This is a story of perseverance.
The American off-road vehicle that from this week explores on Mars is also called Perseverance and reflects the human obsession to tackle new challenges, other challenges.
Each has its red planet. For Meïa Santiago (Manresa 1977), who was previously Mireia Izquierdo on the Spanish musical and theatrical stages or on television, her particular Mars was named New York.
Meïa Santiago
“It was my dream,” he confesses from his shared apartment in Bushwick (Brooklyn). He says that at 23 he already wanted to move to the Big Apple. He asked to study at the Atlantic Theater Company, which David Mamet founded. She says they accepted her, but she couldn’t come. “I do not come from a rich family,” he clarifies. He had no money and his adventure was frustrated.
Until, at a mature age, this composer, singer and actress landed here two and a half years ago, with a suitcase, a guitar and some savings (among these, an advance from the SGAE).
They had awarded him two awards in New York – for his song Be Gentle My Love at the Aphrodite Film Awards– and at the California film festival he was recognized for the music video for the song Beyond the angle of Horror , dedicated to the Franco-Moroccan photojournalist Laila Alaoui, murdered in Burkina Faso.
These distinctions convinced her to start her personal and creative research in the global capital, without even intuiting that after a short time the world was going to suffer a tumble.
The coronavirus has slowed his progression of live concerts, especially on the stages of the Lower East Side of Manhattan. From a distance, due to travel restrictions, he has suffered from the recovery of his mother, infected by the covid.
The coronavirus has slowed his progression of live concerts, but not his record production. “It was my dream,” he confesses
Despite all these circumstances, and the metropolis of live music continues with closed venues, Meïa has continued with her record production. This past week he released his single on the platforms My flame , previewed the album that he plans to release in April, Stoop nº6 . My flame is an adaptation of the 1978 Bobby Caldwell song, whose chorus in Castilian has been approved by the same author, a white man who sings like a black man.
‘My flame’ is the second single from the album he plans to release in April, ‘Stoop nº6’
In this production, made by Kelsey Warren, from Blak Emoji, Meïa remarks that “I tried not to lose the soul, nor its musicality”. That fidelity stumbled on “the esdrújulas”, which make you lose your swing, “he clarifies.
From that next album already advanced Angels in New York City , in which he pays hip-hop homage to Federico García Lorca, and who wrote it hand in hand with the Grammy-winning composer Itaal Shur. This marked the first collaboration with Kelsey Warren, who carried out the arrangements. It came out in the middle of a health crisis, so in December he relaunched it with a video directed by Peter Dressel.
His angels are a dedication to a city in which he has discovered real estate greed. He began residing in Queens, in the Sunnyside neighborhood and then he entered a nomadic route: the Bronx, upper Manhattan and several enclaves of Brooklyn. “I think in a year he was in nine apartments,” he says.
Now, with the pandemic, I feel how many feel, even better, because I am used to fighting. I have never given up
Neither this nor the musical blackout cow her. “Now, with the pandemic, I feel like many feel,” she says, “even better, because I’m used to fighting. I have never given up ”.
That is perseverance.
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