The Estefans are the perfect example of Latino families in the United States, those who were born abroad and those from here, but who were formed with the best of our Hispanic roots. And those who fulfilled and paved the way for those who arrive with the famous ‘American dream’.
The same was reflected in an album of the date we like to celebrate the most, Christmas and they released ‘Estefan Family Chirstimas’. A job that has three columns, Gloria, Emily and Sasha Estefan, but in which everyone participates, from Emilio and Lili, to the puppies. In a chat full of love, mother and daughter tell us the secret of making a unique, intimate and family moment eternal.
-Gloria, it took 29 years and a family for you to release a Christmas album again…
Gloria Estefan: This concept could not have been done in any other way. The 29 were not on purpose, but I have had the joy of being able to evolve in music and do whatever I was excited aboutand that’s at least a year of work, but when I saw that Sasha was already growing up, knowing how beautiful she sings, and seeing that soon that was going to change to be able to capture this moment in a music project like this all 3. It has been the greatest blessing of my life. I have enjoyed it like no other project, and it is something that will remain foreverFor me, for their children and grandchildren, it has been a blessing.
-Emily, how was the process for you? because the mother is a bit the one in charge, but really you are like the leader of the team
Gloria Estefan: I wish one was!
Emily Stefan: don’t look, everyone respects my mom because she is the queen Y…
Gloria Estefan: Do you know that as a child you used to say that you were the queen?
Emily Stefan: Well and I still am.
Gloria Estefan: The father would arrive, “How is my little princess?” … And he said: “I am the queen”.
Emily Stefan: is that in life what is really important is respect, and what my mother has for us that she did the process, do like magic, is respect. Sasha had the idea: “Oh tutu, let’s try this, what if you sing it like this? Come on, let’s do it”… Usually, especially in Latino families, it’s difficult, recording with that dynamic, I think you can hear it on the album, because it really was like that, Sasha and I downstairs doing a harmony, and my mom working on another song upstairs.… As was music before, a building full of people working on something creative, fun, it really was like that.
-Gloria, what did you discover in this Emily and Sasha project? And you, Emily, what did you find out about Gloria and Sasha?
Gloria Estefan: I know Emily very well, but she always surprises me with her interpretation. For example, on this disk her solo ‘When I miss you’, the sensitivity that she has to be able to emotionally transmit those lyrics and that feelingand that the demo he made!
Emily Stefan: It wasn’t my song, it was hers, and I I fell in love with the song when I saw the sheet music. The first day we started recording, his dog died.who was like her baby and so important to all of us. She said: “I don’t know if I can sing”, and I told her, “Don’t worry, the band is here, I’ll do the demo”… And when I left recording she said, “That’s your song”. You see, the respect.
Gloria Estefan: It always amazes me how talented I know she is, Sasha wow, when we were composing the song, that suddenly he and I are with the guitar and he says: “Tutu, put that melody uplet’s upload it here and sing it “… That was him alone, that was his idea and then I say, my God, at that age to have that sensitivity, he wrote to me, he made me a composition when a dog died.
Emily Stefan: That’s a hit.
Gloria Estefan: He came the next day with a song, and me apart with a broken heart and crying like crazy, but that he has that emotional maturity. The ideas he put were so good, I was surprised too. He prepared very well, he came to the studio ready, he knew the song, I got together with him in the studio teaching the things that I have learned as a singer., like someone who records, why record a song. It’s one thing to perform something live, that you have the audience there and there’s that emotion, but when you’re creating something that’s going to last forever, you want it to be the best it can be.
I told him: “You are painting as if it were an emotional picture of this song, you have to think about the things that make you feel, so that you can transmit them” … And it was as if he in the next absorbed it and out.
Emily Stefan: It has lives inside of it. What surprised me about my mom, that no matter how much time goes by, she always surprises me. This woman does not get tired, what I truly saw with my own eyes was this project. Now I am going to turn 28, I am young and I got sleepy and I, “I can’t take it anymore, 2:30”… and she, “Ok bye, good night”… At 5 in the morning, she, “Oh, I got home, look here it is”… Oh my God, when it comes to music, she doesn’t get tired, she’s a drummer of creativity.
Gloria Estefan: It is that to me, that gives me life, when we are doing something, I have told her, I have written most of my songs between 12:00 at night and 6:00 in the morningbecause I had my family, Emilio was there, during the day I had a thousand things to do, and I think that in this hemisphere at that time the spiritual channels are clean, the muses, more freedom to reach oneand me, at that time is when my creativity awakens, and I think it is a very open moment, to compose and do everything.
Emily Stefan: The vibes are like loose.
Gloria Estefan: Y Every time I make a song I compose it, it’s what I tell you I feel, I can never do this againit’s like giving birth, it’s like when you’re 9 months pregnant, but when you have that baby, you have the baby and you say: “Wow, I don’t know if I can do this again”, and that’s how it goes and I continue with the same enthusiasm for music.
–When the years go by and your children arrive, plus grandchildren, what do you want to remember from this moment?
Gloria Estefan: everything but obviously the most important thing for me is to live each moment because if you don’t live it you won’t remember itand you have to be present because many times one is worried about what is going to come: “Oh God, I have to do this next week, what is going to come”… But God knows if it comes next week, then be anytime you’re.
Right now, that we are sharing, for me it is not, “Oh my God, we have to do all this press”, for me it is the opportunity to talk about something that has been so important to us, And that is why I have had many friendships with the press over the years, because there is an exchange. Simply live every moment, and I already remember them there they will be, they will remain, the best, the difficult ones, but you have to be present.
Emily Stefan: For me, yes you want to hear the joy, the happiness that I have to be in this moment right now, it’s the album, that’s the joy of musicwe don’t know if tomorrow a piano hits me and I’m dying, my voice will still be there for you to listen, for you to connect with us, for us to include you in our familySo for me that is the greatest gift, to be able to have that, that my body can leave this earth, but you have my music.
Gloria Estefan: That’s the good thing about music that remains forever, and for future generations.
WATCH THE FULL VIDEO INTERVIEW:
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