This past week we had an amazing moment in history made, Jenni Rivera, La Diva de La Banda, became the FIRST Mexican-American, regional Mexican banda artist, male or female, to ever have a billboard featured in Times Square!
Jenni Rivera from Long Beach, CA, was a Mexican-American mega star who — at the height of her fame — was tragically killed in a plane crash in 2012, after a concert in Monterrey. At the time of her death she was Billboard’s most successful female Latin artist.
Her accolades included: two Oye! Awards, two Billboard Music Awards, twenty-two Billboard Latin Music Awards, eleven Billboard Mexican Music Awards and eighteen Lo Nuestro Awards, and a star on the Las Vegas Walk of Stars.
Jenni Rivera broke down the “boys club” barrier of the Mexican Banda music genre. Not only did she break through but she dominated. She is one of the best-selling regional Mexican artists of all time, with more than 20 million records sold worldwide; which also makes her the highest-earning banda singer of all time.
In 2011, she made history as the first female regional Mexican artist to play — and sell out — Los Angeles’ Staples Center.
In 2012, Rivera had made her film debut in Filly Brown, alongside a new breakout star named Gina Rodriguez (Jane the Virgin) the movie was released in 2013.
Not only an award winning artist, but also a successful business woman, she had her own hit reality show and was in the middle of launching a makeup line, finishing her autobiography and creating her own brand of Tequila, all projects would end up being completed by her children and extended family, after her passing.
A few years ago, her younger brother Juan Rivera had discovered a couple of recordings left on her hard drive, but the family, collectively, felt the timing wasn’t right and instead began working towards making the newly discovered tracks a much bigger celebration of Jenni’s life.
This past week, on July 2, in honor of what would have been La Gran Señora singer’s 50th birthday, the family released “Aparentemente Bien” by Jenni Rivera which was written by “Despacito” co-writer Erica Ender, and Alejandro Lerner.
Jenni and Erica had met in Miami in 2009, at a Billboard Latin Music Awards after party. Ender had then sent music over to Rivera to look at and never knew Rivera had recorded anything, until the family reached out to her about the discovery they had made.
The new song has quickly shot up to #1 across Spotify, iTunes, Amazon etc., and the beautiful, emotional video has already hit 15 million views on YouTube, making it clear that Jenni Rivera, La Diva de la Banda, reigns supreme.
Watch Jenni Rivera’s family reaction the billboard going live!
NOBLEZA MAGAZINE 