Shakira was already a major star in Latin America in 2001 when she became a pop sensation in the US with her first English-language album, the multiplatinum Laundry Service.
And her dominance heading into the Latin Grammy Awards recently in New York City with a field-leading five nominations — including best song, record and album — confirms that she hasn't lost any ground in the Spanish-language market either.
It's a remarkable achievement, considering that her crossover predecessors — Ricky Martin, for example — struggled when they tried to return to their original fan base.
Both sides
What's most notable, though, is that Shakira has managed to work both sides of the border with such ease, bouncing back and forth across the cultural divide with no apparent compromise or change in her identity. (Singer Gloria Estefan, Shakira's one-time mentor, also pursued a successful bilingual career, but always from a base in Miami.)
How Shakira accomplished such a feat may lie less with the artist than with the cultures she straddles. Musically, Latin America and the US have been morphing together, for better or worse.
It's a phenomenon that has little to do with contemporary globalisation, which Shakira herself once cited to explain her cross-cultural appeal. This is all about rock 'n' roll.
No stylistic switch
Shakira is the first artist of the rock en Espanol generation to become a star in the US. So for her, crossing over meant a linguistic, but not stylistic, switch.
This allowed her to preserve a creative continuity regardless of language. Latin fans never felt that she left them when she switched to English — and when she switched back, she was the same Shakira they had always known and loved.
“We didn't see the audience as being divided,'' says Lee Stimmel, senior vice president of marketing for Epic Records, which released both albums last year. “We said, ‘This music is too important and too fantastic just to be marginalised.'''
Suave style
Now compare Shakira's experience to that of Spanish singer Julio Iglesias, one of the biggest crossover stars of all time. Iglesias was the premier pop singer in the Spanish-speaking world when he wooed English-speaking fans with his suave style on his 1984 breakthrough smash, To All the Girls I've Loved Before, an unlikely duet with country star Willie Nelson.
In Los Angeles, there was such a rage over the dapper divo that he set a box-office record with 10 consecutive nights at Universal Amphitheatre, a run that remains unbeaten.
When loyal Latin fans at one of those concerts shouted requests for their old favourites, Iglesias bluntly told them to “shut up,'' explaining to his new admirers that that was another new term he had picked up in English.
Dissing fans
The Spaniard had committed the No 1 crossover crime: He had dissed his former fans while appearing to pander to his new ones, even donning a red bandana for his country-tinged duet. For the Latin psyche, the destructive dynamic is as old as colonialism: He thinks he's better than us because he's now with them.
Shakira, by contrast, was never suspected of changing herself to please anybody. In fact, her success rested in persuading new fans to like her for who she was. She even insisted on learning English so she could write her own songs, rather than let others speak for her or reshape her. That was seen as bringing honour, not disgrace, to her original fans and their home countries, which by then had absorbed aspects of rock culture.
Changing cultures
Martin and Marc Anthony had a different dilemma when they tried to cross back. They were trapped by their genres: Anthony in salsa and Martin in club music, both stuck in the '90s. When they attempted to reconnect with Latin fans, they were out of step.
“That sort of dance pop moment has passed, in either language,'' notes Jordan Levin, an arts writer who covers dance and Latin music for The Miami Herald. “I think the culture changed for a lot of reasons, 9/11 is one of them.
formulaic and un-hip
“Marc Anthony was doing a kind of tropical version of that dance pop ... In English and Spanish, it's been really formulaic and un-hip.'' concluded Levin.
Did someone say hip?
That leads to a final point about Shakira's success. She is the first Latin crossover artist who has also gained critical acclaim from the English-language rock press. She has managed to sell millions and still seem genuine, a prerequisite for rock respect.
