Jorge Drexler
Encyclopedia
Jorge Drexler is an Uruguay
Uruguay
Uruguay ,officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay,sometimes the Eastern Republic of Uruguay; ) is a country in the southeastern part of South America. It is home to some 3.5 million people, of whom 1.8 million live in the capital Montevideo and its metropolitan area...

an musician and actor.

In 2004 Drexler won wide acclaim after becoming the first Uruguayan ever to win an Academy Award. He won for composing
Musical composition
Musical composition can refer to an original piece of music, the structure of a musical piece, or the process of creating a new piece of music. People who practice composition are called composers.- Musical compositions :...

 the song "Al Otro Lado del Río
Al otro lado del río
"Al otro lado del río" is an Oscar winning song, written and performed by Uruguayan singer Jorge Drexler for the film The Motorcycle Diaries...

" from The Motorcycle Diaries.

Career

In 1995 he was invited to Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...

 by well-known Spanish songwriter Joaquín Sabina
Joaquín Sabina
Joaquín Ramón Martínez Sabina , known artistically as Joaquín Sabina, is a singer, songwriter, and poet. He has released fourteen studio albums, two live albums, and three compilation albums...

, who introduced him to other important Spanish singers. Drexler went to Spain to record the album Vaivén in 1996 with Spanish musicians. Vaivén included some old songs from his previous releases mixed with new compositions. He moved to Spain and recorded another four albums: Llueve (1998), Frontera (1999), Sea (2001) and Eco (2004).

Although he lives most of the year in Spain, his latest three albums were partially recorded in Uruguay with Uruguayan musicians. Juan Campodónico
Juan Campodónico
Juan Campodónico, sometimes working under his stage name Campo, is an Uruguayan musician and producer, and former member of El Peyote Asesino. He produced albums by Jorge Drexler, and also creates Bajofondo project alongside iconic producer and two-time Academy Award winner for Best Original Score...

 and Carlos Casacuberta, former members of rock band El Peyote Asesino
El Peyote Asesino
El Peyote Asesino is a Uruguayan hip-hop and hard rock band that was active from 1994 to 1999. The band's members included L. Mental , Daniel Benia , Juan Campodónico , P.P. Canedo , and Carlos Casacuberta...

, have produced Drexler's albums since Frontera.

His music is a combination of Uruguayan traditional music (candombe
Candombe
Candombe is a musical genre that has its roots in the African Bantu, and is proper of Uruguay, Argentina and Brazil .Uruguayan Candombe is the most practiced and spread internationally and has been recognized by UNESCO as Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity...

, murga
Murga
Murga is a form of popular musical theatre performed in Uruguay and in Argentina during the Carnival season. Murga groups operate in Montevideo and at the Buenos Aires Carnival, though to a lesser extent than in Montevideo; the Argentine murga is more centred on dancing and less on vocals than the...

, milonga
Milonga
Milonga can refer to an Argentine, Uruguayan, and Southern Brazilian form of music which preceded the tango and the dance form which accompanies it, or to the term for places or events where the tango or Milonga are danced...

, tango
Tango music
Tango is a style of ballroom dance music in 2/4 or 4/4 time that originated among European immigrant populations of Argentina and Uruguay . It is traditionally played by a sextet, known as the orquesta típica, which includes two violins, piano, double bass, and two bandoneons...

), bossa nova
Bossa nova
Bossa nova is a style of Brazilian music. Bossa nova acquired a large following in the 1960s, initially consisting of young musicians and college students...

, pop
Pop music
Pop music is usually understood to be commercially recorded music, often oriented toward a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short, simple songs utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes.- Definitions :David Hatch and Stephen Millward define pop...

, jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 and electronic music
Electronic music
Electronic music is music that employs electronic musical instruments and electronic music technology in its production. In general a distinction can be made between sound produced using electromechanical means and that produced using electronic technology. Examples of electromechanical sound...

, which results in very personal compositions with original arrangements. The words also play an important role in his songs. Apart from love, reflections about identity, race and religions are a constant in his work.

Oscar

Drexler's song "Al otro lado del río" appeared in the internationally acclaimed film "The Motorcycle Diaries" (Spanish title: "Diarios de motocicleta"). Though Drexler himself sang the song on the movie soundtrack
Soundtrack
A soundtrack can be recorded music accompanying and synchronized to the images of a motion picture, book, television program or video game; a commercially released soundtrack album of music as featured in the soundtrack of a film or TV show; or the physical area of a film that contains the...

, it was performed together by Antonio Banderas
Antonio Banderas
José Antonio Domínguez Banderas , better known as Antonio Banderas, is a Spanish film actor, film director, film producer and singer...

 and Carlos Santana
Carlos Santana
Carlos Augusto Alves Santana is a Mexican rock guitarist. Santana became famous in the late 1960s and early 1970s with his band, Santana, which pioneered rock, salsa and jazz fusion...

 at the Academy Awards ceremony
77th Academy Awards
The 77th Academy Awards honored the best films of 2004 and were held on February 27, 2005, at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, California. They were hosted by comedian Chris Rock.The nominees were announced on January 25, 2005...

. Upon his winning the Oscar for Best Original Song, Drexler's "speech" consisted mostly of him singing a portion of the song a cappella
A cappella
A cappella music is specifically solo or group singing without instrumental sound, or a piece intended to be performed in this way. It is the opposite of cantata, which is accompanied singing. A cappella was originally intended to differentiate between Renaissance polyphony and Baroque concertato...

.

Personal life

Drexler was born in Montevideo
Montevideo
Montevideo is the largest city, the capital, and the chief port of Uruguay. The settlement was established in 1726 by Bruno Mauricio de Zabala, as a strategic move amidst a Spanish-Portuguese dispute over the platine region, and as a counter to the Portuguese colony at Colonia del Sacramento...

 to a Jewish family. His four grandparents were born in Poland, Germany, Brazil and Montevideo. His German parents migrated to Uruguay to escape German persecution. After they faced "criticism" in Uruguay they moved to Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

 for a year. From this Drexler is fluent in Hebrew.

Like much of his family, he studied medicine and became an otolaryngologist ear, nose and throat specialist.

He also studied music and recorded two albums, which were only released in Uruguay.

He was married to singer-songwriter Ana Laan
Ana Laan
Ana Serrano van der Laan is a singer-songwriter born in Madrid, Spain, although she has led a nomadic, multicultural life that has transformed her into a person beyond nationality....

 until 2005. His girlfriend is Spanish actress/singer Leonor Watling
Leonor Watling
Leonor Elizabeth Ceballos Watling is an award-winning Spanish film actress and singer.-Early life:Watling was born in Madrid, Spain to a Spanish father and a British mother, and has three siblings, with whom she speaks English. Her father died when she was a teenager.When she was a child, she...

. She gave birth to their son Luca in January 2009. Watling sings in the band Marlango
Marlango
Marlango is a Spanish music band deeply influenced by Tom Waits. The members of the band are Leonor Watling, Alejandro Pelayo and Óscar Ybarra.-Discography:...

.

Discography

  • La luz que sabe robar (Ayui, 1992)
  • Radar (Ayui, 1994)
  • Vaivén (Virgin, 1996)
  • Llueve (Virgin, 1998)
  • Frontera (Virgin, 1999)
  • Sea (Virgin, 2001)
  • Eco (Dro, 2004)
  • Eco2 (includes 3 bonus tracks + DVD
    DVD
    A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....

    ) (Dro, 2005)
  • 12 Segundos de Oscuridad (2006)
  • La Edad del Cielo (iTunes release) (2007)
  • Cara B(2008) (It received a nomination for Best Latin Pop Album
    Grammy Award for Best Latin Pop Album
    The Grammy Award for Best Latin Pop Album was awarded from 1984 to 2011. The award has had several minor name changes:*From 1984 to 1991 the award was known as Best Latin Pop Performance*From 1992 to 1994 it was awarded as Best Latin Pop Album...

     at the Grammy Awards of 2009)
    .
  • Amar la Trama
    Amar la Trama
    Amar la Trama is the ninth studio album by Uruguayan recording artist Jorge Drexler. It was released by Warner Music on March 16, 2010, after a four-year gap since the release of his last album of original music. Drexler worked as co-producer, along with Matías Cella and Carles Campi Campón...

    (2010)

External links

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