Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl halftime show highlighted the deep connection between ‘America’ and Latin America, a message that country music can learn from to embrace an untapped Latino market.
Vierelina Fernández
| Guest Columnist
Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl Halftime Show resonates in Latin America
Latin Americans from Mexico to Chile praised Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl Halftime Show, saying it had a “great message.”
The article argues that country music should embrace inclusivity for Latinos, similar to Bad Bunny’s message at the Super Bowl.Mexican norteño and Brazilian sertenejo music share many thematic and musical similarities with U.S. country music.Artist Daya Dorado is creating “Tex-Mex Country” music to bridge the perceived gap between Latino music and country.There is a large, untapped market of Latino listeners who are eager for representation within the country music genre.
Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl Halftime show did not disappoint. His performance, lyrics and set were laden with political and symbolic messages — most prominently, on the need for greater inclusivity for working-class Latinos and immigrants. However, it was the grand finale (in which he named almost every country in the hemisphere and displayed their waving flag, including the United States and Canada) that sent the clearest message: “America” is not complete without Latin America.
Bad Bunny forced audiences everywhere to face an uncomfortable (for some) realization: to be “American” is to be inextricably intertwined with Latin America. But Bad Bunny’s message extends beyond Sunday’s sporting event. There is another, more local “all-American” staple sorely in need of considering Bad Bunny’s message: country music.
An artificial music divide
Many artists have been trying to deliver precisely that message to the Nashville music scene for years. Dayanara Fernández — known artistically as “Daya Dorado” — is one such artist.
Growing up Mexican-American in the borderland region of El Paso, Texas and Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, Dorado remembers hearing the similarities between Mexican norteño music and Texan country but being sold the idea that U.S. country music was not for Latinos.
“The musical divide seemed artificial, but I didn’t feel like I had the right to voice it,” says Dorado. “How could country music not be ‘for’ Latinos, when Mexican corridos were musically structured in almost the exact same way?”
The Latin American presence in country music
“Norteño” — translating literally into “northern” in Spanish — is a popular genre of northern Mexican folk music focused largely on rural storytelling. Often referred to as “musical journalism,” norteño songs date back to the early 1900s and have become synonymous with Mexican country life and the borderland experience.
Classic songs like Vicente Fernández’s “Los Mandados” (1976) speak to the Mexican immigrant experience of trying to cross the Rio Grande — not unlike Willie Nelson’s “South of the Border” (1988), as he sings of falling in love down in Mexico.
“I’ve been a hardcore country music listener since I can remember, but it wasn’t until I discovered Brazilian sertenejo music while studying abroad in 2014 that I felt like I could actually take a stab at becoming a country artist myself,” says Dorado. Brazilian sertenejo — better known as “Brazilian country” — parallels every theme that classic U.S.-American country music does: evoking rural imagery, penning lyrics to small town experiences and incorporating the sounds of acoustic guitars and accordions.
“My experience with sertenejo in Brazil made me realize that this love and nostalgia for the rural life is universal,” Dayanara recalls. “Growing up in Texas, I had a life’s worth of experience with both norteño and borderlands music. Nobody was going to tell me I didn’t know country.”
It was from there, she says, that the idea for her trademark “Tex-Mex Country” music brand was born. Her debut album is set for release later this year.
What country music can learn from the ‘Bad Bunny effect’
Country music has some lessons to learn from the “Bad Bunny effect”: today, there is an immense, relatively untapped market for Latinos in country music. Dayanara describes it as a “hunger” to see the nostalgia of their parents’ sacrifices — and the soundtrack of their childhood — immortalized through music.
The songs playing on the kitchen radio while their mothers washed dishes or blasting at a family party — today’s Latino population is looking for someone who can reconcile that with their experiences growing up north of the border.
“Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl show did precisely what country music has yet to do,” says Daya. “He said, I see you. Your contributions are valuable. There’s room for you at my table. I think that’s why he’s seen this level of success.”
Vierelina Fernández is an advisor with Pan-American Strategic Advisors and a postdoctoral fellow at Rutgers University’s Center for Latin American Studies. She holds a Ph.D. in International Relations from Florida International University.