Argentina Sessions: BZRP

Argentina is indeed a difficult country to explain. And perhaps one way of getting to know it a little is through a few names: Juan Domingo Perón, Che Guevara, Evita, Diego Maradona, Lionel Messi, José de San Martín, Jorge Luis Borges, Julio Cortázar. In music, Atahualpa Yupanqui, Mercedes Sosa, Aníbal Troilo, Carlos Gardel, Roberto Goyeneche, Astor Piazzolla, Charly García, Luis Alberto Spinetta, Soda Stereo. All this is Argentina. It is also difficult to tell its history linearly. It can be said that in recent years, the country lived through a long night that began in 1976. That of the military dictatorship. Daylight came back after a war, Malvinas, and in 1983 we regained democracy. And we have been holding free elections for four decades. We have enjoyed freedoms and dreams, we have suffered hyperinflation, evasions and corruption at different levels, and harsh adversity, but we are alive. We are on our feet. Today there is new music in the air. That music and other names are also Argentina. One of those new names is Gonzalo Julián Conde, a brand new 25 year old. From Ramos Mejía, in the west of Greater Buenos Aires. Gonzalo is, today, the most listened Argentine musician in the world. He is known as Bizarrap. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_g3lMcWVy0 Bizarrap is so famous these days that he is recognisable just for his dark shades and cap emblazoned with his identifying acronym on his forehead, and which lacks vowels: BZRP. That's enough. Bizarrap, is the kid in Shakira's song, yes... He gives very few interviews and he never takes off his glasses. He has over 1 billion plays on Spotify for his song in collaboration with Spanish rapper Quevedo. The song was released on Spotify in July last year and took just 10 days to reach the top of the platform's global charts, making Bizarrap the first Argentine artist to reach the number one spot worldwide and he later became the most played Argentinian song of the year. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CocEMWdc7Ck Bizarrap's growth on Spotify is remarkable. In just seven years it went from 1.2 million 200 thousand listens to more than 2.9 billion in 2022. He was also, in 2022, the Argentine artist with the most plays in the world. He performed last April three nights at the Hipódromo Argentino de Palermo, Buenos Aires, in front of more than 60,000 people. He is currently on the Bizarrap Live Tour in Europe. This tour actually began in Puerto Rico, the birthplace of reggaeton, where he performed in front of more than 30,000 people. Bizarrap was named by Time magazine as one of the leaders of the next generation. He reached the global top 3 of the Billboard magazine chart and won the award for Top Music Producer of the Year at the "Tu Música Urbana" awards. He is a six-time nominee for the Premios Juventud 2023, for the categories: Streaming Artist, New Male Generation, Top Beatmakers, Best Song for My Ex for "Shakira: BZRP Music Sessions 53", Best Pop/Urban Song: for the same track and Best Pop/Urban Collaboration for"Quevedo: BZRP Music Sessions 52. He is nominated for Best Artist of the Year by Rolling Stone magazine in Spanish alongside artists such as Bad Bunny, Rosalía, Shakira, Christian Nodal, Feid, Fito Páez, Jorge Drexler, Juanes, Karol G and Natalia Lafourcade. Adrián Korol, director of RAE Argentina to the World Based on an original idea by Alejandro Pont Lezica