Last week Mala reported on Shakira’s claim that her crossover into the English language market had nothing to do with money. It seems that not all the money in the world, his label’s pressure or potential for fame in Europe will make Juanes do it:

The artist is doing so while performing in his native language. Juanes — whose full name is Juan Esteban Aristizabal — speaks English fluently, but is not interested in it for singing.

“I’m still thinking in Espanol, I still dream in Espanol, and I write my music in Espanol,” he says. “I don’t see why I need to change.”

The interesting thing is that Juanes isn’t just playing Latino mainstay cities, he’s hitting traditionally non-Latino markets as well:

On the first leg of the Mi Sangre tour, Juanes sold 2,600 tickets in Minneapolis; sold 1,700 seats in Jacksonville, Fla.; and sold out the Opera House in Detroit, according to Michel Vega, Juanes’ Miami-based agent at the William Morris Agency. “These are not known as strong Hispanic markets. However, the audience is there, and because we worked them early he already had a (fan base) in these markets,” he said.

Without taking away from the fact that Shakira is one of the few Latino artists that have managed to crossover with any degree of success — and that she hasn’t compromised her sound or her lyics in doing so — you really have to commend Juanes. I hate the term “keep it real”, but that’s what he is doing. He believes that his music wasn’t meant to be adapted from Spanish, the language it was conceived in, into English, and he seems to sticking by that.

Let’s hope that if he does conquer the non-Latino market it will encourage Americans to learn a second language. THE second language.

Via / Reuters