American singer Selena rides in a carriage during a performance at Houston’s Astrodome on Feb. 26, 1995. The performance was her last before the 23-year-old’s murder the following month.
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American singer Selena rides in a carriage during a performance at Houston’s Astrodome on Feb. 26, 1995. The performance was her last before the 23-year-old’s murder the following month.
Arlene Richie/Getty Images
Get ready Selena fans — a new album will soon be on the horizon.
Nearly three decades after her tragic death, Abraham Quintanilla, the father of the late Selena Quintanilla-Perez, says a new Selena album is set to be released sometime next month.
In an interview with Latin Groove News, Quintanilla said that the album, which is being produced by Warner Music, will contain 13 songs and that Selena’s brother, A.B. Quintanilla, worked on the album.
“What amazes me and Suzette, my family, A.B., is that 26 years later and the public still remembers Selena. They haven’t let go of her,” Quintanilla said in the interview, referring to Selena’s sister, Suzette. “They’re waiting for a project like this to come out, and I know it will be well received by the public.”
The first song on the new album is one Selena recorded when she was just 13 years old. Selena’s brother was able to digitally update her voice to sound exactly as she did before her death in 1995, according to her father.
The newly released songs are all part of the catalog belonging to the family’s record company, Q Productions.
“My son worked on Selena’s voice with the computers, and if you listen to it, she sounds on [the] recordings like she did right before she passed away,” he said.
Selena’s sister, Suzette Quintanilla, will also have a part in the new album, as she is helping design the artwork paired with the album.
NPR reached out to Warner Music Group with a request to comment but did not immediately hear back.
March 31 will mark the 27th anniversary of the Tejano singer’s tragic death at age 23.
Selena, a native of Corpus Christi, Texas, was a Grammy Award-winning Tejano superstar who was shot and killed by her fan club’s president, Yolanda Saldivar, at a motel after Selena’s father accused Saldivar of embezzling funds from Selena’s fan club and her Selena Etc. boutiques.
Selena receives a Grammy Award on March 1, 1994.
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Dubbed the Queen of Tejano Music, Selena won a Grammy Award for Best Mexican-American Album for Live! and was on the verge of crossing over into the English-language market just before her death. Selena sold around 18 million records worldwide, becoming one of the bestselling female artists in Latin music, according to Billboard.
She was killed about two weeks before her 24th birthday, which would have been April 16, 1995.
Still to this day, Selena’s legacy and music continue to leave an impact across all generations worldwide.
In 1997, two years after her death, Warner Bros. released a blockbuster movie about her life and career that starred Jennifer Lopez as Selena. And in 2020, Netflix released the series Selena: The Series, telling the story of the sacrifices her family made along the way to fame.
Selena was honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2021 Grammys alongside other artists including Salt-N-Pepa, Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, and Marilyn Horne.
