Latin Pop Icon Visits Harvard

He’s sold over 20 million albums. He’s won four Grammys. Yet Spanish balladeer and pop singer Alejandro Sanz opened his visit to the University last night with a confession: “My mother was just so proud when I said I was going to Harvard.”

Sanz spoke about politics, song writing and his life touring the world before a packed crowd of about 400 people yesterday evening at the Graduate School of Education’s Askwith Hall.

Combining elements of Flamenco, Cubano, and hip-hop, Sanz’s music is popular all over the Spanish-speaking world. Sanz’s 2000 album “El Alma Al Aire” (“The Soul to the Air”) won four Latin Grammy awards, including “album of the year.” Sanz is currently on a worldwide tour for his album “No Es Lo Mismo” (“It’s Not the Same”) and will perform at the Orpheum Theatre in Boston tonight.

Yesterday’s program included a conversation with two mediators, Williams Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures Doris Sommer and graduate school student Jesus Suarez, a question and answer session with the audience, and a vocal and flamenco guitar performance by Sanz.

The visit by the international superstar came as a complete surprise to many students. Suarez e-mailed Sanz’s manager on the off-chance that he would speak at Harvard when his tour brought him to Boston. Only five days ago, Sanz offered to speak and perform for free, in support of Latino and Latin American students and to reach out “to the Hispanic culture.”

Sanz spoke for over 20 minutes during his hour-long visit about his involvement in political causes, from his construction of shelters in rural Ecuador, to his work with missionaries, to his music school for women in India. Sanz noted that he “dedicates part of his set against Fidel Castro” and urged students and his fans motivated by politics to “write about what’s important to them.”

Despite Sanz’s serious political message, he spent equal time fielding questions and receiving compliments from the crowd. Several women from the predominantly female audience confessed their infatuation with him during the question and answer session.

“I just called my mom, she told me not to faint,” one particularly excited fan told him.

Fuerza Latina president Felipe A. Tewes ’06 said that Sanz’s visit to Harvard helped to unify the Latin community. “To me, it attests to the Latin presence here that we got an artist of [Sanz’s] caliber. The community is affirming itself, the power and unity of Latino organizations on campus,” he said.

Other organizers of the event stressed Sanz’s unique ability to foster community among Latino and Latin American students on campus.

“[People] here are from all over the world, and it goes to show the effort within students to create a unified Latino community...There’s no way we could have done this unless the community was united,” Shirley V. Cardona ’06 said.

Several Latino and Latin American student groups, including Concilio Latino, Fuerza Latina, Latinas Unidas and Harvard Colombian Society co-sponsored the event.

Sanz’s visit marks the culmination of a number of events hosted by Latino student groups, including last week’s Presencia Latina show, for Latino and Latin American Appreciation Month.