BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KERO) — Hispanic Heritage Month continues in Bakersfield with a Venezuelan artist who's grown in popularity. She says her work helps support her family back home in Cagua, Venezuela.
- Video shows Sasha Wrist, a Venezuelan musican, making music in the studio
- Sasha Wrist immigrated to the United States by herself at 17-years-old because of political unrest in her home country, Venezuela.
- Now, she makes music to support her family back home.
You can probably find a home-cooked meal and good music in most Hispanic households.
This is the melody of Sasha Wrist’s life.
“I like arepas fritas because they’re easier,” she says while making traditional Venezuelan arepas.
But, Sasha’s story begins more than three thousand miles away from Bakersfield where she grew up in Cagua, Venezuela.
“I just miss everything about it like my food my people, the smiles.”
Those are all things she now lives without.
In a special election, current president Nicolas Maduro won the presidency of Venezuela in late 2013, kickstarting the country’s move towards dictatorship.
Around that time, Sasha says she noticed a shift in her everyday life.
“Venezuela started changing into a way that it was more survival than what it already was,” she said.
According to the U.S. Agency of International Development, 2 million people in Venezuela need emergency food assistance, 7.6 million people require humanitarian aid, and 7.7 million people have left the country.
“I was just like I need to get out of here in some type of way.”
At 17-years-old, Sasha fled Venezuela, traveling by herself to Bakersfield without telling many of her loved ones she planned to leave.
“I was just trying to help my mom,” Sasha said, holding back tears.
In hopes of making money to support her family, Sasha took whatever jobs she could find in the fields, at a local gas station, but here everything changed for her.
“I never thought I was gonna do music in the U.S.”
Sasha started working as a songwriter, traveling back and forth to Los Angeles in 2018
After taking the risk to become her own artist, she spends hours in this studio working with her producer to make music that she says tells her story and resonates with her listeners.
“That first day I saw her freestyle over songs that I haven’t heard before, and she literally freestyled her whole lyrics, and I was like I’ll work with you from this day forward, and since then we’ve been basically inseparable,” Giovanni Lopez, Sasha's producer, said about the first time he worked with her during the pandemic in 2020.
They’ve continued to work together ever since.
That year, Latin music began to see a rise in popularity, growing by 55.29% in album consumption in the U.S. between 2020 and 2022, according to Billboard.
“I think for us as Latinos being in the U.S. we just want to feel like we have a voice,” Lopez said.
The Recording Industry Association of America reports in 2023, Latin music made a record-breaking $1.4 billion dollars, outpacing overall recorded music for the last eight years.
“I think that many people don’t like the political topics, but they like music,” Jorge Galvan, a DJ for Que Buena radio station, said.
He says he sees musicians use their platforms and the popularity of Latin music to raise awareness about issues in their countries.
“I think that’s when it’s revolutionary, the music,” Galvan said.
Sasha says speaking up about the love for her country has resulted in controversy.
“They tell you like oh, well like go back to your country, and this, this, and that, and it’s kind of messed up because you don’t know why that person became an immigrant,” she said.
In spite of the hate, Sasha says her music connects with hundreds of other immigrants like her and she hopes to grow her platform and uplift other Venezuelan artists up with her.
“Keep an eye on me because there’s more music from Sasha Wrist.”
You can find Sasha's music here.
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