If Calle 13 isn’t playing at a party in South Florida, something has gone terribly wrong.
The experimental hip-hop group from Puerto Rico has been groundbreaking for Latin urban genres —winning over 20 Grammys and Latin Grammys.
Ileana Cabra’s formal entry into performance was with her older brothers Residente and Visitante of Calle 13.
She is better known now as iLe. She traveled around the world with her brothers as the female vocalist for Calle 13. Her stage name then was PG-13 because she was just a teenager at the time.
But the first time she sang at a Calle 13 concert, she sang something a little different: an emotional ballad — or bolero — by the Afro-Cuban singer La Lupe.
That first performance of the song "Puro Teatro" set the tone for her eventual solo career –– which she launched in 2016 with the debut album iLevitable.
iLe expanded her musical heritage while making it her own. Her dad and siblings collaborated on the album and her late grandmother wrote some of the songs.
On the March 20 episode of Sundial, she joined WLRN's Caitie Muñoz to talk about her music and the inspiration behind it — love, feminism, government corruption and her family.
iLe’s third album Nacarile came out last year. She’ll be performing this Thursday, March 23, in Fort Lauderdale as part of her U.S. tour for the album.
On Sundial's previous episode, we heard from WLRN's investigative team. Reporters Joshua Ceballos and Danny Rivero look into a government-funded nonprofit that was put in place to help care for people who can’t take care of themselves — and sometimes sell their homes to cover the cost of their care. They found blurred lines in the program.
Listen to Sundial Monday through Thursday on WLRN, 91.3 FM, live at 1 p.m., rebroadcast at 8 p.m. Missed a show? Find every episode of Sundial on your favorite podcast app, such as Apple Podcasts, Stitcher and Spotify.
Stay in touch with us by emailing us at sundial@wlrnnews.org.
