David Archuleta recently replied to a tweet from me in Spanish.  *insert fan girl scream here*

David’s tweet – Finished an hour and a half of interviews this morning.  Now on the phone with mi madre.

My reply – @David Archie  awwww…mi madre…la mujer mas importante de nuestras vidas.  Que alegria me da de ver como aprecias a tu madre.  (Translation:  aww…my mother…the most important woman in our lives.  What joy I feel to see how much you appreciate your mother.)

David’s reply – @djafans  aw lol gracias!

On December 2, 2009, four generations of Latinas will be attending David’s Christmas concert.  My mother and sister, my daughter, my granddaughter and I.  My father is a musician and loves to sing, so there was always music in our home.  I grew up listening to Latino music:  Mariachi and Ranchera,  sung by great vocalists like Javier Solis, Pedro Infante, and Vicente Fernandez.  These wonderful singers all had a big influence on me, but none became a part of my very DNA until David Archuleta.

2009 ALMA Awards

After I saw him on AI 7, my seven years of watching American Idol came to an end, and my concert going days began.  My mom became worried about my sudden habit of attending concerts to see the same guy sing the same songs.  I tried to explain it to her, and played his videos, but she just didn’t get it.  Then he surprised us with the tease of Como La Flor from his solo concert.  She liked it; she said he was good, but she still didn’t get it.  Then I played it for my husband.

He got it.  He surprised me by declaring that if David were to put out a Spanish album, he would definitely win the hearts of the Latin community.

Enter the ALMA Awards.  I submitted my name at least five hundred times in the drawing to win a spot on the red carpet and won!  He was impeccably dressed and gorgeous!   As he signed my CD, I spoke to him in Spanish.  “Estamos muy orgullosos de ti.”  (Translation: “We’re very proud of you.”)  He replied, “Gracias.”  Then I told him to look up.

Little did we know what was in store for us that night.  David reached deep into his Latin roots and pulled off a performance that will go down in history as one of his best ever, especially for one so young.  Contigo en la Distancia.

I sent that YouTube video to everyone I know who loves Spanish music.  A coworker asked where she could get the CD of that.  I told her nowhere.  She said she needed it.  I made her one with some songs in English too, and put it on her desk.  I asked her the next day if she liked it and she said she had been listening to it non-stop.  Just Contigo though.  She said there was just something different in the way she felt when listening to David sing in Spanish.  Before our conversation was over, she had me in tears.  After hearing it, my brother, who sings in a choir, said that David is a vocal genius and at eighteen has more talent than Groban, Bocelli, Vincente, or Pepe.  He said too, that David stole that song from Luis Miguel.

My father told me that he had not heard anyone sing like that…ever.  He wanted to know if David has any plans to do a Spanish album and I told him he does.  We both agreed that now is a good time.  David has the youth factor on his side and mega talent.  There is Ricky Martin, Enrique Iglesias, and Marc Anthony that have crossed cultures and been very successful.  Alejandro Fernandez and Pepe Aguilar all have huge followings and sell out arenas.  But, we concluded, none of these are in David’s league.

With the release of Christmas From the Heart, a sea change occurred in the rest of my Latino family.  My mom remembered Riu Riu Chiu as a song she sang as a child growing up in a little town in Mexico.

My mom also said she couldn’t believe it, that he was singing Ave Maria the way it was meant to be sung, the way it was sung in church when she was a little girl.  The Latin words came back to her as she sang along.  It was a surreal moment.

She then asked if David would be singing these songs in his Christmas concert.  I said probably and asked if she wanted to go.   To my surprise, she said yes!

And that’s how it happened, that on the 2nd of December four generations of Familia Latina will be experiencing the magic that is David Archuleta.

My father believes the connection to the Latino community and the inevitable passion it will ignite, will be something not seen since Selena.  I believe it has already begun.

Well I must say, it’s a bit of embarrassing having a post with nothing under it.    Inveterate fans that you all are, it didn’t stop you from commenting on it anyway though.  LOL.   Thanks!  Actually,  when I first got the idea to create this site, I was playing around with a subtitle and came up with this.   It was mistakenly posted as the title to an article.  An article that did not exist.   This is an effort to rectify that error.

There is David the artist.  The Voice.  That terrible, wonderful,  glorious, soul embracing, knee buckling, sigh inducing, tear producing Voice.  Then there is David the song writer, who we are just getting to know and anticipate the fruits of his labors there.  *insert squee*  There is David the dancer/performer, also a work in progress, and the work is going very well, I might add.    (See my YT videos, Spicy Nacho and Locomotion for more on that.)  heheh.    Name of strangerphilosophy.

But over and above all this, the crown jewel, the cherry on top of all that delightful, delectable,  deliciousness is the man himself.  The David we have come to know off stage.  A man of  quiet strength, compassion, courage, humility and character.  A man after our own hearts, when all we meant to do was love his art.

So we are here to celebrate his art, which is awesome, and his humanity, which is awesomer.    We are here to celebrate the totality of his awesomeage.  And that, though linguistically incorrect, is the charuth.