Seven years ago, she came to Las Vegas and left a star — only to shine elsewhere.
Flashback to Nov. 14, 2019: It’s Rosalía’s night at the 20th annual Latin Grammy Awards, which doubled as a coming-out party for the then-ascendant, do-it-all Spanish singer/composer/producer/dancer.
She’d leave the MGM Grand Garden Arena with a trio of awards, tied for the most by any performer, her groundbreaking sophomore LP, “El Mal Querer,” notching big wins for Album of the Year and Best Contemporary Pop Album.
Rosalía would return to town and earn another seven Latin Grammys in the years to come — yet, through three tours, she never actually played here.
That changes Saturday, when she makes her Vegas concert debut at T-Mobile Arena.
What to expect at her first local show? A lot.
Get ready with this primer on all things Rosalía:
Nontraditional traditionalist
Rosalía’s career is rooted in flamenco tradition — she studied the music for a decade; “El Mal Querer” doubled as her baccalaureate project at Barcelona’s Catalonia College of Music, where she graduated with honors.
But Rosalía turns this traditionalism on its head in terms of how she reimagines and presents the sound of her homeland, modernizing flamenco with pop and hip-hop flourishes and production values on “El Mal Querer,” in which old-world musicianship gets wormholed into a new millennium.
“Querer” was an instant game changer: Though released less than a decade ago, it stands as the highest-ranking Spanish-language entry on Rolling Stone’s list of the top 500 albums of all time.
“Piensas: ‘¿Cómo he llegado hasta aquí?’” (“And you think: ‘How did I end up here?’”), Rosalía wonders incredulously on “Preso.”
And she was just getting started.
Visual provocateur
A few scenes from Rosalía’s expansive, what-did-I-just-see? videography, which has racked up over 6 billion views on her YouTube channel:
— J. Balvin piloting a rose-filled airliner (“Con Altura”).
— A hooded, ominous-looking figure in purple robes riding a nail-festooned skateboard (“Malamente”).
— A symphony on a subway train; Rosalía doing her laundry in an apartment populated by CGI raccoons (“Berghain”).
— Oh, and don’t forget that chrome thong (“La Perla”).
As boundary-blasting as Rosalía’s songbook might be, her visual aesthetic only builds upon this thorough lack of creative inhibition.
There are some recurring motifs in her many viral videos — bright colors, puffy clothes, motorcycles, fingernails the length of airport runways — but mostly her artistic impulses are like the goop inside a lava lamp, constantly taking new forms.
Where to start? Cue up Rosalía’s cinematic clip for beatific ballad “Sauvignon Blanc” and watch her skull morph into a flaming Rolls-Royce.
Multilingual masterpiece
In full-on opera mode, her voice soaring from her lungs as if propelled by rocket boosters, Rosalía sings of a lover’s fiery passions, employing a child’s toy as a metaphor for the emotional weight she feels in response — oh, and she does so in German, from the perspective of an 11th century Benedictine abbess.
“Die Flamme dringt in mein Gehirn ein / Wie ein Blei-Teddybär” (“The flame penetrates my brain / Like a lead teddy bear”), Rosalía trills on “Berghain,” the truly one-of-a-kind lead single from her latest album, “Lux” (Latin for “light”), in which she employs 13 languages on songs inspired by the trials and triumphs of various female saints, singing in their native tongues. (“Berghain” is indebted to German writer-philosopher Hildegard of Bingen.)
Though flamenco underpinnings still power portions of “Lux” — see: the clapping polyrhythms of “De Madrugá” and “La Rumba del Perdón” — the album finds Rosalía redefining herself once again as she delivers a sweeping, supremely ambitious orchestral pop masterpiece recorded at 10 studios across four countries with a cast of over 80 collaborators — and a whole lot of input from Google translate.
It’s a stunning achievement, divided into four movements.
“Seven heavens / Big deal / I wanna see the eighth heaven / Tenth heaven / Thousandth heaven,” Rosalía’s translated lyrics read on “La Yugular,” a sentiment that encapsulates her creative aspirations.
“It’s just like going through one door — one door isn’t enough,” she continues. “A million doors aren’t enough.”
Bringing ‘Lux’ to life
Three songs into the show comes a pronouncement — delivered in Japanese, no less — from the ballerina who’ll transform into an angel soon enough.
“私はカオスの女王,” (“I am the queen of chaos”), a tutu-clad Rosalía sings on “Porcelana,” setting the tone for her 22-song, nearly two-hour “Lux” tour concert production, in which Britain’s Heritage Orchestra performs on a secondary stage shaped like a Latin cross.
Divided into four acts like “Lux,” the show sees Rosalía singing in 11 languages and undergoing multiple costume changes for the first time, eventually donning cherub’s wings by night’s end.
Contrasting religious iconography with elaborate choreography and a phalanx of performers from French dance collective (La) Horde, the show spans much of Rosalía’s discography while heavily mining “Lux,” featuring 14 of its 15 tracks.
Handful of highlights
Need some tunes to get ready for it all?
Check out these five highlights from the “Lux” tour setlist:
“El Redentor”: Performed orchestrally, this spare, haunting number is the only song Rosalía revisits from her 2017 debut, “Los Ángeles.”
“Saoko”: The “Motomami” album opener and reggaeton throwback hits like a linebacker.
“Cuuuuuuuuuute”: Rosalía brings the Baaaaaaaaaass on this “Motomami” banger.
“Mio Cristo Piange Diamanti”: A “Lux” standout that climaxes with goose bump-inducing vocal acrobatics. Breathtaking.
“Divinize”: A kinetic ballad with a pinballing beat that doubles as a statement of intent. “Not everyone will understand it; she doesn’t expect them to,” Rosalía sings in Catalan, her words translated to English. “They think it’s the end, but it’s only just beginning.”
Contact Jason Bracelin at [email protected] or 702-383-0476. Follow @jasonbracelin76 on Instagram.
‘Lux’ world tour
who: Rosalía
when: 8:30 p.m. Saturday
where: T-Mobile Arena
tickets: Prices vary; t-mobilearena.com