Juan gabriel was gay

He never spoke about his sexuality, yet was widely assumed to be gay. It’s no surprise that the singer was an icon in Mexico’s gay subculture. But how was it that he came to be celebrated by the. In a recorded interview, reporter Fernando Del Rincón boldly asked Gabriel if he was gay. The journalist started by quoting a Mexican historian who noted that Gabriel “explored the.

En Fernando del Rincón preguntó a Juan Gabriel si era gay y la respuesta del “divo de Juárez” pasó a la historia. --Juan Gabriel. Dicen que es gay, ¿Juan Gabriel es gay?. Renowned Chicano gay poet Eduardo C. Corral shared a personal story highlighting how Juan Gabriel’s influence helped his parents come to terms with their own homosexuality. Our first homophobic joke was a man on TV dressed as Juan Gabriel talking about wanting to sit on a chili as my mother shifted uncomfortably in her chair.

My mother was so obsessed with it, the title became one of my first words. As toddlers, my little brother and I danced by the record player, the only luxury for an immigrant family in Arizona, fresh from Mexico, grasping at links to the border town we left. El Divo De Juarez was from our state, looked and sounded like us, and his record was one of the few belongings we brought. In the song, a man pleads the listener to go out dancing to a club called El Noa Noa.

It's a disco song with a country beat, the minor key make it both an invitation and lament. When my brother and I came out of the closet and moved to San Francisco, leaving our parents behind as they had left their own parents , we packed that 45 record. Juan Gabriel, who passed away last weekend at the age of 66, had dozens of songs that followed my brother and I throughout our lives.

When new neighbors arrived from Mexico, we partied to No Vale La Pena at the start of the night and ended with Querida , when the men drank enough to let themselves feel for the one that got away and the one they married. I watched these songs eviscerate the emotional composure of Mexican machismo all through my childhood. Juan Gabriel was a masterful songwriter and producer but it was his voice that did it. In his seven-minute heartbreak masterpiece Hasta Que Te Conoci , it travels from feminine moans and whimpers to reach gospel heights, fusing the melisma of Spanish flamenco with Indigenous battle cries, ending in that wail.

Juan Gabriel never "came out" as

To me, it was homosexual yearning given sound. His sexuality was never ambiguous, it was always just there , never spoken of directly, always joked about. Our first homophobic joke was a man on TV dressed as Juan Gabriel talking about wanting to sit on a chili as my mother shifted uncomfortably in her chair. He had no girlfriends, only muses: Rocio Durcal, Ana Gabriel, Maria Felix — their campy rapport in music videos and performances the first time we saw the classic fag hag dynamic.

There was the cheap reporter who, in a break with decorum, asked him if he was gay. The reporter withered. It was the first time we saw shade. Juan Gabriel was never allowed to own his homosexuality, but he never lost control of it. It was seared into his art. To watch his decadent concert at the Palace of Fine Arts is to behold a queer artist soaring. Symphony orchestra, mariachi, choir all bowing to twenty minute versions of his songs.

Imagine what that does to two little gay boys. At that moment we knew that whatever made this man so different was not only ok, but with enough work, it could be adored. Immigrants are forced to leave places and cultures — and so are queer people. Histories, traditions and belongings are scrubbed off until all we have is images and songs. When we weep for the death of our icons it's a selfish grief isn't it?

The tears are for our own memories, for those links to loss, for the knowledge that their death is another signpost towards our own. The most successful artists create vessels for these feelings and dualities. And for my brother and me, Juan Gabriel represented that duality. He was the country we left because of its poverty and homophobia, the heritage and family we sacrificed to follow our queer path.

This story first appeared in 48 Hills from San Francisco.