Hasta Que Te Conocí
Marc Anthony · 1993 · written by Juan Gabriel, from the album Otra Nota
He never knew sadness, never cried, until he met her: the Juan Gabriel song that a young Marc Anthony heard in a taxi and made his salsa debut.
The story
1.Before
He didn't know sadness, or tears, or anything that could make him cry. He knew affection and tenderness, which his mother taught him as a boy, and joy and the beauty of life. But not loneliness.
2.Then her
He never suffered, never cried, he was happy, until he met her. From then on he saw life with pain. He admits he was happy, even with very little love.
3.Too late
Too late he understood he should never have loved her, because now he thinks of her more than ever.
4.Go
In the last part the hurt turns into anger. She was cruel to him, so he doesn't want to see her ever again: go, go, go. She's a thief of hearts.
Key phrases
- “No sabía de tristezas”I didn't know about sadnessHow the song opens: the life he had before.
- “Eso me enseñó mamá”That's what my mother taught meLove and tenderness, he says, he learned at home as a small boy.
- “Hasta que te conocí”Until I met youThe title and the turn. Everything before this line was happiness.
- “vi la vida con dolor”I saw life with painWhat she brought into his life.
- “Eres una bandolera”You're a banditA bandolera is a female outlaw, a highway robber. She stole from him, and he isn't talking about money.
Context
Juan Gabriel, the great Mexican singer-songwriter, wrote it and released it on his album Pensamientos (1986). It became one of his signature songs.
Marc Anthony was a young New York singer of dance-pop when he heard it on the radio during a taxi ride, and asked Ralph Mercado of RMM Records to let him record it as salsa. It was the first single from his first salsa album, Otra Nota (1993), produced by Sergio George, and it launched his career in salsa.
Twenty years later, Marc Anthony became the voice of salsa's biggest modern hit, “Vivir Mi Vida”. This is where it started.
On the dance floor
Full of drama: Marc Anthony's voice rises and breaks over a tight, modern 1990s salsa band.
The chorus is the big release: “hasta que te conocí”, sung at full power. In the last part he improvises over the coro and the song gets angrier and hotter each round.
This is our own retelling of the song, not its lyrics or a translation of them: the few short phrases quoted are there to explain what they mean. The song belongs to its writer, Juan Gabriel.