By Steff WillisWednesday 12 Oct 2022MusicReading Time: 2 minutes
How can you authentically love your neighbour if you don’t speak the same language?
This is a question Evan Craft asked growing up in Los Angeles California where 60% of people speak Spanish. This led him to take Spanish lessons at the age of 15.
Fast forward to 2022 and Evan Craft has numerous albums under his belt in both Spanish and English.
96five’s Tim Bain caught up with Evan Craft to learn some Spanish and hear about the many iterations of his song Be Alright came to be.
“My music took off on YouTube” Evan said.
“It was such a surprise because I thought YouTube artists were like B artists that they couldn’t make it with a record label and actually that was the thing that really carried my career for years and years.”
Evan originally wrote the hit song Be Alright for another artist but had some regrets because of how much he loved the song.
“Be Alright is such a cool song because we actually wrote it first in Spanish and we were thinking about people in Latin America.”
After realising he could release an English version of the song, he teamed up with Danny Gokey and Redimi2 to create a bilingual radio edit which eventually led to the remix with KB and Sam Rivera, playing regularly on 96five.
“There’s this tension in the song which I think is really beautiful” Evan said.
Evan’s passion to transcend culture and language has seen a non-Hispanic man become one of the most successful Latin music artists.
“I’ve been surrounded by a tonne of Latinos who have really shaped me and formed me and really enriched my entire life”
Evan Craft is currently touring with KB and Sam Rivera across the south of America.
To hear the full interview, check out the video player above.