Is a Latino artist’s career “sin barreras” when they decide to record in English, like Shakira, Ricky Martin, etc. or can they make it big without going crossover and recording only in Spanish? The Boston Globe has a very interesting piece that ponders this very question:

But Leila Cobo, Billboard magazine’s bureau chief for Miami and Latin America, doubts these artists can achieve a high level of success unless they embrace English. ”If you want to do some kind of crossover,” Cobo says, ”usually you do need to have some language connection. Reggaeton is just the big exception to all the rules. And even so, these artists are doing collaborations with people who are singing in English, and that’s going to prove to be their entryway.”

While I personally don’t like to see Latino artists go crossover — I think the lyrics end up suffering and the performances seem forced at times — it has worked for quite a few artists. Paulina Rubio comes to mind. The opposite has happened for Thalia. As much as she tries, with her bigwig producer husband behind her, Engligh-language audiences just don’t warm up to her. Should she care? The Globe goes on:

With more than 41 million Latinos living in this country and an international Latin audience willing to purchase the music, is the crossover audience even important for a Spanish-language artist?”You do need it,” Cobo says. ”If you’re an artist and all you want to do is play concerts, no. But if you’re a label and want to sell albums, yeah. Because Latin America is very, very pirated.”

Apparently the only genre that doesn’t have to worry about what language it produces music in is reggaeton. No one can really understand what they are saying anyway.

Via / The Boston Globe and Latin Music News