cloud
Speaker 1: having a good time, gom By playing and Selia singing.
Speaker 1: I hope that's the case.
Speaker 2: As we were working on this episode of the podcast,
Speaker 2: I immediately started thinking about my grandmother and how she
Speaker 2: never got to go back home either, Like she never
Speaker 2: traveled a lot once she kind of settled here in
Speaker 2: the United States, and she never went back to her
Speaker 2: hometown where she was born and where she grew up.
Speaker 2: And part of me like really aches about that for her,
Speaker 2: because I think that experience happens to a lot of
Speaker 2: people who come here and choose to never go back
Speaker 2: for whatever reasons. Right, Sometimes it's too painful, Sometimes it's finances,
Speaker 2: sometimes it's the economics of things. But I can't imagine
Speaker 2: having that be so present in your pain. Like everybody
Speaker 2: needs closure, you know. I feel like she never got that.
Speaker 1: Well, you know. I think it's because she was always
Speaker 1: hopeful for it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she was able to go once.
Speaker 1: To me, she thought she could go again. And I
Speaker 1: also think she also lived a hopeful life.
Speaker 2: One thousand percent. I think when people listen to her music,
Speaker 2: or they listen to some music and you just hear it, right,
Speaker 2: like if you don't speak the language, and you're just
Speaker 2: like taking in the energy of the song. Right, it's
Speaker 2: like an energy transfer when you're listening to music room
Speaker 2: where and you're appreciating art, whatever it is, If you
Speaker 2: just take in that energy transfer, there is a joyfulness
Speaker 2: to her music that exists regardless of the subject matter.
Speaker 2: And I think that's what's so beautiful about her music
Speaker 2: and why people connect to it so much, because I
Speaker 2: think it initially kind of brings you in on that
Speaker 2: like very like high vibration, high frequency like we're having fun,
Speaker 2: we're dancing, we're at a party. But if you listen
Speaker 2: to the words and a lot of SADSA songs like
Speaker 2: they're incredibly painful and they're really deep. Same thing. I'm
Speaker 2: not gonna constantly take it back to Bad Bunny, but
Speaker 2: a lot of Bad Bunny's music, when you actually break
Speaker 2: down the lyrics and you listen to what he's saying,
Speaker 2: it sounds like music you can shake your ass to,
Speaker 2: but he's actually talking about the state of mental health
Speaker 2: for him, his struggles. So I think with this kind
Speaker 2: of music, it's nice because it gets it out to
Speaker 2: a wide audience because it feels so joyful and high energy.
Speaker 2: But when you actually listen to the song and you
Speaker 2: actually process the lyrics, you're like, damn, that's deep. Isaac Delgado,
Speaker 2: at the time, the last remaining artists living on the
Speaker 2: island to have played with Celia, said, she is an
Speaker 2: artist who really always carried the name of Cuba in
Speaker 2: her mouth. I have to say this, when we translate
Speaker 2: phrases from Spanish to English, I feel like it loses
Speaker 2: a lot of like the beauty of the sentiment, because
Speaker 2: like I can hear him saying that saying like, like
Speaker 2: that's what he would say.
Speaker 1: It's more. It's more than that. It's more than what
Speaker 1: this sentence.
Speaker 2: It just gives more. So please forgive if like when
Speaker 2: we say it in English, it's like, well, that doesn't
Speaker 2: sound right. No, it doesn't sound right because it's not
Speaker 2: meant to be translated, right. But I just had to
Speaker 2: add that footnote because often when we translate, I feel
Speaker 2: like it loses all of the heart and language and
Speaker 2: spirit of it. So okay, moving on.
Speaker 1: Sinceelia's passing, streets and schools have been named after her
Speaker 1: in theronx, Miami and throughout Latin America, the Smithsonian would
Speaker 1: put up an exhibit honoring her life and featuring several
Speaker 1: of her most iconic dresses.
Speaker 2: In twenty twenty one. I remember this very clearly. Mattel
Speaker 2: released a barbie in her honor, clad in her classic
Speaker 2: red rumbera dress, and this year she was put on
Speaker 2: the quarter belting in that same dress, along with her catchphrase, Joseph,
Speaker 2: give it to us Asuka. But most importantly, Celia's music
Speaker 2: continues to bring Cuba as she lived and remembered it
Speaker 2: to the world.
Speaker 1: Camilla Cabello saying that she can visit Cuba through Celia's songs,
Speaker 1: and in.
Speaker 2: Twenty nineteen, African artist Angelie Kidjo won a Grammy for
Speaker 2: her album of afrobeat renditions of Celia's classics titled Simply Celia.
Speaker 1: Whether she had even a glimmer of an idea of
Speaker 1: where her voice would lead her, Celia would leave this
Speaker 1: world having changed it forever.
Speaker 2: Four years after Celia's death, her husband, collaborator and the
Speaker 2: business partner, Fedro Knight, passed away at the age of
Speaker 2: eighty five.
Speaker 1: The two are buried together in the same mausoleum at
Speaker 1: Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx. Next Time on Becoming an
Speaker 1: Icon the Queen.
Speaker 2: Of the Hanno. Music to Becoming an Icon is presented
Speaker 2: by Sonoo and Iheart's Michael Guda podcast network. Listen to
Speaker 2: Becoming an Icon on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or
Speaker 2: wherever you get your podcast