tour, the audience was composed almost entirely of Hispanic-American girls-a situation that has changed a good deal since RCA undertook an extensive campaign to introduce Menudo to a wider audience.
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A major success in Latin America, the group was signed by ABC Television in September of 1983 for a Saturday morning series featuring songs in English and Spanish, and RCA Records signed them to an international record deal a few months later. Once a member passes 16, grows too tall or experiences a voice change, he must leave the group and is replaced by another boy, thus assuring that Menudo will remain forever the stuff of prepubescent/teen dreams. Formed in 1977 by Menudo mastermind Edgardo Diaz, the Puerto Rican singing quintet features an ever-changing roster of appealingly cute, invariably polite and well-behaved Latino boys in their early to middle teens. Still, it happened with Iglesias-and it`s happening with Menudo, another Hispanic success story that`s further raising Latin crossover hopes. (A number of American rock bands, among them Cheap Trick and Kiss, have enjoyed huge success in Japan.) Generally, it`s easier for American bands to succeed in non-English speaking countries than for foreign superstars to duplicate their stardom on these shores. The odds against success are multiplied enormously when an artist attempts to succeed in a country and continent where the language and customs differ from those in his or her homeland, though there are exceptions. Competition in show business is always tough all over, and tougher still for a performer operating outside his home turf. Those barriers, of course, are formidable. ''After that, it would be whatever barriers any other artist would face,'' says DeLattiguera. (Iglesias, who speaks several languages, was so concerned about his serviceable but sometimes hesitant English that he spent more than a year recording his English debut album.) The biggest barrier to Latin artists in the U.S., notes DeLattiguera, is the language the ability to record in English (and, one hopes, the ability to speak it well enough to do promotional interviews with Anglo media) is a must. We see the potential in many of our artists to cross over, but how soon, I can`t say.'' But I am more optimistic because the American people are more aware of Hispanic music right now because of what Julio Iglesias and Menudo have done in the English market. ''Not everybody will be able to make the crossover. Julio Iglesias is recognized to be a crossover artist, but Feliciano was around before Iglesias, and we think he can cross over into the English market again. ''The American population is now more aware of the Hispanics they are aware of the music as well, and that gives us the opportunity to cross some of these artists over. ''There are somewhere between 18 million and 23 million Hispanics here, and there has been an increase of about 20 percent a year of Hispanics coming to the U.S.''Īs for crossing over Latin artists, DeLattiguera is cautiously optimistic.
is the fifth largest country when it comes to Spanish-speaking population,'' notes Mario DeLattiguera, an RCA Latin division vice president.
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(Around the same time, they assigned a publicist to work more or less full time with Menudo, the teenaged Puerto Rican pop quintet currently making a concerted effort to widen its appeal to American non-Hispanic audiences.) Latin division in September, 1983, in response to the country`s growing Hispanic population. RCA Records, for instance, established a U.S. But I don`t see many Spanish artists crossing over like that.
''Julio`s success is something out of the ordinary,'' says the promoter, who did ''extraordinary'' business with Iglesias` shows at the Rosemont Horizon last year but had mixed luck at the box office with concerts by Emmanuel (''Business was so-so.''), Jose Jose (''Good'') and El Puma (''A very bad turnout, maybe because the show was on Memorial Day and everybody had other things to do.'') at the Pavilion. But when it comes to Latin music in general crossing over in a big way to the mainstream, Miranda remains doubtful. Miranda, who has staged Hispanic dances featuring Mexican bands for 20 years at the Aragon Ballroom (business lately, he says, has been ''up and down'') and has promoted concerts in Chicago for the last decade, acknowledges that Iglesias` success has had an effect on Latin artist concert bookings in general: Where a Hispanic show once involved a ''Latin caravan'' of 8 or 10 acts all performing on the same bill, now the top names headline their own, separate shows.