‘We Need Anger to Fight for Our Lives’: Mexican Musician Silvana Estrada on Sorrow, Violence and the Humiliation of ‘El Ghosting’

For 25 years, Silvana Estrada admits she was unable to learn the art of expressing anger. “It drained my energy and self-respect,” she reflects. Sadness, however, was something she always understood: “She has always been by my side.” Now 28, Estrada grew up near Veracruz, an urban center on the Gulf of Mexico, where she witnessed violence from so many angles: rampant femicide, drug cartel influence, and environmental attacks on local farms and waterways. As a lonely teenager, she discovered Billie Holiday, Sarah Vaughan, Ella Fitzgerald. They helped guide the darkness she felt and introduced her to vocal improvisation.

Hailing from a lineage of instrument makers, Estrada started making her own music, using a Venezuelan cuatro and inspired by Mexican son jarocho. Her 2022 debut, Marchita, meaning “withered,” presenting a minimalist, heartbreaking narrative of lost love.

“She stands among the most profound artists today,” says her peer and mentor, the Mexican songwriter Natalia Lafourcade. “Her voice embodies liberty, exotic beauty, and Latin American spirit. It reflects a deep connection to love, nature and human relationships.”

Estrada still loves that album, she mentions now, during a New York interview. It earned her a Latin Grammy for best new artist and critical raves. However, later, she explains, “I really wanted to do something with my humour. Post-Marchita, I felt confined to a somber, solemn persona. That is also me, but I wanted to show myself in a way that’s even closer to how I really am.” She fondly recalls her younger self so animatedly that her sparkly rose-shaped earrings swing. Some of Marchita’s songs dated back to when she was 18, she says: “All this eloquence, darkness, I see it as so much naiveness because I thought that was the only way to talk about love and dreams.”

Shifting Sounds and Deeper Emotions

Her second album, she decided, would be poppier, lighter. Yet, personal losses unveiled a deeper, darker aspect. Estrada’s new lyrics are stark with recrimination and brutal despondence: for ex-lovers who couldn’t reciprocate; for a friend who ditched her “because he couldn’t stand that my career was” – she shoots her hand upwards – “and his wasn’t. I got so depressed after that. She wondered how years of brotherly love could end over insecurity. The shock was profound.”

She transformed her anger into Good Luck, Good Night, a dramatic, humorous farewell to the pettiness of ghosting. Each verse evokes the image of a tipped wineglass. “Sometimes our lives are like a telenovela – infinite drama and suffering,” she remarks, referencing the high-octane Latin American soap operas of her youth. “Existence involves pain, but ghosting—where someone chooses invisibility—is utterly miserable!” Her offense remains palpable. ‘It’s funny because I guess it shows how small we can be.”

Harnessing Anger’s Energy

During the process of writing, “I was like, wow, anger is really helpful,” she says. “Anger is this energy that really wants you to be responsible for your needs and your limits. It’s beautiful, strange, uncomfortable, almost like a grandmother telling you: ‘What are you doing? You don’t want this.’ Ultimately, anger is essential for personal and collective survival.”

However, Vendrán Suaves Lluvias conveys serenity; it’s one of the year’s most unabashedly beautiful albums. Following unsuccessful collaborations with producers, Silvana decided to do it herself. She acknowledged her unique vision. Trusting others over her instincts felt irresponsible.” She enriched her cuatro with orchestral elements, her commanding voice brimming with compassion. The radiant Como un Pájaro, nominated for best singer-songwriter song at next month’s Latin Grammys, evokes springtime freshness. She was surprised by the joyful melodies that came out of her. “Aging has taught me to cherish joy amid adversity. This album is like a pendulum between beauty and terror.”

Loss and Homage

The insult of being ghosted paled next to the tragedy of losing her best friend and fellow musician, Jorge, killed violently with his family in late 2022. “This is a little bit embarrassing, but I didn’t value friendship very much when I was growing up,” she says. “I was a little bit weird. My musical tastes were unconventional. I felt deeply isolated. Even friends treated me poorly. I’ve always been highly sensitive.” Jorge showed her true friendship. “Someone that loves you, accepts you, who has the generosity of telling you: ‘Hey, you did this and I didn’t like it,’ or, ‘This is amazing, I love you.’ We were inseparable.”

When she planned to relocate to Mexico City, her parents were unsure until they heard that Jorge was going too. “They loved Jorge so much. He was like an older brother to me.” He accompanied her on tours. “I enjoyed so much feeling loved, not so like this super lonely child.”

Regarding Jorge, she shares: “I could be a child again. My heart felt weightless. And now my heart is heavy. I’m adapting to it.” Grave and sharpened by sudden bursts of strings, Un Rayo de Luz honors his memory. Composed at Chavela Vargas’s home, her idol, and interpolates her words: “¿Cómo será de hermosa la muerte que nadie ha vuelto de allá?” “I cling to that belief,” she states.

Activism and Inspiration

The perpetrators were apprehended. “They’re gonna die in jail,” says Estrada, “but justice is the minimum. Institutions failed us all. I don’t fully trust incarceration. I advocate for rehabilitation.”

She has long championed justice: one of the earliest online hits for her is a 2018 video supporting Mexican abortion rights, predating legalization. In 2022, she released Si Me Matan following a student’s murder. “I use my platform to empower, particularly young girls,” she says.

Lafourcade inspired her. She reciprocates the praise. “She is undoubtedly the voice of young generations, with a soul and heart of great sensitivity,” Lafourcade comments. “I see her as an old soul and wisdom within a young body full of vitality and beauty in every sense.”

Music, Culture, and Conversation

In 2023, Mexico’s then president played Estrada’s music as part of an effort to deter young people from corridos tumbados, the genre of regional Mexican trap popularised by Peso Pluma that has been accused of glorifying drug cartels and stoking violence. Estrada says she was “honoured”, but had mixed feelings. Instead of cancelling this kind of music, she says, “we must discuss why society idolizes destructive figures.” She adds: “In Mexico, there are so many things we need to start talking about, and we need to involve everybody. Conversation drives real change.”

Listening to herself helped Estrada become accountable to her own feelings. Composing Dime, she recognized her desire to leave. She sought departure. “It was such a useful thing to realise you can always turn around and walk away,” she says. “For me, it was hard to understand that I could just say no.”

She draws parallels to the Furies of Greek myth: goddesses of vengeance depicted with horrifying facial features. “I see their rage as a response to divine injustice. Society shuns them due to misogynistic views on female anger. But I align with their spirit over other goddesses: OK, I’m gonna have snakes instead of hair and one eye in my frente – I don’t care: I strive for happiness, vitality, and growth.”