Rosal¨ªa becomes first female Spanish artist to win an MTV Video Music Award
The 25-year-old star from Catalonia won Best Latin Video alongside reggaeton artist J Balvin for their song ¡®Con Altura¡¯
After two hours of the 36th edition of the MTV Video Music Awards last night, it was time for a song in Spanish. The 20,000 attendees of the event in New Jersey were silent as a flamenco voice sang out. Rosal¨ªa, dressed all in black, lit up the Prudential Center. Last night the 25-year-old, who is from Catalonia, became the first female Spanish artist to have received a prize at the event. In 2001, Spain¡¯s Alejandro Sanz took the MTV Latin America International Viewer¡¯s Choice award for for the video for his song El Alma al Aire.
Rosal¨ªa came up onto the stage, accompanied by J Balvin, to receive an award for the Best Latin Video for the song Con Altura. ¡°I come from Barcelona,¡± she said after collecting the prize. ¡°Thank you for inviting me to sing on this stage in Spanish.¡±
Taylor Swift was in charge of opening the night, and taking the audience on a voyage that MTV wanted to be a magical one. And in part, it was. The pop superstar sang You Need to Calm Down on a stage that looked like the stomach of a unicorn, while Rosal¨ªa and Camila Cabello danced along. The magic continued to flow when hip-hop legend Missy Elliot sang through a compilation of her hits as rain fell from the ceiling, volcanoes spit out lava and a spaceship landed on the stage.
Praise from the US
Earlier this week, Rosal¨ªa was also in the headlines after former US President Barack Obama published on Twitter a list of songs that he and his wife Michelle had been listening to over the summer. Among them, at number 31, was Con Altura, the same song that won Rosal¨ªa and J Balvin their prize at last night¡¯s MTV awards. It was not the first time that the Obamas had put a Spanish artist on their summer playlists. In 2015, they included Tengo un trato by La Mala Rodr¨ªguez.
In May of this year, Con Altura was named one of the 10 best songs of the year so far by the prestigious US magazine Time. While the reggaeton-influenced collaboration was not to all of her fans¡¯ tastes, the song won the admiration of the publication, praising her for proving herself ¡°chameleonic during her swift ascent over the last year,¡± having handled ¡°James Blake ballads, voluptuous dancehall anthems and mournful Justin Timberlake interpolations with equal aplomb.¡± As for the song, Time said it sounded like ¡°dembow, hip-hop and flamenco, with middle eastern influences sprinkled in,¡± concluding that it ¡°sounds like the future of global pop music.¡±
English version by Simon Hunter.
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