Amid national boom, Atlanta’s Latin music scene is ‘very early stages’

Credit: Ryan Fleisher

Credit: Ryan Fleisher

When Shakira last performed in Atlanta in 2006, she was among only a handful of Latin artists bursting into the mainstream at the time. Today, the scale and scope of Latin music is flourishing — so much so that Shakira’s comeback album featured collaborations with a vast array of Latin artists who’ve dominated the sound over the past few years, including Karol G, Rauw Alejandro, Ozuna, Bizarrap and Grupo Frontera.

Today, Latin music is one of the fastest-growing genres in the U.S.

A 2024 midyear report by Luminate (a music and entertainment data company) revealed that the genre outpaced country, pop and rock for the first half of last year. By the end of 2024, the genre only trailed pop and rock.

As the sound takes over the country, mainstays in Atlanta’s Latin music scene are optimistic about its future in the city.

‘We’re here. Here we are.’

Credit: Olivia Bowdoin

Credit: Olivia Bowdoin

In 2017, friends Margarita Rios and Randall Ruiz began hosting Latin music dance parties and other community-building events before launching Oye Fest, the premier festival for Latin music in Atlanta, in 2018.

“The biggest reason why we’re trying to push right now for our community to be so strong and for everybody to connect is because right now, we’re just trying to create resources for ourselves,” said Rios. “We’re trying to grow together.”

Ruiz said the success of the music genre provides more opportunity for the scene to grow in Atlanta, a city he says doesn’t have many platforms to amplify local Latin artists and connect the Latin community.

But Oye Fest is seeking to change that.

“When you’re talking about the Latino community, it’s not just one thing,” Ruiz said. “There’s so many pockets. What’s going on right now is that everyone’s vibing together. I think that’s the exciting part. We’re kind of trying to figure out what that looks like, what it sounds like.”

The name Oye, which means “hey” or “listen” in English, “speaks to why we did this to begin with,” said Rios. “I think that some of these venues in the city weren’t aware of how many more Latinos were moving into the city, and how our presence was growing here. The name is like, listen: We’re here. Here we are.”

Roughly 1 million people make up Georgia’s Latino population, the ninth largest in the country, according to a 2024 report conducted by the Georgia Latinx Alliance. Since 2010, it has grown at a faster rate than the national average (32.7% compared to 25.9%).

While Atlanta venues have grown more receptive to Latin music over the years, Oye Fest founders say, the city’s Latin music scene is still a budding field.

“Compared to New York, Miami, LA, a lot of the Latin community here is very new,” said Ruiz. “In New York and LA, where they’ve been there for decades, that voice is already established, so we’re still figuring out what the scene is here.”

Credit: Olivia Bowdoin

Credit: Olivia Bowdoin

Last year’s Oye Fest, featuring performances by La India, Farina and Reyna Tropical, attracted nearly 2,000 people to Old Fourth Ward. This year, it will be held Oct. 4, with location and lineup to be announced later.

Outside of the festival, Oye hosts monthly events, like karaoke night at 97 Estoria in Cabbagetown, and promotes local concerts. In March, they launched a ticket giveaway for J. Balvin’s concert at State Farm Arena, which kicked off his first tour in six years.

Oye plans to establish a nonprofit arm, with goals to provide grants to local artists and programs and to partner with schools for arts and music courses.

“We’re not just an annual music festival,” Rios said. “Our mission is a lot bigger. I hope that people can see what we’ve been wanting, what we’ve been trying to do, and hopefully we can continue to do what we love for our community.”

Push for visibility

Credit: Ryan Fleisher

Credit: Ryan Fleisher

The number of international Latin music artists performing in Atlanta is on the rise.

At Atlanta’s State Farm Arena alone, artists like J. Balvin, Ivan Cornejo and Rauw Alejandro, along with Shakira, have hit the stage.

Popular Mexican EDM group 3BallMTY has a July show at the Masquerade that’s already sold out. Colombian-American indie singer Kali Uchis will embark on her first headlining arena tour this fall, including a stop at State Farm Arena. Four-time Grammy-winning Natalia Lafourcade will perform two nights at the Tabernacle in October.

And that same month, Latin indie pop band the Marías (fronted by Puerto Rican singer María Zardoya, who grew up in Snellville) will perform at Atlanta’s Shaky Knees Festival in September.

State Farm Arena started booking Latin acts about three years ago, roughly two a year at the time, said Trey Feazell, the venue’s vice president of programming. Today, it books 12-14 acts a year.

“The one thing I love about the Latin music is there’s so many genres within the genre,” Feazell said. “At Ivan (Cornejo’s) concert, it was a really, really young audience. ... the audience has really grown.’

Indeed, part of Latin music’s success is the many sounds within it. For example, Bad Bunny’s Latin trap-inspired reggaeton — a buoyant mix of dancehall, reggae, rap and salsa — has fueled his success as the only artist to chart multiple No. 1 Spanish-language albums.

And 21-year-old Ivan Cornejo, a rising star in the regional Mexican music scene, has garnered an impressive following (over 7 million across social media) since his 2021 debut.

While subgenres continue to push Latin music’s rise in the mainstream, some local artists in Atlanta say the genre’s diversity can complicate their road to success.

Credit: Handout

Credit: Handout

Csndra (real name Cassandra Garcia) is a 29-year-old Puerto Rican indie pop artist. The Suwanee resident, who sings in English and Spanish, dropped her first EP, “Lovers Club, Vol. 1″ last year. She’s performed twice at Oye Fest and hopes to be back this year.

As an independent artist, Csndra said her hardest challenge is getting audiences to understand her embrace of both languages.

“I feel like playlisters and people who can put me in the spotlight want me to do Latin music,” she said. “It’s fine, of course. I’m not gonna stop. But I also have this love to write in English, too. And I think that I don’t want to compromise myself just for opportunities. I don’t want to give up expressing myself in a certain art form because it’s not going to produce well online or on streaming.”

The success of Kali Uchis and the Marías inspires her to continue her path. With the help of her social media profiles (she has roughly 25,000 followers on TikTok), she’s garnered about 20,000 monthly listeners on Spotify.

Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC

Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC

Mexican American rapper Kap G is a veteran in the city’s music scene. Inspired by Atlanta’s trap sound, he emerged in the mid-2010s. Kap G, born George Ramirez in College Park, gained prominence for his platinum 2016 single “Girlfriend” as an Atlantic Records artist.

The following year, he was named in XXL magazine’s highly coveted freshman class, along with Playboi Carti. It’s hard not to view Kap G’s early success as a precursor to That Mexican OT, a breakout Latin artist from Texas known for weaving trap music and a Mexican-influenced sound.

Now an independent artist, Kap G hasn’t garnered the same success as his early career days. The rapper said being a pioneering Hispanic artist in the city continues to be hard, especially as the scope of Latin music is evolving.

“Being one of the first rappers from Atlanta to be Hispanic and kicking the door down (was challenging) just because nobody ever done it before,” he said. “It’s not like it was a lane that was carved out, so it was a lot of grinding and a lot of hours of building that path.”

But he continues to weave his pride for Mexican culture with his love for trap music. Earlier this year, in the wake of increased U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrests under the Trump administration, he released the song “MAGA (Mexicans Ain’t Going Anywhere)." The video has nearly 30,000 views.

The single has all the flair, lyrics and visuals of a protest anthem. For Kap G, the message is bigger than the music.

“A lot of times, it’s negative things about us,” the 30-year-old said. “I think sometimes there’s people out there who are Hispanic, and they might be afraid, so with that song, I was just kind of putting on for the people, for the culture.”

Sustaining community

Credit: Olivia Bowdoin

Credit: Olivia Bowdoin

On June 6, Oye Fest hit a milestone by hosting Frequency Fridays, a popular monthly art and culture party at the High Museum of Art, for the first time.

Along with curating talent from local Latin DJs, Oye Fest also organized a salsa dance performance by Eli Perez and brought in Latin food vendors.

While Oye Fest acknowledges that its work hasn’t been easy over the years, they’re proud to be a leader in cultivating spaces for Atlanta’s Latin music scene.

“It still feels like it’s in the very, very early stages of what we’re going to be seeing in Atlanta for our community in the next few years,” Rios said. “But it’s really beautiful to be a part of the early processes and to see all of that growth happening.”

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