Student Profile: Perla R., the singer

By Carlos P.

Perla R., a junior at CATS, was just in kindergarten when she started to sing at restaurants and family gatherings. In addition to the 11 years of singing, dancing is another thing she likes to do. She sings and dances, mainly focusing on Mexican music like corridos, rancheras, mariachi, and cumbias.

Perla says about her plans in singing: “I want to, I hope so, maybe one day, I do want to become a known singer, not famous but known.” She likes to sing because it’s interesting and a light on the tunnel of life. “It makes me feel happy, singing calms me down, knowing that people like my singing motivates me to keep going.”

Origins

Perla inherited her singing from her family. Her grandfather from her mom’s side was in a music band, he was the first one to have the courage to sing, and from then on every member started to sing.

From the beginning of her career, her role model in life has been her mother, but her idol in music is Jenni Rivera. The first song she learned was “Ya lo se” by Jenni Rivera. Jenni Rivera was a single mother that went through a lot. She was abused and lost all hope in life, but never gave up and she got where she wanted to be. Her focus was family and her supportive family as she used to call her fans, never left her alone and always gave support. 

Challenges and Rewards

Singing has ups and downs, and every singer has strengths and weaknesses. Perla has a loud voice, but when it comes to extreme high songs her voice cracks sometimes, she says, in rancheras like “El Herradero” and “Demasiado Tarde” by Ana Gabriel.

Throughout Perla’s career no one has tried to pull her down and everybody is supportive and motives her to continue and follow her dreams, she said. Therefore ,she asks for support because that is something that motivates her and the best part of her singing, she said, is the smiles she sees on others faces while she sings, their happiness.

CATS Karaoke 

There is always an opportunity to have a fun time during lunch every Friday at CATS. For Perla, it was a chance to share her talent with the whole school. And so she began to sing the song “Que creías” by Tejano legend Selena.

She looked confident but she said, “I was just nervous, I was shy, I thought that I was messing up in parts, I didn’t think I did good, I doubted myself.” After all, it’s not easy to stand in front of everyone and sing, it’s something that not everyone has the courage to do. 

Her advice? “Just, don’t let people break you down, ignore what they said, if it’s negative comments, take it, I guess that’s a compliment to push you to do harder things.”