"We like the rhythms with a lot of personality, music with an intense smell and flavor, that sounds distinguishable, forceful and, why not, that is risky", Radio Gladys Palmera

Gladys Palmera is one and many. She is the radial alter ego of Alejandra Fierro, Spanish by birth and Latin American descent. Daughter of a Venezuelan and a Panamanian, Fierro is the one who gives life to Gladys Palmera Radio, which brings together the best of music from Latin America and the Caribbean. Gladys Palmera is also a team that together with Fierro, collects and heals a digital station that rescues and vindicates our music.

Leer en español: Gladys Palmera, la radio para oyentes curiosos, arriesgados y lunáticos

Gladys Palmera Radio

Gladyspalmera.com is a portal where you can listen to two different stations. On the one hand, there is the Gladys Palmera Collection, curated by Fierro herself. In this station you can listen to classic Caribbean music and hits from the past to discover. This is a carefully curated selection among Alejandra Fierro's discoveries.

What makes Radio Gladys Palmera different is precisely the team's attention in selecting songs that represent the tropical sounds of the Caribbean and seek, in their search, to find never seen jewels. On the other hand, there is the Future Beats Radio station that focuses on rhythms, this time, looking to the future and in a global way.

Gladys Palmera Radio offers a selection for two types of listeners: those who want to learn, who want to discover classics, and who want to return to the roots of our music and influences; and whoever wants to know what is happening in Latin America and the Caribbean today in the musical field and how it influences the rhythms of other continents.

Fierro's idea is to discover new songs that travel through this region and give strength to the Latin American identity: from Cuban music made in Veracruz to tangos in the Caribbean. Thus, this radio is made for curious and daring listeners.

"To make matters worse, we feel proud because if there is one thing we know how to do is look for and select music that goes beyond the norm. In Radio Gladys Palmera we like rhythms with a lot of personality, music with intense smell and flavor, that sounds distinguishable, forceful and, why not, that is risky," it is explained on its page.

Gladys Palmera Radio was born in 1999 and has, in addition to these two stations that can be listened to online, a podcast programming. In these they discuss music from different parts of Latin America, and interviews musicians and experts. In their Youtube channel you can also find mini documentaries, profiles and exclusive recordings of new artists and musical groups.

You can also read: 10 Colombian Indie music projects that transcend borders 

Alejandra Fierro: the brain behind the radio

Alejandra Fierro has been collecting vinyl records and CDs since she was 18 years old. Fierro told El País that at this age she bought her first Cuban music vinyl: "Metiendo mano" by Rubén Blades. After this, she toured collectors and music stores from New York to Puerto Rico, and swelled her collection, which is now one of the most important collections of Afro-Cuban music in the world.

She started with a radio program in Madrid that she called "Sabrosura", in which she interviewed musicians and showed something from her collection. After some years she decided to launch her own radio digitally. This is how Radio Gladys Palmera was born.

According to Vanity Fair, Fierro affirmed on her radio that she invented it in her "image and likeness, independent, rebellious and free, I wanted to make the radio that sounded in my head: Latin, ancient but very modern." This rebel passionate about tropical music won the 2015 Ondas award for best radio platform on the internet.

Fierro, besides being a music curator, is also a patron. She has an educational project called "La Escuelita del Ritmo" in Portobelo, a small town in Panama. "La Escuelita" works as an unpretentious conservatory in which children and young people who want to learn to play an instrument are welcomed.

For Fierro, music education is fundamental in the childrens education. It will also be fundamental in our identity formation as Latin Americans. This music, our music, is to listen to it and, why not, to dance it, to taste it.

LatinAmerican Post | Juliana Rodríguez Pabón

Translated from "Gladys Palmera, la radio para oyentes curiosos, arriesgados y lunáticos"