Guadalupe Urbina

Guadalupe Urbina (born 28 October 1959) is a Costa Rican singer-songwriter, poet, and activist. Urbina is a folk musician whose compositions reflect the oral tradition of Guanacaste, her birthplace. She has performed in both Europe and the United States and has won various awards for her work domestically and internationally.

Biography

Early life

Guadalupe Urbina was born 28 October 1959 in Sardinal, Guanacaste, Costa Rica as the youngest of ten children of Nicaraguan immigrants. Urbina was born into a rural household in a town with no electricity, and did not own shoes until she was eleven years old.

Born into a musical family, both of Urbina's parents played and sung music at home. Urbina recalls learning the traditional tales that she would perform through her career from her mother, Ángela Juárez, during her childhood. Local radio broadcast rancheras and other songs by Víctor Manuel and Joan Manuel Serrat, which Urbina listened to on a battery-powered radio. By the time she was eight years old, she had become a frequent performer at family events, possessing a large repertoire that she had learned from her mother or heard on the radio.

When she was eleven years old, her mother died, and she was sent to San José to live with her older sisters. Urbina learned to play guitar at sixteen years old, and began to hone her skills as a poet and singer-songwriter. Soon after, she attended the National University of Costa Rica in Heredia to study music and guitar, during which she won first prize at the university song festival two years in a row.

Early career and residence abroad

Urbina recorded various cassette recordings in the 1980s of which there is little record. Her first appearance on an LP record was in the 1986 compilation album ''La Paz del Mundo comienza en Centroamérica''. The following year, Urbina performed at the Latin American Music Festival in Utrecht, Netherlands through which she received an invitation to perform at a concert within Amnesty International's Human Rights Now! tour in 1988. Held at the Estadio Nacional de Costa Rica, Urbina shared the stage with musicians Youssou N'Dour, Sting, Peter Gabriel, Tracy Chapman, and Bruce Springsteen. By the end of the decade, Urbina had toured internationally and performed in venues in Spain, Senegal, France, Canada, and the United States.

In 1994, Urbina was presented with a Gaviota award from the Círculo de Bellas Artes in Madrid, Spain, for her work with oral tradition. A year later, she was presented with Radio France's American Discovery Award by Youssou N'Dour. Urbina moved to the Netherlands in the mid-1990s. She continued composing music, combining her own compositions with the traditional songs of Guanacaste folklore that she encountered in her research. Under a government scholarship, Urbina refined her singing technique and practiced with percussion instruments. She also taught in workshops alongside musicians Angélique Kidjo, Bobby McFerrin, and Mari Boine.

While living in Europe, Urbina returned to Costa Rica for several months each year to teach children stories related to their cultural identity. In 1999, Urbina founded Voz Propia, an organization in Costa Rica which supports the development of the arts in young people. Further along her stay in the Netherlands, in 2000, she began dabbling in drawing by illustrating stories that she wrote while raising her daughter. Urbina released her 2001 album ''Trópico Azul De Lluvia'' under Belgian-Dutch world music label Culture Records. One of the album's songs, "Agosto Azul", was included on '' The Rough Guide to the Music of Central America'' and was praised in a review by ''RootsWorld'' magazine: those "...who miss the exquisite poetry and visionary yearning of revolutionary Central American trova will welcome this subtle recording." Putumayo World Music, a world music label, also included her music on their album ''Garden of Eden'' (2001). Urbina presented her children's book ''Benito, Pánfila y el perro garrobero'', illustrated by Gabriela Cob, at the Centro Nacional de Cultura (National Cultural Center) in December 2002. The book covers the adventures of a girl growing up on a farm in Guanacaste.

Return to Costa Rica

In 2002, Urbina was diagnosed with brain cancer. After she received treatment in Belgium, the Dutch government told her that she was disabled and could not work anymore. Soon after she returned to Costa Rica, she continued her creative work, including writing a musical, in addition to her work with Voz Propia. The book ''Al Menudeo'', in which Urbina compiled stories, songs, poems, myths, and prayers, was published in 2003 in Spain by publisher Horas y Horas.

In 2006, Urbina and journalist María Suárez Toro were granted a scholarship by the GAEA Foundation recognizing their "notable work to explore and develop alternative social realities that promote justice, creativity and sustainability". The scholarship was given to support a two-month residency in Massachusetts, United States in the following year during which the pair were to write a theatrical production, titled ''Wings of the Butterfly'', based on Suárez's doctoral thesis. Twenty-five of Urbina's paintings were showcased in a 2009 exhibition at the Museo Nacional de Costa Rica

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