VINCENTE FERNANDEZ DIES AT 81: A CULTURAL MUSICAL ICON
A cultural genre from the Mexican clan bowed out
Vicente Fernández, the debonair Mexican crooner with the buttery baritone whose romantic rancheras & timeless folk anthems defined the grit & romance of his turbulent homeland & elevated him to a cultural icon throughout Latin America & beyond, has died.
During a career that began on the street corners of Guadalajara, the self-taught troubadour recorded more than 50 albums, all in Spanish, and sold tens of millions of copies, nearly half in the United States.
He toured relentlessly, created the themes for wildly popular telenovelas and starred in more than two dozen movies throughout the ’70s and ’80s often depicted in his iconic traje de charro.
In 1998, he received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame — his greatest prize, he once said, because he considered it a gift from his fans. As late as 2016, the inveterate performer was still drawing accolades.
Fernández’s most significant feat may be that he managed to stay relevant, preserving a vernacular genre without being reduced to a novelty act. “When you’re a ranchera singer, you represent your country,” as he once told The Times. “It’s a God-given gift.”
Fernández, who performed his final live show at Mexico City’s Azteca Stadium in 2016, had a variety of health ailments in recent years, including cancer of the liver and prostate. A cause of death was not made available.
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