Over the years he has become “more patient”, although this does not mean that he has given up dreaming: “imagine life without having a dream”, says Mexican Carlos Rivera to EFE, who, despite the current times, continues to demand “useful” music that accompanies the life of the public, that connects with them.
And this despite the fact that he recognizes that “there is less and less space” for genres like his, although, be that as it may, “music is like water, it finds its channel sooner or later”. “Maybe a song I release now can be more or less successful, but with the passage of time there will always be someone who will listen to it”.
Born in Huamantla in 1986, he is Mexico’s ambassador at the International Tourism Fair (Fitur) in Madrid, a city where he is “happy” and feels at home after playing Simba in the musical ‘The Lion King’ for seven years, a role that marked the definitive start of his career after a long time “chipping away at the rock”.
“I arrived in Madrid when I was 25 years old. At that time I was a dreamer, but I felt that something was missing. I had been searching for many years for what I wanted so much and although I didn’t get it, in my heart I always knew that something was going to come along and that it was going to change my life, and it did,” he recalls.
A before and after Simba
Simba marked a before and after in Carlos Rivera’s career and taught him that dreams come true, “although it sounds very trite, if you work for what you dream you will achieve it”.
“Today I share it a lot, because now many young people say: ‘I already decreed it and the universe is going to bring it to me’, and they are waiting for it. It doesn’t work like that, the magic is to get up early and work, work and work,” he explains.
He remembers walking down Madrid’s Gran Vía and thinking: “Could it be that I see myself living here? And yes, I stayed. From the first moment I felt an embrace from the city and when I was returning to Mexico after ‘The Lion King’ it was already different, from then on people started to look at me differently.”
Necessary” music
With a more than consolidated career, Carlos Rivera has just released ‘Vida’ (Apple Music), a work “that comes from the deepest” of his soul and in which “there are some of the most intense feelings that a human being can live”.
For example, the pain over the death of his father three years ago, from which emerged songs like ‘Almas’ and ‘No es para menos’. “I have always shared my feelings through songs, but with pain it was more difficult; with time I transformed that sadness into music,” he points out.
“I can share it – he continues – because I know that when I open my heart many people empathize, it becomes a kind of collective therapy, we have all lost someone. When people tell me that these are the exact words they felt, that’s where the music makes sense.”
And for that reason, Carlos Rivera defends the idea of “necessary music”, “not only that it works or that it is number one, but that it is useful, that it accompanies people in important moments. When someone tells me that a song of mine represents a moment in their life, that’s when it’s worth being an artist”.
Vida Mexico!’ Tour
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For starters, the singer of ‘Recuérdame’, the main theme of the movie ‘Coco’, has already begun a tour – ‘¡Vida México!- that will take him to 11 Spanish cities starting in July and will include mariachi music.
The tour’s presentations are “a party, a celebration of life, with elements of the Day of the Dead, because we (Mexicans) don’t celebrate death, we celebrate the life of those who are no longer here. And of course there are also ballads,” says Rivera.
“I dream of continuing to take the music of my country to more places, to continue creating those songs that people need in special moments, that they find in me a refuge,” he says.
And when it comes to dreams, there is one specific one that he has yet to fulfill: a collaboration with Shakira.
“It’s on my wishlist, although the truth is that of my top five dreams I’ve already fulfilled three or four.”
HERE you can listen to Carlos Rivera’s music.
With information from EFE
