This Q&A between Acción Latina’s Executive Director Fátima Ramírez and award-winning Tejana singer Isabel Marie Sánchez profiles a talented artist who discusses what it was like to be signed to Q Productions, the label owned by Selena’s very own father Mr. Abraham Quintanilla, and how she is using the advice that she received to make her own voice heard. 

Isabel Marie will be performing a tribute to Selena at the San Francisco Symphony on Saturday, July 9 at 7:30 PM. Tickets are available here. You can follow Isabel Marie on social media @isabelmarieofficial. The San Francisco Symphony is an advertising sponsor of El Tecolote Newspaper. This interview has been shortened for length and clarity. You can listen to the full conversation on an upcoming Radio Teco’s Our Cultura podcast.   

So I want to start with highlighting some of your early successes or triunfos for our audience because you have done a lot at such a young age. So first Sabado Gigante—at 11 you sang La Malagueña for a father’s day singing competition and you won the contest and you won $1,000! Then I believe it was the same year you did La Voz Kids and you sang Cucurrucucu Paloma from one of your singing inspirations Lola Beltrán. And then at 12, you signed with the Q Productions label, which is owned by none other than Selena’s father Mr. Abraham Quintanilla, which if I’m connecting the dots correctly, means that you got to record some of your first songs in the same studio where Selena sang her top hits that now you get to perform with symphony orchestras across the country, including our very own San Francisco symphony! Ok I’m so impressed. Also as a Selena fan my mind is blown! Okay, so talk to me about this journey. How old are you now, and when did you decide that you wanted to pursue a singing career? Was that something that your family encouraged, and how did you decide to sing in Spanish?

Well, I’m 19 years old now, which I feel like I’m getting older. But desde chiquita, my parents have always had music around in our family. I feel like everyone in my family can sing. We always do karaoke at our family parties, and I actually wanted to learn how to read so I can do karaoke with my family. So I literally came out of the womb singing. It’s in my blood. My parents always showed me different genres. We would go from Lola Beltrán to Whitney Houston, then to Mariah Carey, then Vicente Fernández. And then like Earth, Wind & Fire, then Michael Jackson. So it was like always all over the place, and Andrea Bocelli. So I always loved that because I grabbed inspiration from different artists, and everyone has their different way of singing, so I just made my own sound with that. And of course, I loved Selena. Because my mom’s dad was a truck driver, and so he would go to Texas and he would bring back CDs of Selena when she was like 14, 15 years old and he would play it in their house in Chicago, and so my mom always knew about Selena and even before she got super big.

So she always would play her songs while she was cleaning the house or anything and so it was kind of engraved in my mind like “Bidi Bidi Bom Bom” and like “Como la Flor,” and even her older hits. So I definitely loved the way that Selena interacted with her fans and her amazing stage presence was unbelievable. So that definitely inspired me a lot, and I saw her growing up and I realized you know she has dark hair. She has dark skin. So I see myself in her, and if someone who looks like me can do that, why can’t I? I’m gonna try my hardest, and I was five years old looking up to her because she opened so many doors for young women like myself. So I was super super inspired by her and many artists. Then from La Voz Kids, after I got off that show, Mr. Quintanilla had reached out to us, which was crazy because it’s super surreal because you never would think like, oh my gosh of all people, Mr. Q wasn’t even signing people anymore. So everyone thought he retired, and so he called us and said I have two songs for you, and I said OK. I was 11 at the time, and I hadn’t signed with them yet. So I recorded two songs in the span of 45 minutes. It’s actually a crazy story because I had never heard the songs at all, and I went to the studio and he said, ‘you know, just learn whatever you can from these songs. Here’s the play and the pause button, and I’m gonna take your dad to go eat breakfast.’ So he left me and my mom in the studio and my mom wrote the lyrics down of the song, which are actually on my Spotify. And I was so determined to learn these songs because I wanted to impress him so badly. I was like, I need to show him that I have the drive and everything. So, I learned both songs, and I recorded them in 45 minutes. Then he was like, ‘OK, they’re radio ready.’ So he sent them to the radio and then from there he had asked about signing, and I was definitely super excited about that! I jumped at the opportunity because it’s definitely not something that you can have every single day. I’m able to call Mr. Q and ask him for advice. Not everyone can do that, and I’m super grateful to have people like him and Suzette and their family. 

Well, my goodness that sounds like the opportunity of a lifetime! So let’s learn a little bit more about you. You mentioned Chicago. I believe that’s where you’re from originally, and then you moved to Texas. Is that right?

Yes ma’am I was born in Chicago, and then when I was 9 years old I moved to San Antonio, Texas. It wasn’t even because of music or anything. It was because my dad had a job and he had the opportunity to move to San Antonio, and he always wanted to move to Texas so he was like OK, let’s do it! So he did it, and then that’s when I had started getting into the music more, and then he eventually quit his job so that he could manage me full-time, and it just started growing and growing and thank God we got that opportunity and we’re here today. 

Yeah, seems like the stars were really aligning for you. I also read somewhere that you were homeschooled since the 7th grade and you also recently graduated from high school in 2020 during the pandemic, which is no easy feat. ¡Felicidades! How did you navigate school with your performances and then the cancellation of shows for performing artists that we saw happen across the country? 

It was definitely hard when I was in school. I went to an all-girls school from middle school on. And I was missing a lot of school and performances, and so I talked to my parents. I said, ‘I don’t know how we’re gonna make this work. But I still want to go to school. I want to finish school, but I also want to do what I’m doing and because these are only opportunities that come once in a lifetime.’ So if I can do that now, then I’m going to do it and try my hardest. And if I have to make sacrifices, like not going to school and not going to parties or having a lot of friends. Then I was going to make it, so I made those sacrifices, and I was homeschooled from 7th grade and on. I had a teacher. It’s not like my parents were there teaching me. A lot of people are like, ‘oh that’s why you graduated!’ I’m like no, I actually had a teacher, and she would send me school work online or sometimes she would even come with us. So it was definitely a lot of fun! Then the pandemic hit. Of course, a lot of performances definitely did get canceled, and my last performance was actually in San Antonio with the San Antonio Symphony. I was definitely so sad because that was my last show, and I didn’t even know it. But after that we quarantined for a long time. I was on my social media a lot, which is kind of what kept me through the pandemic, just singing online and on Facebook and on Tiktok and just growing my fanbase and that was definitely something that I tried to focus more on. But I did hear a lot about, even friends of ours, struggling because for a lot of them, music was their only way of providing for their family. But I had school too so I was like I need to focus on this. I want to finish it as fast as I can! I graduated a year earlier than I was supposed to because I was like, once the pandemic finishes, I want to be able to just focus on the music and not always think about, ‘Oh my god I have to do finals right now or have to turn in my homework.’ So I did whatever I could. I said, ‘How can I graduate now?’ She (the teacher) told me what I had to do, and I did it and I graduated in 2020, which was exciting! 

That’s amazing! Well again, ¡felicidades! I know many other students across the country were in a similar boat trying to do school from home, and many of them hadn’t done that before. So I know that you did fulfill a five-year contract with Q Productions, and moved on in 2021. You mentioned earlier that you received a lot of great advice from the Quintanilla family, and I’m just curious if you can share some of the advice that they gave you when you were just starting out with your singing career?

Yeah definitely. You know in the beginning, there was always a little bit of a comparison (to Selena) right? Just because I was signed to Q Productions, and I’m a girl. A lot of comparisons, but of course there will never ever be another Selena. I’ve said that many times, and even with the symphony performances. It’s not an imitation. It’s a tribute to her music, and we want to just give her that honor. But they definitely gave me that advice of, just be you, who you are. And they’re always saying stay true to who you are, and treat people with kindness because your kindness will take you very far. It doesn’t matter how talented you are, if you do not know how to treat people, then you’re not going to go anywhere. I have always lived by that, and even when Mr. Q would go to our performances at times, and you know he’s kind of like my dad too. My dad goes to my performances, and every time I come off stage he’s like, ‘OK, this is what you did good and this is what you could do better and what you can work on.’ Mr. Q was like that too, and he would go to my performances, and say, ‘You did this great, I’m super proud of you but we can work on this and we can work on this.’ And I said, ‘you’re right.’ And I took it and I ran with it. And even in the studio, any advice that they give me I will run with it, and I will try to work my hardest on it because they have a lot of experience, and they’ve been doing it for a long time. So to get that advice, you can’t get it anywhere. And it’s more constructive criticism than like bashing. I mean, a lot of people say that Mr. Q is very mean, but honestly I really haven’t seen that side of him. I can understand how they say that. I mean sometimes someone has to be the bad guy. But he’s definitely such a humble person. I’ve seen that, and being that they’re very successful and for them to stay super humble is something that I admire a lot and something that I strive for. 

Yeah, definitely. You mentioned that Selena herself was an inspiration to you. Does it ever feel like you have a responsibility to also carry Selena’s legacy, when you were with the label and maybe even now when you’re performing her songs on stage?

I feel like Selena carries her legacy all by herself. You can look at a video on YouTube, and she still is a star. You see her on that stage, and she completely owns it. So I never really felt that responsibility because I’m not trying to be Selena. It’s just really that I’m being asked by the family to do the tribute and sing the songs on stage, and I really just try to do my best to just live the music and just enjoy myself and if the people enjoy it, thank God! That’s what it is. And it’s never been where I’m trying to continue her legacy. I’m continuing what she has done for women in general. I love when I go to symphonies, parents will come up to me with their little girls and they were like, ‘You know what, I had Selena to look up to, and now my daughter has you to look up to,’ and so that’s such an honor for me to receive that because like, wow, I really have somebody to do this for. I want to continue, and I want to do things that are hard for women to achieve. 

That’s beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. So I’m curious. Are you a free agent now, an independent artist or have you signed on with a new label?

No, I am definitely free right now. I was signed to Q for five years, and they offered me another five year contract, but I had decided to go by myself and do something different. 

That’s amazing and very commendable too. We know a lot of other artists in the Bay Area that also share with the community about the challenges and also their successes in being an independent artist. So more power to you! ¡Adelante! You were talking about really finding your own voice, so how do you stay true to your own voice and your sound because I know you also play the guitar! How are you moving forward with putting out the kind of music that reflects who you are and who you are becoming?

Yeah, definitely. I feel like with this project—because I released a new EP—it’s called Una Ilusión, I definitely was more hands on. I was super excited about like, you know, becoming who I was. I had an amazing team to work with as well, that is very open to ideas and so if I had any any little thing like, I want more trumpets in this or you know the mids are too low, I need them a little bit higher or like anything they were like, ‘OK well, let’s do it.’ And they were definitely super helpful. I also wanted to still do a kind of homage to Tejano music, because that is where I kind of started. And the fans in Tejano music are super loyal, and I wanted to give them something at least because I hadn’t released music in about two years! So, I was like let’s do this for them and throw in a mariachi, because that is also where I started, like at the pulga performing mariachi music. So we did an original in mariachi, and it was nice to finally be able to have a different touch in the music you know, and even in the artwork. I even invited my sister to help me with the artwork, and it was a beautiful experience and something that I’m going to carry on, even if I sign with someone again, because I do have an opinion, and I have a voice and I’m growing up. It’s not like I’m letting people tell me what to do, but it also does help a little bit sometimes because more brains are better than one.

Yeah, that makes sense. You’re also, I think, in a great position too. Regardless of which choice you want to make because you won best new female artist at the Tejano Music Awards in 2017, and you also won top female artist at the My Tejano Awards in 2019. You alluded to how Selena helped to open doors, particularly for women singers in Tejano music, which you know at the time was a very male-dominated genre. So about 25 years later, has it gotten easier for young women artists in Tejano music? Have you faced any roadblocks yourself? 

I feel like I have, not in the way of, I mean, there are many female artists now, and which I’m so happy to see because it’s definitely needed. Who wants to see a man all the time? (Laughs) But no, I mean for me the biggest hurdle that I’ve had to jump is basically my age, and I’ve said this because I started at 9 years old professionally. And I feel like once I started getting more into the industry, I was like 12 or 13 years old, and at that time my family and I were working very hard on my craft, and I was working on my voice every single day. A lot of people didn’t allow me to be on certain stages just because of my age and that always really irked me, and I was like you know what? I’m young. Yes, but I have proved myself, and I have proved that I am as professional as another artist that’s 20 years old. Ever since I was little, I’ve always strived to be professional and so that way I can be on those stages, but that was definitely something that I had to get across because not everyone will give you that opportunity. But when they do, it’s meant to be. They really want to see your talent, and you really have to give it your all. That was, I think, the biggest thing for me. But I had my dad by my side and he always fought for me. All the time. Like I said, someone has to be the bad guy. That was my dad. So he was always like, ‘No, but she’s gonna show you, just let her have that opportunity on the stage and you’ll see what she can offer as well.’ So it was always my dad, and I always have this saying like he’ll open the door for me, but it’s up to me to walk into it and really conquer it. So I feel like that was the hardest thing for me—my age.

Yeah, to have to constantly prove yourself, particularly at your age as you were mentioning, can be taxing, but it also you know can thicken your skin. You just show up ready in some ways right? Because you have to be.

There’s a lot of work that needs to be done, and I’m willing to do whatever it takes. I need to work on my vocals every day, and I warm up every day, and I work out because that helps my vocals when I’m on stage with my endurance and everything. You have to think about everything, and so yeah, definitely having to prove yourself all the time makes you ready at any certain moment. And I want to do so many things. 

So I’m curious. What are some of the things that you’ve got on your bucket list? What do you want to do next Isabel Marie?

Oh, I have really big dreams! I would love one day to hopefully get a grammy or get an American Music Award. But, those are things that will come eventually. But, I always say with the platform that I have, I feel like I need to use it for better things in life. Like to spread awareness. My aunt, she passed away from cancer when I was like 9 years old, and that really hit my family and me really hard. It was definitely something that you don’t want to see your loved ones go through. So to be able to use my platform for good, like for that or for finding a cure for cancer. I love to give my time to community service. I feel like that’s what’s most important honestly, because awards and things can come and go, but I feel like what really fills your heart is honestly being with your community, and it’s hard seeing them struggle. So, if I’m blessed enough to be able to do what I love every single day, and do that for my job then I’m definitely going to bless people back. At least have them smile by singing them a song or doing anything, I would love to be able to do that for the rest of my life.

It’s an amazing gift. You know music, I’m sure many people can say has been something that has helped them continue to make it through this pandemic. You know every day to be able to have a song that gets you by.

Yeah, that’s very true. Even with me. Definitely I have songs that I’m like, I feel sad, I want to listen to this song. 

Is there a message that you would like to send out to our Latinx audience in the Bay Area and beyond?

I want to say thank you! It’s definitely been such a wild journey, and I want to appreciate every single person that has followed me on Instagram or on all my social media. Thank you for all your support, for supporting my music and just, you know, even though these are hard times but you guys know that you can do it and you can push through. And I know that a lot of people are going through some tough times right now. So my heart is with y’all, and even people who are going through good things right now, I love y’all and congratulations on everything. But thank you again, and I hope to see y’all at the concert in San Francisco and just bring that energy. Singing Selena songs—we’re just there to have a good time. You can even dress up as Selena. I’ve seen so many people dress up in her bustiers, and you know just have a fun time!