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“Thank God it’s doing well,” said Salgado during a recent phone interview. “I was a little nervous; I wasn’t sure how people were going to take it.”
Salgado, whose visit to Toledo’s East Side Cantina drew a sold out crowd this past May, is already scheduled to return to Toledo for a Cinco de Mayo concert in 2015, Salgado and promoter Joe Garcia, president of IB Entertainment confirmed. Salgado will be one of several performers on what has been dubbed the Tejano Music Tour.
Father and Son
Salgado’s latest single is a duet with his 17-year-old son Andrés Salgado.
“I was already working on the song with a friend when my son asked if he could sing it with me,” said Michael Salgado. “I told him ‘alright, put you’ll have to hurry up and learn the lyrics – and he did.”
Andrés has been performing the song on stage with his father during concerts.
“He’s not nervous at all,” the proud father says. “He likes interacting with the audience; I think he likes it better than me.”
Salgado is currently working on his son’s first single, which is expected to be a remake of a popular Bryan Adams song. Salgado is waiting for the song publisher’s permission to commercially release the song.
The 43-year-old Salgado made his recording debut in 1989, but it wasn’t until the mid-1990s that he found the national spotlight with the song Cruz De Madera, which earned him the award for best song of the year. Other hits have included Sin Ella, Palomita Blanca, La Media Vuelta, Otra Vez A La Cantina and the number one Tejano hit of 2001: Ya No Voy a Aguantar, which earned him Best Song of the Year by the Tejano Music Awards – his first of four awards from the music industry organization.
In 2007 he won the Latin Grammy Award for Best Norteno Album for En Vivo.
After years of working for others, Salgado started his own record label Zurdo Records. His first album, No Vengo A Ver Si Puedo… Si Por Que Puedo Vengo, which was released in July 2011, landed him a nomination for Best Banda Norteno at the 2012 Grammy Awards. It was this album where Salgado took his first shot at the country market with Honky Tonks and Cantinas. He was also featured in the film, This is my Country, Twin Fiddles and Accordion, where Salgado is among several artists who talk about the influence country music has had in their lives.
“I grew up in on ranches until I was 15-years-old,” said Salgado who was born and raised in various small rural communities in west Texas. “I lived the farm life; driving a tractor.”
Roots
Michael was about 8 years old when he began singing with his father, Ernesto Salgado, who enjoyed playing the guitar at small family gatherings and at local bars. He even had his own band for a while, Michael said.
Although he was influenced by Spanish music, especially Norteno artists like Ramón Ayala, Michael says he was also exposed to country music.
“My style of music was classic country, like Merle Haggard and George Jones,” said Salgado. “But I’m trying for a more modern country sound.”
Establishing his own record label gives him greater freedom in producing the music he wants to, he said. But it’s also making him a better businessman, like understanding the importance of making revenue from publishing rights.
“There was never a ‘you definitely can’t record that song” by the record labels,” said Salgado. “But they would say you pick six songs and here are six songs we want you to put on the album.”
In 2012 Salgado released his second Country song, A Far Cry from Gone, which is only available as a digital download. That same year he also released his third album on Zurdo Records, Buscando Amor, a Spanish re-creation of the 1980s song, Looking for Love, by Johnny Lee and featured in the popular movie Urban Cowboy.
The success of his country outings has inspired Salgado to begin working on his next project, a country EP that currently is planned for release on the Internet. Salgado, who will head to Chicago in November to begin recording, admits he’s already second-guessing the idea and might end up releasing a full-length country album instead. The full-length album would include several country remixes of songs Salgado has already recorded in Spanish.
His third project, which he’s close to finishing, is a kind of “back to roots” album which will include Michael playing acoustic guitar and singing classic Spanish tunes “in a backyard type of style,” he says.
Branching Out
In addition to releasing Porque Me Amas in the Tejano market, Salgado has also put Vestidos Elegantes out as a single in the Regional Mexican market. The strategy is to branch out into as many markets as possible because “the market for Tejano music has grown smaller,” he said.
Now that he’s conquered the Tejano, Regional Mexican and Country markets and exploring the pop market with his son, what’s the next challenge? In recent interviews Andrés Salgado has stated that he prefers to listen to Hip Hop and Reggaeton.
Don’t wait for Michael Salgado to venture into those music genres.
“No, yo no estoy interesado en esos estilos,” said Salgado, who bursts out laughing at the thought of himself rapping. “Eh, it’s not my cup of tea.”
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