Juanes hit a breaking point at the height of his career. Now he says he’s never felt better

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For more than two decades, the music of Colombian rock star Juanes has carried far beyond Latin America, winning him several Grammys and sold-out tours.

Born Juan Esteban Aristizábal Vásquez, “Juanes” was an affectionate childhood nickname used by his family long before the awards and songs that would go on to inspire generations of fans.

“My father and my siblings used to call me Juanes, an abbreviation of my first and middle names,” the singer told CNN in a wide-ranging conversation about his 25 years as a solo artist.

Over time, Juanes became something much bigger even as Juan Esteban, the man behind the artist, struggled to protect his private life.

At one point, he said, the demands of being a public figure nearly consumed him. “I collapsed. I burned out, completely burned out.”

After a decade of working pretty much nonstop, Juanes says the pace of touring and recording left him exhausted and increasingly aware of what he was missing at home with his three children.

“I was so tired of traveling, of not being with my kids, of not being able to see them during important moments at school,” he recalled. “I said : ‘No, I can’t do this anymore. I mean, if this is going to be the rest of my life, I have to stop here.’”

Even more painful, he said, was realizing that music, his lifelong passion, had begun to make him unhappy.

“I couldn’t understand how the thing I loved most was making me feel this sadness,” he said.

So he decided to step away for several months, giving himself permission to pause, reconnect with his family, and rethink how he wanted to move forward.

“I thought that if I stopped working, everything would fall apart. It was a very difficult time, but fortunately, I made the right decision,” he said. “I’m still here, I’m OK, and I’m enjoying it.”

That relationship between Juanes and Juan Esteban now sits at the center of his latest musical chapter.

His new album, “JuanesTeban,” looks inward, tracing the many sides of his identity and how they eventually learned to coexist.

“Juan Esteban, in the end, embraces Juanes,” he said.

The album leans into that duality. Co-produced with Argentine producer Nico Cotton, it blends the warmth of vintage records with a more contemporary sound, while Juanes’ longtime band anchors the music.

The tracks move through love, heartbreak, purpose, self-discovery, sensuality, humor and darker emotions, carried by music that draws on cumbia, vallenato, rock and funk, as well as traditional Colombian rhythms and influences ranging from Metallica to the Beatles and the Rolling Stones.

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“I’ve always been very visceral with my songs, with my pain and with my joy,” Juanes said. “If I’m in a good mood and I want to make funny songs, I can. But if I’m in a very, very dark place, I go all the way into the depths of my soul and find music there to reflect what I’m feeling.”

The album also closes with “Madre,” an acoustic ballad for his mother and longtime confidante, Alicia Vásquez, who died last year at 95.

“She loved it so much,” Juanes said of the song, which she heard before her death.

For him, the emotional and musical range captured in “JuanesTeban” also reflects a newfound creative freedom.

“I like having freedom in music and in the way I create it, without putting up barriers for myself,” he said.

“I feel freer than ever to create.”

Juanes is now bringing that renewed energy back to the stage with a 30-date North American tour that begins in Florida in early September and ends in San Diego in October.

Touring the United States, he said, has always carried special meaning. He has performed here since the early days of his solo career, when he and his team traveled by van, played small venues and slowly built an audience.

Manny Hernandez/Getty Images

‘Origin’ story: Juanes revisits roots of his inspiration after a year of lockdown blues

“Every time I have the opportunity to tour the United States, it’s a way of thanking the public, of connecting with my community in this country, with the people who have appreciated my songs for so many years and with new people, too,” he said.

Along the way, Juanes also helped bring Spanish-language music into mainstream American spaces where it was still rarely heard.

His milestones include the first all-Spanish plaza concert on NBC’s “Today” in 2014 and the first Spanish-language performance on “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” that same year.

More recently, Juanes became the first Latin artist invited by YouTube to help launch YouTube Stations, joining Bruno Mars, Green Day, Radiohead and Alicia Keys in the platform’s experiment with continuous, 24/7 streams of artists’ video catalogs.

For Juanes, though, his global reach is less about the number of shows he plays or online views his videos attract, and more about the way his music continues to resonate across generations.

He said few things make him happier than seeing younger fans, some born after songs like 2002’s “A Dios le Pido” were released, singing along at his shows.

“That is beautiful because, in the end, that is the greatest prize,” he said. “The music keeps passing from generation to generation.”

His children — Luna, 23, Paloma, 21, and Dante, 16 — also help him stay connected to younger listeners, pointing him toward artists, sounds and social media habits he said he continues to learn from.

Even so, he insists he doesn’t long for his own youth. Asked whether he would go back to being 20, he did not hesitate.

“No, no, no, wait, please. Leave me right here. I’m doing very well here,” he said with a laugh.

At 54, Juanes said he feels better than ever.

“I play guitar better. I sing better. I’m more present now than I was before,” the singer reflected.

“Obviously, youth is great, and you’re in that period of searching and discovering. But now I feel this sense of calm, and for me that is incredibly valuable.”

That may be the clearest difference between the Juanes who launched his solo career 25

years ago and the Juan Esteban speaking now: less urgency, more patience.

These days, he said, he is less focused on counting the years than on living them, trusting that his songs have told his story all along.

“Most of my life is in my songs. Every time I feel pain, I make a song.” He said. “Every time I feel frustrated or I’m afraid or I am in love, I make a song about it.”

阿尔贝托·E·塔马戈/西帕美国/美联社

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二十多年来，哥伦比亚摇滚明星胡安内斯的音乐早已风靡拉丁美洲以外，为他赢得了多项格莱美奖，并举办了场场爆满的巡回演唱会。

胡安·埃斯特班·阿里斯蒂萨瓦尔·巴斯克斯（Juan Esteban Aristizábal Vásquez）原名“胡安内斯”（Juanes），“胡安内斯”是他童年时期家人对他的爱称，早在那些后来激励了几代歌迷的奖项和歌曲出现之前，这个昵称就一直被家人使用。

“我的父亲和兄弟姐妹过去都叫我胡安内斯，这是我名字的缩写，”这位歌手在与 CNN 就他 25 年的独唱歌手生涯进行的广泛对话中说道。

随着时间的推移，胡安内斯这个名字变得越来越有名，而作为艺术家的胡安·埃斯特班却在努力保护自己的私生活。

他曾说，有一段时间，作为公众人物的压力几乎将他吞噬。“我崩溃了。我精疲力竭，彻底精疲力竭了。”

胡安内斯说，在连续工作了十年之后，巡演和录音的节奏让他筋疲力尽，也让他越来越意识到自己错过了和三个孩子待在家里的时光。

“我厌倦了到处奔波，厌倦了不能陪伴孩子，厌倦了无法在他们学校的重要时刻与他们见面，”他回忆道。“我说：‘不行，我不能再这样下去了。我的意思是，如果这就是我余生的全部，我必须就此止步。’”

他说，更让他痛苦的是，他意识到自己毕生挚爱的音乐，竟然开始让他感到不快乐。

“我无法理解，我最爱的东西怎么会让我感到如此悲伤，”他说。

因此，他决定离开几个月，允许自己停下来，与家人重新建立联系，并重新思考自己想要如何继续前进。

“我当时觉得，如果我停止工作，一切都会崩溃。那是一段非常艰难的时期，但幸运的是，我做出了正确的决定，”他说。“我还在这里，我很好，而且我很享受现在的生活。”

胡安内斯和胡安·埃斯特班之间的关系如今成为他最新音乐篇章的核心。

他的新专辑《JuanesTeban》着眼于内心，追溯了他身份的方方面面，以及它们最终是如何学会共存的。

“胡安·埃斯特班最终拥抱了胡安内斯，”他说。

这张专辑正是对这种二元性的巧妙运用。它由胡安内斯与阿根廷制作人尼科·科顿共同制作，融合了复古唱片的温暖质感和更具现代感的音色，而胡安内斯的长期合作乐队则为音乐提供了坚实的支撑。

这些歌曲涵盖了爱情、心碎、目标、自我发现、感性、幽默和更黑暗的情感，其音乐融合了昆比亚、巴耶纳托、摇滚和放克，以及传统的哥伦比亚节奏，并受到从 Metallica 到 Beatles 和 Rolling Stones 等各种音乐风格的影响。

Alberto E. Tamargo/Sipa 美国（美联社）

“我的歌曲总是非常真切地表达我的感受，无论是痛苦还是快乐，”胡安内斯说。“如果我心情好，想创作一些轻松幽默的歌曲，我可以做到。但如果我情绪非常低落，我会深入灵魂深处，在那里找到能够反映我内心感受的音乐。”

专辑的最后一首歌是《Madre》，这是一首献给他的母亲兼长期知己艾丽西亚·瓦斯奎兹的民谣，她于去年去世，享年 95 岁。

“她非常喜欢这首歌，”胡安内斯谈到这首歌时说道，她在去世前听过这首歌。

对他而言，《JuanesTeban》中所展现的情感和音乐范围也反映了一种新获得的创作自由。

“我喜欢在音乐创作和表达方式上拥有自由，不给自己设限，”他说。

“我感觉自己比以往任何时候都更自由地去创作。”

胡安内斯现在将带着这股焕然一新的活力重返舞台，开启为期 30 天的北美巡演，巡演将于 9 月初在佛罗里达州开始，10 月在圣地亚哥结束。

他说，在美国巡演对他来说一直意义非凡。从他单飞生涯初期开始，他就经常来这里演出。那时他和他的团队开着面包车，在小型场地表演，慢慢积累了一批观众。

Manny Hernandez/Getty Images

“起源”故事：胡安内斯在经历了一年的疫情封锁低潮后，重温了他的灵感之源

“每次有机会在美国巡演，都是我感谢公众、与我在这个国家的社区、与多年来一直欣赏我的歌曲的人们以及新朋友们建立联系的一种方式，”他说。

在此过程中，胡安内斯还帮助将西班牙语音乐带入了美国主流社会，而此前这种音乐在美国还很少被听到。

他的里程碑包括 2014 年在 NBC 的“今日秀”节目中举办的首场全西班牙语广场音乐会，以及同年在“吉米·法伦今夜秀”节目中首次进行西班牙语表演。

最近，胡安内斯成为 YouTube 邀请的第一位拉丁裔艺术家，帮助推出 YouTube Stations，与布鲁诺·马尔斯、绿日乐队、电台司令乐队和艾丽西亚·凯斯一起参与了该平台的实验，该实验旨在全天候不间断地播放艺术家的视频目录。

但对胡安内斯来说，他的全球影响力与其说是他举办的演出数量或他的视频吸引的在线观看次数，不如说是他的音乐能够跨越世代持续引起共鸣的方式。

他说，没有什么比看到年轻的歌迷（其中一些是在 2002 年的《A Dios le Pido》等歌曲发行后出生的）在他的演唱会上跟着一起唱歌更让他高兴的了。

“这很美好，因为归根结底，这才是最大的奖赏，”他说。“音乐能够代代相传。”

他的孩子们——23 岁的 Luna、21 岁​​的 Paloma 和 16 岁的 Dante——也帮助他与年轻的听众保持联系，向他推荐艺术家、音乐和社交媒体习惯，他说他一直在从中学习。

即便如此，他仍然坚持说自己并不怀念青春。当被问及是否愿意回到20岁时，他毫不犹豫地回答。

“不，不，不，等等，求你了。让我待在这儿吧。我在这里过得很好。”他笑着说。

现年 54 岁的胡安内斯表示，他感觉比以往任何时候都好。

“我的吉他弹得更好了，唱歌也更好了，我现在比以前更专注了，”这位歌手感慨道。

“当然，青春很美好，你正处于探索和发现的阶段。但现在我感到内心平静，这对我来说无比珍贵。”

这或许是25岁开始单飞生涯的胡安内斯与现在的胡安内斯之间最明显的区别。

多年前的胡安·埃斯特班和现在的胡安·埃斯特班一样：少些紧迫感，多些耐心。

他说，如今他不再那么关注数岁月，而是专注于享受生活，他相信自己的歌曲一直以来都在讲述他的故事。

“我的生活大部分都融入了我的歌曲里。每当我感到痛苦，我就会创作一首歌。” 他说，“每当我感到沮丧、害怕或恋爱，我都会把这些感受写成歌。”