Gloria Estefan - Oye Mi Canto: Los Exitos (2006)

The same day Sony BMG Music Entertainment released The Essential Gloria Estefan, in effect resolving a long-time need for a career-spanning retrospective of the singer's numerous English-language hits from the 1980s and '90s, the conglomerate also issued Oye Mi Canto: Los Éxitos, a likewise much-needed greatest-hits compilation that tells the other side of the Gloria Estefan story. By and large, most people know Estefan for her late-'80s/early-'90s chart-topping ballads like "Anything for You," "Don't Wanna Lose You," and "Coming Out of the Dark," as well as mid- to late-'80s dance-pop favorites like "Conga," "Rhythm Is Gonna Get You," and "Get on Your Feet." But, perhaps unknown to many, she also released a bounty of Spanish-language material over the years -- some of it versions of her popular songs, most of it original material and exclusively Spanish-language in nature. During the '90s, once Estefan's star had dimmed a bit, she would alternate such albums with English ones: Mi Tierra (1993), Abriendo Puertas (1995), and Alma Caribeña (2000) were the flip side to Into the Light (1991), Destiny (1996), and Gloria! (1998). These Spanish-language albums were generally excellent -- 100 percent authentic and often pan-cultural, incorporating all kinds of Latin music, especially tropical -- and while they stand up well on their own as respective listens, Mi Tierra above all, they also have enough highlights to warrant a compilation like Oye Mi Canto: Los Éxitos. Granted, Sony Discos already mined this material for one best-of, Amor y Suerte: Exitos Romanticos (2004), and indeed several songs that were compiled there are again compiled here. But Oye Mi Canto: Los Éxitos is a much different album than Amor y Suerte, to such an extant that devoted fans will want both. Whereas Amor y Suerte was a collection of love songs, practically all of them ballads, Oye Mi Canto: Los Éxitos is a straight hits collection, compiling not only her best Spanish-language ballads like "Con los Años Que Me Quedan," "Como Me Duele Perderte," and "Tu Fotografía," but also uptempo songs like "Mi Tierra," "Abriendo Puertas," and "Santo Santo," as well as versions of her three number one hits: "Si Voy a Perderte" (a version of "Don't Wanna Lose You"), "No Te Olvidaré" ("Anything for You"), and "Desde la Oscuridad" ("Coming Out of the Dark"). Clocking in at 18 tracks, Oye Mi Canto: Los Éxitos is filled with highlights and serves as a purposeful complement to The Essential Gloria Estefan, summarizing the other side of the singer's remarkable career to date. In doing so, Oye Mi Canto illustrates that even though Estefan began receding from the English-language pop charts in the wake of Greatest Hits (1992), she continued to record enjoyable music, albeit much of it Latin in character.~Oye Mi Canto: Los Éxitos Review by Jason Birchmeier