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Jorge Drexler’s Homecoming Pays Off: ‘Taracá’ Earns Seven Latin Grammy Nominations

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Thirty years into his career, Jorge Drexler went home, and home answered. The Uruguayan singer-songwriter has earned seven nominations at the 27th Annual Latin Grammy Awards for Taracá, the album he recorded in Uruguay for the first time in two decades. He is also set to perform when the ceremony airs live from the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas on November 12.

Taracá competes for Album of the Year and Best Singer-Songwriter Album, while “¿Cómo Se Ama?” is nominated for both Record of the Year and Song of the Year. “Las Palabras” is up for Best Singer-Songwriter Song, and “El Tambor Chico,” recorded with Rueda de Candombe, is in the Best Roots Song field, alongside a Best Alternative Song nomination that rounds out the seven.

The album, released March 13 on Sony Music Spain, is built on candombe, the Afro-Uruguayan drumming tradition carried by three drums: piano, chico and repique. Its title is the sound of the smallest of them, the tambor chico, and a play on “estar acá,” to be here. Drexler, who has lived in Spain for three decades, made the record after losing his parents, working with young producers and with Rueda de Candombe, who appear on three tracks. Young Miko sings with him on the ballad “Te Llevo Tatuada,” and the album closes with “Las Palabras,” a murga farewell featuring Murga Falta y Resto that Drexler dedicated to his father.

The Taracá tour has carried the experiment around the world this year, from Buenos Aires’ Movistar Arena in April to Costa Rica in September, with Drexler performing the candombe-rooted songs alongside the catalog that made him one of Latin music’s most decorated writers: an Academy Award winner for “Al Otro Lado del Río” and a thirteen-time Latin Grammy winner before this year’s nominations were even announced.

His last album, Tinta y Tiempo, won seven Latin Grammys. Taracá now has the chance to match it. Whatever happens on November 12, the homecoming already ranks as one of the year’s great stories: a master songwriter, a drum pattern from the streets of Montevideo, and seven nominations to show for listening to both.

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We Speak Latin

Xavi Earns His First Latin Grammy Nominations With ‘Dosis,’ Plus a Performance Slot in Las Vegas

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October 29, 2026

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The face of romantic tumbados just got his first Latin Grammy invitations. Xavi, the Phoenix-born singer-songwriter who helped redefine corridos for a new generation, has earned the first two Latin Grammy nominations of his career: Best Contemporary Mexican Music Album for Dosis and Best Regional Song for “No Capea,” his collaboration with Grupo Frontera. On November 12, he will also perform at the 27th Annual Latin Grammy Awards at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas.

Dosis, his nineteen-track sophomore album released in May through Interscope Records, is the bigger swing. After breaking through with the viral acoustic hit “La Víctima” and the follow-up smash “La Diabla,” and establishing himself with his debut album Next, Xavi used Dosis to widen the frame, keeping the requinto-led, guitar-first heart of his tumbado romántico style while pushing its production and songwriting into new territory. “No Capea,” which he co-wrote, pairs him with Grupo Frontera, one of the genre’s biggest groups, and has become a streaming-era anthem of its own.

“To see Dosis and ‘No Capea’ celebrated alongside artists I admire is a dream come true,” Xavi said when the nominations were announced. “I dedicate these nominations to my grandfather, who first introduced me to music. Making him proud means everything.” It is a fitting note for an artist who began composing as a teenager in Phoenix and built his audience one phone-recorded song at a time.

The live show has kept pace with the records. His X tour has been filling arenas across Mexico, and in September he joined Natanael Cano on stage in Guadalajara, a meeting of the two artists most responsible for the corridos tumbados era.

First nominations are a before-and-after moment in any career. Xavi arrives in Las Vegas with two of them, a performance slot on the telecast and a sophomore album the Academy itself has certified as one of the year’s essential Mexican music records. The next chapter starts November 12.

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