New Selena album will be released nearly 3 decades after singer's death, her father says
The father of the late Selena Quintanilla — the "Queen of Tejano" — says a new album will come out, almost three decades after her death. Abraham Quintanilla said in an interview with Latin Groove News that the album set to be released next month contains 13 songs and A.B. Quintanilla, Selena's brother, worked on it.
"Selena's been gone 26 years now," he said last week. "It's amazing how fast time flies... 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. They're waiting for a project like this to come out, and I know it will be well received by the public."
Quintanilla said there's a "unique" element of the album: Recordings of Selena when she was 13 years old were digitally updated to sound as if she was 23 years old — the age Selena was before she was killed in 1995.
"My son worked on Selena's voice with the computers and if you listen to it, she sounds on this recordings like she did right before she passed away," he said.
The only holdup is the artwork that will be paired with the album, according to Quintanilla. Suzette Quintanilla, Selena's sister, will have a role in that part of the project, he said.
CBS News reached out to Warner Music Group for comment, but did not immediately hear back.
March 31 marks the 27th anniversary of Selena's death. She won the best Mexican-American album Grammy for "Live" and had several U.S. hits, and she was going to cross over the English-language pop market before she was murdered by Yolanda Saldivar, the president of her fan club. Saldivar is serving a life sentence.
Still, Selena remains popular today and her music continues to resonate throughout North and South America. She has more than 6 million listeners each month on Spotify and her rise to fame was the subject of a Netflix series released in 2020.