Gloria Estefan

We are truly honoured to host legendary music icon, Gloria Estefan this week. Fresh into London from Miami, Gloria joined us for lunch which we really wish could have lasted all day and night. We found out about her family escaping Cuba during the revolution, her legendary Cosmo recipe, working with her beloved husband Emilio, owning a hotel & restaurant in Miami and we discover what it is like performing to five US presidents (and who served the best food). I grew up listening to her music and was completely enthralled by everything she had to say. We could do this with Gloria every day and never get bored, she’s a superstar and the absolute perfect dinner party guest with endless fabulous stories! Mark my words Gloria, we will come and see you in Miami soon, thank you for popping round to Clapham. Gloria’s new album Raíces is out now. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:35Jessie Ware?

  Hello and welcome to Table Manners. I'm Jessie Ware and I'm here in Clapham in my mum's kitchen. Hi mum.

• 0:41Speaker 02

  Hi darling.

• 0:42Jessie Ware?

  It's been an eventful 24 hours for you.

• 0:44Speaker 02

  It has.

• 0:45Jessie Ware?

  What's happened?

• 0:46Speaker 02

  I'm crutches darling.

• 0:47Jessie Ware?

  Crutch.

• 0:48Speaker 02

  No, I've got one upstairs and one downstairs.

• 0:51Jessie Ware?

  Why don't you just have both upstairs?

• 0:53Speaker 02

  I don't know, but I managed with just one last night.

• 0:56Jessie Ware?

  Why? What's happened?

• 0:57Speaker 02

  Just got a pain above my, in the middle of my knee that I couldn't put any weight on. But actually, the physiotherapists were extremely kind and saw me. But as I was walking from the car yesterday, a man saw me in the street wincing. He said, please take my arm.

• 1:12Jessie Ware?

  Was he Australian? Oh right, that was very good.

• 1:15Speaker 02

  And he actually held me and he said, I'm really worried about this woman. There was tears running down my face because the pain was so bad. They had to put a chair out in the street.

• 1:26Jessie Ware?

  But the show must go on.

• 1:27Speaker 02

  I've rallied.

• 1:29Jessie Ware?

  And from one diva to another, we have the formidable Gloria Estefan coming on today.

• 1:39Speaker 02

  I'm so excited.

• 1:40Jessie Ware?

  Me too, and you've even made food.

• 1:42Speaker 02

  We've loved her for a long time.

• 1:43Jessie Ware?

  You used to play, well, we used to play Anything For You, the album that I think came out in 87. So, did you have it on tape? Is that why I know it so well? Because it was in the car?

• 1:56Speaker 02

  I don't know, probably.

• 1:57Jessie Ware?

  But I loved it so much.

• 2:00Speaker 02

  We loved every song, knew all the words.

• 2:02Jessie Ware?

  She just made you feel good. Yeah, well, we just put it back on. I was like, bloody hell, muscle memory. Anyway, we have Gloria Estefan coming on and we're really excited to have her. Let's go through some of the accolades of Gloria Estefan before she gets here. She's approaching forty albums, I think.

• 2:19Speaker 02

  You've got a long way to go then, Jess.

• 2:21Jessie Ware?

  She has played the Super Bowl halftime show twice.

• 2:26Speaker 02

  I'm not surprised to get everyone going.

• 2:28Jessie Ware?

  People say she is the most successful crossover artist, a Latina artist who, you know, has paved the way for people like Shakira, J Lo.

• 2:37Speaker 02

  Ricky Martin.

• 2:38Jessie Ware?

  Ricky Martin. She has won infinite amounts of Grammys. She has her own Hollywood star on the pavement. She has made musicals. I think she's made a musical with her daughter, Emily, who is incredibly talented, who just went on tour with Cyndi Lauper.

• 2:57Speaker 02

  But do you know what her greatest achievement is?

• 3:00Jessie Ware?

  What?

• 3:00Speaker 02

  Being a grandma.

• 3:01Jessie Ware?

  Apparently she loves being a grandma. Anyway, I don't want to talk about everything about Gloria before she gets here, but she's coming straight from doing the conga in Radio Two with Bob Mortimer. So what have you made today, Mum, with your crutch?

• 3:15Speaker 02

  With my crutch? I stirred it with my cr- no, I didn't. I made an old Delia recipe, bass chicken, which you love.

• 3:22Jessie Ware?

  You used to make this in the nineties, so I don't know whether it's all this nostalgia of like listening to Gloria in the eighties, nineties, and you always doing this for like a Sunday lunch.

• 3:30Speaker 02

  Well, it's kind of a Spanish twist to it, because it's got a bit of chorizo in.

• 3:34Jessie Ware?

  Yeah. Are you gonna say torito?

• 3:37Speaker 02

  Torito. So it's just chicken with rambus martini rice, peppers, onions, garlic, olives and oranges.

• 3:46Jessie Ware?

  Yum.

• 3:46Speaker 02

  And it's baking now in the oven, and I'm just gonna have a check in a minute.

• 3:50Jessie Ware?

  And then when you were in emergency, I promise you, I did offer to help Mum cook today, but she said she had it under control, because that is the diva that you are.

• 3:59Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:59Jessie Ware?

  I have made, Sophie Weiberg, who I love, who's a really great cook, put up a story recipe on Instagram the other day. It looked really yummy and seasonal. It's a blackberry crumble yoghurt cake.

• 4:14Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 4:14Jessie Ware?

  I have no idea what it tastes like, but I know what went into it, and it all sounds quite delicious.

• 4:19Speaker 02

  Great.

• 4:20Jessie Ware?

  And you do this kind of streusel, like, crumble on top.

• 4:24Speaker 02

  So, one, two, three, four, come on, baby, say you love me.

• 4:29Jessie Ware?

  Five, six, seven times.

• 4:32Speaker 02

  We're ready.

• 4:32Jessie Ware?

  We are so ready. Gloria Estefan coming up on Daily Matters.

• 4:52Jessie Ware?

  Gloria Estefan.

• 4:54Speaker 03

  So happy to be here, I'm thrilled.

• 4:56Jessie Ware?

  I'm sorry, this is, you also are the most glamorous person I think we've ever had in Clapham.

• 5:01Speaker 03

  Really?

• 5:01Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 5:02Speaker 03

  Because that's not the word I would use for me. I am like so chill and happy and just a t-shirt and, and you know, sweatpants.

• 5:11Jessie Ware?

  Well, you're giving icon today. It would be the hair and everything.

• 5:14Speaker 03

  Eva.

• 5:15Jessie Ware?

  Well, I just have to say first up, you've just met our gorgeous cameraman director, David, who met his husband because of going to Spain and, and, and learning. Yes, and it's all so thanks, thanks to you. But also personally for us, I, when I was kind of re-listening to your music in preparation to chat to you, I realised I know basically all the lyrics to Anything For You, the album that came out in eighty-seven. And it was like something that, and it must have been on cassette, I think, because I don't know if CDs were albums.

• 5:49Speaker 03

  You're too young for a cassette.

• 5:51Jessie Ware?

  No, I'm not. I'm forty-one.

• 5:54Speaker 03

  Well, well, yeah, my son saw some cassettes, but you saw the edge of it, the end of it.

• 5:59Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. But we loved that album so much. And actually, it's something, and I sing and I'm really touched.

• 6:04Speaker 03

  I know you sing, I'm a big fan, I told you.

• 6:06Jessie Ware?

  This is so sweet.

• 6:07Speaker 03

  It's not sweet, you have a beautiful voice. I love that dance, that groove, you've got great songs.

• 6:13Jessie Ware?

  You are the queen of groove.

• 6:14Speaker 03

  Well, I don't know about the queen.

• 6:16Jessie Ware?

  You are.

• 6:16Speaker 03

  The conga queen, that part, yes.

• 6:18Jessie Ware?

  I saw you had to do the conga this morning.

• 6:20Speaker 03

  Oh my gosh, nobody told me, nobody gave me the memo. And I'm in these heels, but it was fun, it was a lot of fun.

• 6:26Jessie Ware?

  It was, it, it, Radio Two, you were on.

• 6:28Speaker 02

  Jessie said, we played the songs this morning together, it's in the mood because we love you. And Jessie said, she loves a good intro. And I hadn't realised how fabulous the intros were.

• 6:40Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, you actually allow the music to breathe. And we're not really allowed to do that anymore in pop music.

• 6:45Speaker 03

  People's attention spans are very short now. You have to have a single that's like two and a half minutes, two forty-five tops. Who can say what they want to say in that, you know, but. It's making a comeback because kids find that nostalgic and they are kind of rediscovering what came in the past and that's a beautiful thing. Everything comes around.

• 7:05Jessie Ware?

  Do you feel like you're about to get a whole load of Gen Zs listening to you then? Or are they already? I'm sure they are.

• 7:11Speaker 03

  In different ways they are and now I'm going to get a whole bunch of little kids because of

• 7:15Jessie Ware?

  Gabby's dollhouse.

• 7:16Speaker 03

  Gabby's dollhouse. I'm already getting it. When they've seen the movie, they run up to me, Grandma Gigi, they hug me. And I love that. I love being a grandma. I'm sure you do too.

• 7:25Jessie Ware?

  Well, let's talk. There's a song on your new record.

• 7:28Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 7:28Jessie Ware?

  Am I saying it correctly? Raices?

• 7:30Speaker 03

  Perfect.

• 7:31Jessie Ware?

  Oh, okay, great.

• 7:32Speaker 03

  You're saying it. If now you can ask your director. But yes, that's perfect.

• 7:36Jessie Ware?

  What does it mean, raices?

• 7:37Speaker 03

  It means roots.

• 7:39Jessie Ware?

  Roots.

• 7:39Speaker 03

  Raices, those things that, you know.

• 7:42Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 7:43Speaker 03

  Roots connect underground, the trees. If there's a tree that's ill, another tree will send it love. And I think our cultural roots are that for us and we can't lose that. So it was important for Emilio and I for this full circle moment, actually fifty years.

• 7:59Jessie Ware?

  This is your husband, who is like your collaborator forever.

• 8:02Speaker 03

  Forever. We've been married forty seven years, together forty nine, and working together fifty because he was my boss the first year and.

• 8:10Jessie Ware?

  And now you're the boss, obviously.

• 8:12Speaker 03

  That's what he says, but it's a BS like that. We're a partnership all the way and, you know, so for us, our family, he's half Lebanese, half Spaniard from Galicia. My grandfather was Asturiano and our, my grandsons, the OGs, as I call them, the other grandparents, are Italian. He speaks fluent Italian. I think it just enriches the world, all this, you know, like a tapestry of colors and cultures and I find it fascinating.

• 8:44Jessie Ware?

  So this record is predominantly in Spanish?

• 8:46Speaker 03

  Yes, yes.

• 8:47Jessie Ware?

  But there is a song about your grandson.

• 8:49Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 8:50Jessie Ware?

  That's English though, isn't it?

• 8:51Speaker 03

  My beautiful boy. It was born in English, but when I, I wrote it before I was even thinking of this album. I haven't. Been thinking about doing an album because I was writing a musical with my daughter.

• 9:03Jessie Ware?

  Emily.

• 9:03Speaker 03

  Basura, Emily. She's.

• 9:05Jessie Ware?

  She is so talented.

• 9:07Speaker 03

  She's a beast.

• 9:08Jessie Ware?

  She, the percussion, I've seen, and wasn't she just on tour with Cindy Loufa?

• 9:11Speaker 03

  Yes, and she was actually with Carol G in, in Madrid.

• 9:16Jessie Ware?

  Amazing.

• 9:17Speaker 03

  Playing percussion. You know, she tries to stay away from me and that's why she never really sang until she was eighteen.

• 9:23Jessie Ware?

  But she can sing.

• 9:26Speaker 03

  When I, she came home from holiday the first semester, she went to Berklee College of Music. Cause it came naturally, but she also wanted to be the best she could be at everything. She comes home and she goes, Mom, I, I have to do something, but you can't look at me and you can't cry. I go, oh no, what's coming? So one o'clock in the morning. And we were alone at a beach house we have up there in Vero Beach. She makes me face the wall. She picks up my guitar and she sings Bed I Made by Alan Stone. And I always thought that she would sing one day because I could hear, you know, you can tell.

• 10:05Speaker 03

  A baby with their ear and they can sing and, but she would joke sing. She would never seriously sing. I go, it, it sounded like a forty year old heroin addict from the twenties that was singing because she was so. I said, the pain, the loss, the, the soulfulness, the crazy. I never expected that. So. When she went back, I please record this for your, you know, I wanna play it for your dad. I didn't tell him. And when she sends me the thing, I, I took, babe, listen to this. I discovered this amazing new singer. And he's listening and his hair's standing and he goes, who is that? And I go, your daughter.

• 10:45Speaker 03

  He freaked out. I did that to my mom as well. She was afraid that she would open her mouth and I would come out of it. And the timbre is there, of course, for the family, but. I wish I could do what she can do. Oh my god, she's amazing.

• 11:00Jessie Ware?

  So did you not cry when you heard it?

• 11:02Speaker 03

  Of course I cried. I cried and I've cried every time since. And you know, it's beautiful to see your kids be better than you. And I know the measuring stick, you know, is there for her and my son. And that's rough, you know, when you have parents that have done so much different stuff.

• 11:23Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 11:23Speaker 03

  And then everybody's always gonna compare you, but I tell her, people watch you three minutes and I am out the window. There's like, you're, she's riveting. She played with me in the show in Madrid and people were floored.

• 11:36Jessie Ware?

  Let's talk about this show in Madrid. So you're in Europe at the moment, but you went to Madrid. Can you explain why you were there? And how many people you performed with?

• 11:43Speaker 03

  Yes, oh my gosh. You know, I'm not touring. I've been toured worldwide since two thousand and four. You know how rough touring is for the singer. And I was touring fifteen years straight, so I had the opportunity to go and celebrate Hispanic Heritage Week there and the day, which was the day that I performed. And I thought, okay, you know, this album's in Spanish. I really wanna get back to the mother tongue. And we said yes, and it was free to the public. But it's, they had to move it because of the response it got. And we, it was three hundred thousand people in the audience.

• 12:20Jessie Ware?

  So where was it held?

• 12:21Speaker 03

  It was held in Plaza Colón. And then they had screens on all the streets, so I could literally see all the streets, the whole plaza packed, all the streets going down. I could see people's eyes. I had fans from Britain that flew there. They flew from Australia, from Thailand, from all over. And I know them through, you know, Twitter. It'll always be Twitter to me. And then Emilio brought them in and put them, there was a security area for the president and all this stuff. And Emilio brought the fans and put them in front row and they were trying to, no, you can't do that. He goes, try and stop me. He goes, these are the people that deserve to be in the front row, not a bunch of government, you know, people.

• 13:05Speaker 03

  And it was, they were so happy. They came to see me on Graham Norton that we filmed last night and.

• 13:12Jessie Ware?

  So, hon, you're like, uh, these are, I, would we call them super fans, like?

• 13:16Speaker 03

  Super fans.

• 13:17Jessie Ware?

  So, and, and you will make sure that they have the front row seat?

• 13:21Speaker 03

  Absolutely. I, I'm kind of their mom now, you know?

• 13:25Speaker 02

  You recognize them when you see them.

• 13:27Speaker 03

  Of course I do.

• 13:27Jessie Ware?

  You are mother. You are mother.

• 13:29Speaker 03

  And we talked through DMs on Twitter. They've told me their biggest problems. One of them was really ill and he told me before he told his mom because he wanted me to give him some ideas of how to do it and what to do and, yeah.

• 13:43Jessie Ware?

  You don't, I mean, I think it's incredibly um, unique that you do that and I think it's beautiful. And I think it just shows that this is why you have such a connection with your fans, like, you know, David and, and, and, and, and so many, but the, and such a legacy, but is that not quite overwhelming sometimes?

• 14:02Speaker 03

  Well, I wish I could do more and that I had more time, but I realize, you know, that I can only do what I can do. I studied psychology and communication, so it's kind of like my way of.

• 14:12Jessie Ware?

  Being a therapist.

• 14:13Speaker 03

  Exactly. I did it through the music, but I, it's nice to do it in person.

• 14:18Speaker 02

  When did the singing start?

• 14:20Speaker 03

  Oh, since I talk, that, that came with.

• 14:22Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 14:23Speaker 03

  But not the performing part, because I don't like to be the center of attention. Believe it or not, I had to get used to that part. My mom was the diva. She was a singer. She was gonna be Shirley Temple's double in Hollywood. They had, she had won an international contest. And my grandma had her bags packed and ready to go and they said, only one parent can come. You, the other one has to give up rights to the child. And my grandfa- father said, no way. But my mom would walk into a room and light it up. She was just, so I, that wasn't my nature, but music was my catharsis.

• 15:01Speaker 02

  Were, were, were you born in Cuba?

• 15:03Speaker 03

  I was born in Cuba.

• 15:04Speaker 02

  And how long were you there for till, till you?

• 15:08Speaker 03

  The revolution, my dad was a police officer. And he was really good looking and very moral. He wouldn't take free anything. And so they chose him to be the motorcycle escort for the first lady. And the night of the revolution, he was at the presidential palace. They were having a giant party. And he came home and went into the bathroom, locked himself in. And my mom goes, what's happening? What's happening? And he said, ah, president just left the country. We're in trouble. And she told him, don't go back. He goes, I have to go back. I'm a police officer, you know? You'll be arrested, yes, but I have to go back. And he was arrested. Everybody that had anything to do with that government and his dad was also arrested.

• 15:53Speaker 03

  His brother, who was doing counter revolutionary things and when he, finally, when he was let out because they had no charges.

• 16:01Speaker 02

  Two years, two years later?

• 16:02Speaker 03

  That, no, that, no, that was the second time. So he came out maybe four months later. And he told my mom, I have to get you out of the country. I have to. And she said, I don't want to go without you. He goes, I'm gonna go first.

• 16:17Speaker 02

  How old were you then?

• 16:18Speaker 03

  I was two. He took the ferry from uh Havana to Key West. He got a job thinking he was gonna make fifty dollars a week and it was fifteen. He misunderstood because.

• 16:30Speaker 02

  Fifteen?

• 16:31Speaker 03

  Yeah, they told him fifteen and he, he thought fifty, but he made a lot of tips because he was very good looking. He was parking cars in a bar. And then we came, uh, my mom and I. They only allowed us one suitcase.

• 16:46Speaker 03

  And then he disappeared again and left my mom a note, I can't tell you where I'm going. You're gonna receive a check from the US government. Uh, here's a doctor's phone number. And yeah, he went to Bay of Pigs. It was his birthday, the day they landed in Cuba, April seventeenth of sixty-one, I believe.

• 17:08Jessie Ware?

  I can remember that.

• 17:09Speaker 03

  And.

• 17:09Jessie Ware?

  It was such a dramatic moment in our lives. We thought there was gonna be a full-scale war.

• 17:15Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 17:15Jessie Ware?

  Through the Bay of Pigs.

• 17:16Speaker 03

  And then he got jailed for the two years there.

• 17:19Jessie Ware?

  That was so hard for you and your mom and of course, and him, of course.

• 17:24Speaker 03

  It was tough. And then he came back and the US government felt guilty about having abandoned them there because they trained them in the best equipment and then they gave them broken down stuff to actually do the invasion. And they said, any of you that learn, that know English, that learn English can come in as officers. And he was a military guy, so he did so. And then he went to Vietnam. And got sick with Agent Orange poisoning.

• 17:52Jessie Ware?

  What, what is Agent Orange?

• 17:53Speaker 03

  Agent Orange was a defoliant that a big American company would like spread from planes. So that the trees would lose their leaves and the gorilla warfare. So they could see, but it got everybody. And if it kills a plant like that instantly, got in their nervous systems and there was a lot of guys, so. I spent my adolescence taking care of my dad because my mom worked during the day and then at night she would uh, study to get her teaching credentials revalidated. She had a PhD from Cuban education and she knew she had to get a better job because now she was the pretty much sole supporter. She worked hard.

• 18:35Jessie Ware?

  Um, can we talk about kind of some food memories from your time? I mean, food's really important to you and obviously you were looking up and you were looking after your father. And what kind of food were you? Eating around the dinner table and who was, what's a memorable kind of uh picture of who was around the dinner?

• 18:54Speaker 03

  Well, eventually my grandma came from Cuba. I, when I left Cuba, she lost twenty five pounds. She was so depressed. So she ca- we got her out finally when her parents passed because she was taking care of them. And my grandmother had been the sous chef to her father, a chef to two presidents in Cuba. So she, when she came to the States, she thought food is the only way we're gonna be able to survive. So she kind of started an illegal restaurant in her house that abutted a baseball field. And the Cuban men would bring their, their boys and she, she was making five thousand dollars a weekend in the sixties in cash.

• 19:36Jessie Ware?

  That's amazing.

• 19:37Speaker 03

  Famous in Miami for her croquetas and her tamales and the pork and I, she was an amazing cook. And I helped her in the kitchen. I grew up with her in the kitchen. So I can pretty much make up anything. I have a beautiful chef though. She's Dominican and it's delicious. But yeah, it was my mom, my grandma's cooking Cuban food. We couldn't afford.

• 20:01Jessie Ware?

  Your preferred cuisine?

• 20:03Speaker 03

  Uh, everything is my preferred cuisine, which is a problem.

• 20:06Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 20:07Speaker 03

  I really love food, but when I was a kid, that's the only thing I tasted was Cuban food. And the first time we went to Japan, when we were promoting Dr. Beat and they gave me sushi. I, my grandma would have turned in her grave me eating raw fish, first of all. Raw, although I love raw meat. She'd bring the raw meat and I would eat it. And she goes, no, you can't eat that. It's not cooked. But when I pu- popped that in with that wasabi, I had never had a spicy thing in my life and it was on camera. Oh my gosh, I remember it was so funny. My ears went like, like the cartoons, woo, my eyes.

• 20:42Jessie Ware?

  Do you like sushi?

• 20:42Speaker 03

  I love it. I love it. I love everything now, but back then, I mean, it was so what when you two years.

• 20:48Speaker 02

  Yeah. What did you, what did little children eat when they were small and just growing up?

• 20:54Speaker 03

  Well, uh, Cuban food, rice, the beans, they would puree it to make sure. Well, when I was a baby, they would puree everything and I got so bored because I had teeth. Where are they gonna give me chewing things? But they were so concerned about me being, you know, making sure I ate everything. That it was really detrimental. Now we know that babies can't even process anything other than fruit and milk or whatever. For six months and they were giving me black beans, rice, the chicken all in. And I would sit there like chewing, trying to chew this thing. Then I loved mango baby food. So when we went to the States, they didn't have that. My grandma would send it to me, would smuggle it from Cuba.

• 21:39Speaker 03

  She would go to the airport and saddle any pilot with a box of food, of mango baby fruit. And they'd knock on our door in our little apartment and there'd be a pilot standing there with a box. And in that box, she'd smuggle my mom's records because we couldn't take anything with us, her record collection.

• 21:57Jessie Ware?

  Is your musical that you've made with your daughter about your life?

• 22:00Speaker 03

  No, uh, what we're working on is there's a place, Catedra, in Paraguay, in Asuncion, Paraguay. And it used to be a beautiful lake forty five years ago, and it is now the largest landfill in Latin America. And a lot of people live off the grid. So this environmental engineer went to try to make things better

• 22:25Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 22:25Speaker 03

  with recycling and all this, but it was in the magnitude

• 22:28Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 22:28Speaker 03

  was impossible. It's a place that also has. Fires, ash storms from when they burn trees in Argentina, they come straight over, floods, and he started a little music class with his violin. And the kids were so excited, so they started going to this music class. He tried to get more instruments. It was really hard that he couldn't afford it. So they started making instruments out of the trash. Because one of those kids, they used to sleep in the street, it didn't have parents, is on the spectrum and can speak to things, talk to him. They, he would lay at night and the stars would speak to him.

• 23:13Speaker 03

  He would see musical notes in the astrological signs and the stars. So now they, the school, they have like three hundred students. They built the school out of trash. They've played for Queen Sofia of Spain. They've played for the Pope, the previous Pope, and I think even John Paul, because they've been around a while. And we met them. It's such an uplifting story about how music can lift you out of, and make even the most difficult situations palatable because they've had success, but they don't leave. They go back. They have a strong sense of community and love and

• 23:55Speaker 03

  family. So we want, we've brought this to, I'm so excited about that.

• 24:00Jessie Ware?

  Is it coming out in twenty twenty seven?

• 24:02Speaker 03

  It come, well, it comes out May of twenty six, in a few months, in Atlanta, in the Alliance Theater, because you always start off Broadway somewhere. And then hopefully soon after to Broadway, but we are so happy, we're thrilled. Plus secretly, I did it so I could spend more time with Emily.

• 24:19Jessie Ware?

  That's why you do the podcast, isn't it, Mum?

• 24:21Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 24:22Jessie Ware?

  How was it working with her? I mean, did, was it testing with your relationship? Or is it quite a good partnership? Like, I mean, I guess you work your family all the time. Emilio is your longtime, you know, he's your, your husband, but he's produced and written this record.

• 24:35Speaker 03

  Yes, he has. He has, because I couldn't write. I was focused on Basura, which is the title. And except the song for Sasha that I had written before he even came to me with the idea. He brought me the song, right? He says, and I fell in love with it, but I told him, babe, I can't. I'm not you. I can't do, you know, fifty things at once. I need to focus. And he says, will you let me write it for you? And I go, please do. And I had already written the Sasha's song because he had gone to our beach house with me and we'd. I taught him how to boogie board and we were doing all these things.

• 25:08Jessie Ware?

  How old is Sasha?

• 25:09Speaker 03

  He's thirteen now.

• 25:10Jessie Ware?

  Right.

• 25:10Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 25:10Speaker 02

  Thirteen. How many have you got?

• 25:12Speaker 03

  That's it.

• 25:13Speaker 02

  Just one?

• 25:13Speaker 03

  But that one is a good one.

• 25:14Speaker 02

  I need to get.

• 25:15Speaker 03

  I think his parents, my son is afraid of having another one because this one's so good. He's gonna go, oh, the next one's gonna get me. And I would pray that it would be like him to get some payback. Cause he, I didn't think I'd survive until he was eighteen.

• 25:32Speaker 02

  Your grandma quite young.

• 25:33Speaker 03

  Yeah, uh, yeah, it was. Um, but we, we love each other. We do things together all the time. And we had, when he left, I, I was writing for Basura, but he left and I was so nostalgic that I grabbed my guitar. And I wrote this song and then I called him and I go, baby, look, I finally wrote your song. Cause I knew one day I would. I don't like to push it, you know?

• 25:55Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 25:55Speaker 03

  Inspiration has to be natural and his dad and his mom, which were also on the line, they all cried. And I promised them I'd record it one day. So when we did this album, I wrote it in Spanish. And I included both versions. They each have their own magic.

• 26:12Jessie Ware?

  Um, I would love to know, uh, you, we, you've talked about being a good, you, you learned from your grandmother, your abuela. Is that how you say it? Your abuela. Um, but if we were coming over to yours and maybe you were rustling up a meal for Lenny and I.

• 26:27Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 26:28Jessie Ware?

  What would be on the menu? What would you be cooking for us?

• 26:30Speaker 03

  Oh, I'd make a paella, which is not Cuban.

• 26:34Jessie Ware?

  God, now I'm scared that what we're eating today.

• 26:36Speaker 03

  What are we eating?

• 26:37Jessie Ware?

  Well, it's not paella, but it's.

• 26:39Speaker 02

  Not paella.

• 26:39Jessie Ware?

  With Basque chicken with rice.

• 26:41Speaker 03

  I love chicken and rice. That's my favorite food.

• 26:43Jessie Ware?

  Okay, great.

• 26:44Speaker 03

  That is my favorite food.

• 26:45Jessie Ware?

  Great.

• 26:45Speaker 02

  I think we'd work that out and we adapted the menu.

• 26:49Jessie Ware?

  Um, but tell us, okay, so paella would be in there with the fish and the meat.

• 26:53Speaker 03

  Yeah, if you'd like, I mean, you can make it all seafood. My daughter and her partner are vegetarian, so I know how to make it that way too.

• 27:01Speaker 02

  How do you make a vegetarian pile?

• 27:03Speaker 03

  With vegetables and vegetable broth and mushrooms and, you know, savory mushrooms. You can have so many different mushrooms in there that are great. Um, yeah, but seafood is usually the way to go. Uh.

• 27:18Speaker 02

  Do you like seafood?

• 27:19Speaker 03

  I love seafood.

• 27:20Speaker 02

  What do you get that's really great in Miami?

• 27:22Speaker 03

  Is it anything crab, stone crabs?

• 27:25Jessie Ware?

  Is it conch?

• 27:26Speaker 03

  Conch.

• 27:26Jessie Ware?

  Conch.

• 27:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, conch is more. The Bahamas.

• 27:29Speaker 03

  Yeah, conch is more from the Bahamas.

• 27:32Jessie Ware?

  Okay.

• 27:32Speaker 03

  Uh, but, you know, it's delicious.

• 27:34Jessie Ware?

  I think I know about conch because when we went to Florida to see my cousins and they're from, um.

• 27:39Speaker 03

  Key West.

• 27:40Jessie Ware?

  They're from, well, they're from the Bahamas and I think he'd gone over to the like Bahamas and and he'd gone and got and then he made us conch.

• 27:46Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 27:47Jessie Ware?

  That's why I thought it was.

• 27:48Speaker 02

  Big conch shell.

• 27:48Speaker 03

  Yeah, they're very controlled because, you know, people will ruin everything, just like the lobster in Miami are very controlled. I have behind my house, which is on the bay, we put all this keystone to create a reef. And we have over a hundred fifty species of coral behind my house.

• 28:06Jessie Ware?

  Wow.

• 28:06Speaker 03

  And the lobster have a blast because I won't pull them out of there. I'm not gonna eat them, but, uh, I see people, they'll park their little boats over there and kind of sneak over and take. And and when they're taking, I'll go, but that's Freddie. Don't get it.

• 28:19Jessie Ware?

  Do you have a whistle where you go, get off, go, leave Freddie alone?

• 28:22Speaker 03

  I can't stop them, but, um, you know, uh, Florida, probably in the Keys would have conch.

• 28:27Jessie Ware?

  Surely you can stop them, Gloria.

• 28:29Speaker 03

  No, they won't listen to me. They'll just take a picture of me yelling at them.

• 28:33Speaker 02

  Do you feel the same about crabs as you do about lobsters?

• 28:36Speaker 03

  I love crabs. Uh, oh, stone crabs in Miami. Joe's Stone Crab is the oldest restaurant. It's been there over a hundred years. But they're seasonal, so you wanna make sure you get them when they're good.

• 28:47Speaker 02

  Is it snow crab that you did that?

• 28:50Speaker 03

  It's the crab claws.

• 28:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, the claws.

• 28:52Speaker 03

  And literally they they'll pull the claw off and leave the crab. It'll regrow it.

• 28:56Speaker 02

  Which is the crab that you can deep fry, the whole?

• 28:59Speaker 03

  Oh, the soft shell crab.

• 29:00Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 29:00Speaker 02

  Oh, I love that.

• 29:01Speaker 03

  That is so good.

• 29:02Speaker 02

  But I also love crab cakes.

• 29:04Speaker 03

  Crab cakes delicious. You would love cod. You like cod?

• 29:08Jessie Ware?

  Love cod.

• 29:09Speaker 03

  Okay, we make cod fritters. Cuban a lot. And malanga, which is taro root, we make that into fritters.

• 29:17Jessie Ware?

  Oh.

• 29:17Speaker 03

  Um, we'll make anything into a fritter. I've even had brain fritters.

• 29:22Jessie Ware?

  Oh, my god.

• 29:22Speaker 02

  How was that?

• 29:23Speaker 03

  It was good. You can fry a shoe and eat it.

• 29:26Jessie Ware?

  Sweet, isn't it?

• 29:27Speaker 03

  Uh, yeah, not really, but a little bit.

• 29:30Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 29:30Speaker 03

  The malanga, the taro root, it gets a little sweet when you fry it. But I love codfish and uh, in the Spanish style with.

• 29:38Jessie Ware?

  So is it bacalao?

• 29:40Speaker 03

  Bacalao.

• 29:40Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, so the the salt cod, yeah.

• 29:43Speaker 03

  Absolutely.

• 29:43Jessie Ware?

  Cause you can't catch cod down, you you must come salted.

• 29:47Speaker 03

  Yeah, it comes salted and prepped for that.

• 29:50Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 29:50Speaker 03

  Yeah, grouper, snapper, that's great Florida fish that are from those waters. Um, you could get, there's a couple of little places on the river that will bring in fish daily. And my chef will go and buy it. Whenever she's gonna make fish, she'll buy it from the day.

• 30:14Speaker 00

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• 30:50Speaker 03

  Mum is over there.

• 30:51Jessie Ware?

  Mum's.

• 30:52Speaker 03

  She's cooking away over there.

• 30:53Jessie Ware?

  She's doing it.

• 30:55Speaker 03

  You have beans?

• 30:56Jessie Ware?

  Well, no, green beans.

• 30:57Speaker 03

  Oh, green beans.

• 30:58Jessie Ware?

  I would, yeah.

• 30:59Speaker 03

  I love green beans.

• 31:00Jessie Ware?

  Um, so, so you're making a paella.

• 31:02Speaker 03

  And I would make you an avocado salad, sliced avocado and tomato.

• 31:07Jessie Ware?

  Okay.

• 31:08Speaker 03

  Um, always have to have salad.

• 31:09Jessie Ware?

  Is it, what's your dressing with that?

• 31:11Speaker 03

  I love to just olive oil and vinegar.

• 31:14Jessie Ware?

  Okay, which vinegar are you doing? Balsamic?

• 31:16Speaker 03

  Oh, balsamic is a little too sweet for that fruit. And I love beets, so sometimes it'll be just tomato and sliced beets. I like the, you know, tangy, but red wine vinegar.

• 31:28Jessie Ware?

  I like sherry vinegar. Manza, what's it, Manzan, Manzanella, anyway.

• 31:33Speaker 03

  Manzanilla?

• 31:34Jessie Ware?

  Manzanilla.

• 31:35Speaker 03

  Right.

• 31:35Jessie Ware?

  That's my favorite.

• 31:36Speaker 03

  You know what's a great thing for singers, the tea? Where you can take your apple juice or whatever fluid you like. And you, a tablespoon of red wine vinegar.

• 31:47Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 31:47Speaker 03

  And a pinch of cayenne pepper.

• 31:49Jessie Ware?

  That's good for the voice?

• 31:50Speaker 03

  Very good. It brings a lot of circulation to your vocal cords.

• 31:54Jessie Ware?

  See, I would have thought that would be really abrasive.

• 31:56Speaker 03

  It's not at all. The cayenne, it just brings, just a pinch.

• 32:00Jessie Ware?

  Well, so.

• 32:01Speaker 03

  And honey, of course.

• 32:02Jessie Ware?

  And I, you know, you just, you just played to like three hundred thousand people. And, but you don't wanna tour, really, because it's, it's taxing. And, but what about a residency?

• 32:14Speaker 03

  Oh, that's even more taxing.

• 32:16Jessie Ware?

  Oh, is it?

• 32:16Speaker 03

  Well, if, if, if it's in someplace like Vegas, it's a desert. Whenever I played Vegas, we, we did a ten days.

• 32:25Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 32:25Speaker 03

  At Celine's Theater before she opened Caesar's Palace.

• 32:30Jessie Ware?

  I love that you call it Celine's Theater. I love that.

• 32:33Speaker 03

  It was. She opened that theater. And, uh, kudos to her because she spent a long time in Vegas. And she doesn't lip sync, because a lot of people that do Vegas will lip sync their show.

• 32:46Jessie Ware?

  Okay.

• 32:47Speaker 03

  But I was in the room with twenty seven humidifiers the entire day. Just watching my voice. It's so.

• 32:55Jessie Ware?

  That's not fun.

• 32:56Speaker 03

  You know what? I've done a lot of things. And what I love about being this age is, like I tell my husband, I didn't work this hard to work this hard. So, you know, so I will pick and choose.

• 33:05Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 33:06Speaker 03

  And it's really luxurious and I love it because it's not one thing. As you know, touring is like boot camp for the singer.

• 33:14Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 33:15Speaker 03

  You can't go to restaurants because you'll speak above the day. You're not using technique. And then you can ruin your voice like I have, doing all these interviews during these days. Uh, I did the whole show. It was fabulous. I was fine afterwards. And then we threw a little party. We were so celebrating and the DJ was wonderful, but so loud. And I had let those fans in to take pictures and talking to them. I was like screaming over this music. But, yeah, it's hard. I'm gonna figure out a way. Like what they're doing with Abba over here. We're gonna go see the show tonight.

• 33:49Jessie Ware?

  Oh, it's so good.

• 33:51Speaker 03

  You'll love it. Yes, I I'm I'm excited.

• 33:53Jessie Ware?

  It's fantastic. You actually believe they're there.

• 33:56Speaker 03

  Yeah, so Emilio is working with these people that created this show.

• 34:01Jessie Ware?

  And this makes total sense because you have so many.

• 34:04Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 34:05Jessie Ware?

  Albums. What album? How many albums are you up to now?

• 34:07Speaker 03

  I believe, and I don't count them, but this is my thirtieth studio album.

• 34:11Jessie Ware?

  There's a there's a lot of content there. There's a lot of catalog.

• 34:15Speaker 03

  There's a lot, and we have so much video footage that I've never even seen. That Emilio documents and keeps everything. We have a whole, like, room of library of in every format possible. Oh, my God, that looks delicious.

• 34:34Speaker 03

  Oh, Lord. Do you use, you know, we marinate a lot in Cuban food.

• 34:40Jessie Ware?

  Do you?

• 34:40Speaker 03

  We do, and we use bitter orange.

• 34:43Jessie Ware?

  Ah, okay.

• 34:44Speaker 03

  It's a wonderful marinade with the garlic.

• 34:47Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 34:48Speaker 03

  And the bitter orange and you, you know, like, we'll rub it into the chicken, leave it overnight and cook it the next day. Delicious.

• 34:55Jessie Ware?

  How do you get, Maria, which bit of the chicken would you like?

• 34:58Speaker 03

  Whichever one you wanna give me.

• 34:59Jessie Ware?

  There's breasts, there's thighs, there's legs.

• 35:01Speaker 03

  I can't like the dark meat. Oh, my God, that looks delicious. Oh, the sausage is in there. Yummy. Oh, my God. I think my team is salivating over there.

• 35:13Jessie Ware?

  They can have some.

• 35:14Speaker 03

  Wow. Don't do too much, because you're gonna be shooting rice across the room.

• 35:21Jessie Ware?

  Um, I'll take a breast. It's good. Yeah, yeah, fine.

• 35:24Speaker 03

  Yeah, Emilio, see, that's what's great. Emilio likes the breast. I like the dark meat.

• 35:28Jessie Ware?

  Let's talk about Emilio a bit, because I thought he was maybe coming today. Is he in London?

• 35:32Speaker 03

  He's in London, but poor thing. First of all, he's exhausted. I don't know why, because I'm the one doing all the talking. But, um, he he gets up very early and we've been going to bed late. No, but the main reason was well, we leave tomorrow back to Miami and Sunday is my daughter-in-law's birthday.

• 35:50Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 35:51Speaker 03

  So I told him, please go out and get her a gift. She will love it. Something from London. She loves shopping. And he's gonna buy another suitcase, so for sure, he's gonna come back with clothes for me because I'm missing some hormone or gene. That I don't like shopping, what's wrong with me?

• 36:09Jessie Ware?

  Your husband shops for you as well?

• 36:10Speaker 03

  And he knows what looks good on me. He just brings me all this clothes and then I'll try it on at home and if something doesn't fit, he'll change it for me.

• 36:19Jessie Ware?

  So this guy not only writes you an album when you don't fancy writing because you're too busy, you know, writing a musical because you are incredibly capable. He also goes shopping for you?

• 36:28Speaker 03

  He does and he loves it.

• 36:29Jessie Ware?

  And he films you and does he take a good photo of you Gloria?

• 36:32Speaker 03

  He does.

• 36:33Jessie Ware?

  He's the only man in the world that takes a good photo of his partner.

• 36:36Speaker 03

  But he's a producer, you know, he, that's his bag, like that's, he loves that. And he's always watching out for my lighting and all. I directed the two videos for this album.

• 36:47Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, it was pop there.

• 36:48Speaker 03

  Since I couldn't see, they would bring me the monitor. And I'm checking, okay, I like this shot, but he was over there making sure. I would like some beans, thank you. Oh, so good.

• 37:00Jessie Ware?

  Emilio, Emilio sounds too good to be true.

• 37:02Speaker 03

  You know what, I wish I could clone him and sell him because everybody wants one.

• 37:07Speaker 02

  I wish you could.

• 37:08Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, mum's in, in, yeah, needs an Emilio.

• 37:11Speaker 02

  I'm in the market for an Emilio.

• 37:12Speaker 03

  You are, oh, well, he's a Yenta too, so look how tender that chick is.

• 37:17Jessie Ware?

  Gloria's happy.

• 37:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, this is my happy dance.

• 37:20Jessie Ware?

  For people that aren't watching this on YouTube, Gloria is dancing with her fork and swearing.

• 37:25Speaker 03

  People know that when I do this, I'm a happy girl. I love rice.

• 37:30Jessie Ware?

  Me too.

• 37:31Speaker 03

  I love all rices, just like there's not a potato I didn't like.

• 37:36Speaker 02

  The brown as Marty Rice.

• 37:38Speaker 03

  Oh, I love, that's very healthy. This is wonderful.

• 37:42Jessie Ware?

  Good. Do you have a sweet tooth?

• 37:45Speaker 03

  Emilio has a sweet tooth. I would rather savory than sweet, but I love chocolate.

• 37:50Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 37:50Speaker 03

  I love of the, of the Cuban desserts, flan, my grandma was an expert. And I love custard. That kind of creamy thing.

• 38:00Speaker 02

  Flan is crammed caramel.

• 38:02Jessie Ware?

  Oh, okay.

• 38:02Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 38:03Speaker 02

  When we come to Miami, where are we going to eat?

• 38:06Speaker 03

  Well, you can come to my restaurant.

• 38:08Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, let's talk about it. What's on the menu?

• 38:10Speaker 03

  We we own the Cardozo Hotel. We bought that like thirty years ago. And on Monday, they're going to name the street, Thirteenth Street, which is my lucky number. They're gonna call it Gloria Stefan Way.

• 38:21Jessie Ware?

  Oh.

• 38:22Speaker 03

  Which is really cool.

• 38:23Jessie Ware?

  That's amazing.

• 38:24Speaker 03

  That's so nice. But we have a restaurant in there called Call Me Cuban. And the chef is Cuban, but he studied in France.

• 38:31Jessie Ware?

  Oh.

• 38:32Speaker 03

  So he does the most incredible mixes, like I love oxtail. My grandma would make the best oxtail ever. And he will take that and he'll stuff ravioli with the oxtail.

• 38:44Jessie Ware?

  Hmm.

• 38:44Speaker 03

  Makes it easy to eat, cause you know oxtail, you gotta get rid of all the slime and, oh, it's so good. My grandma was the best. And funny enough, that Cardozo Hotel, I have a picture of my dad and me and my mom and his sister and my cousin on the beach in front of the Cardozo when I was like three.

• 39:03Jessie Ware?

  Mm hmm.

• 39:04Speaker 03

  And the day we closed on the hotel that we bought it officially, I tell my mom, Mom, you know, Emilio and I just invested, we bought the Cardozo. And she says, oh, my god. That's the hotel that when we went to that beach outing, cause my mom hated the beach, so it was her one and only beach outing. She goes, you turned around and you told your dad and pointed to that hotel and said, when I'm big, I'm gonna buy you that hotel.

• 39:29Jessie Ware?

  No, you didn't.

• 39:30Speaker 03

  I did. And there it is.

• 39:33Jessie Ware?

  That's so romantic.

• 39:34Speaker 03

  Crazy.

• 39:35Jessie Ware?

  That is crazy. Is there anything that you feel you haven't done yet that you would like to do?

• 39:43Speaker 03

  Well, our professional dream would be to sing in a free Cuba. Um, to do a celebratory concert there.

• 39:54Speaker 03

  But honestly, what I'd love is just more vacation time with my family.

• 39:58Jessie Ware?

  So we're gonna ask you, well, you can start thinking about it, your last supper, not in the most bleak sense of the word. You know, but you're going off to a desert island for a very, very long time.

• 40:07Speaker 03

  I've already thought about it.

• 40:08Jessie Ware?

  Okay.

• 40:10Speaker 03

  It would be chicken fricassee

• 40:15Speaker 03

  with rice and beans and avocado salad and flan for dessert. I love it because it has the potatoes.

• 40:23Jessie Ware?

  You just get it done, Gloria Stefan. You literally, you just gave us. The quickest Last Supper, just bang, bang, bang.

• 40:29Speaker 02

  What what's your drink of choice?

• 40:31Speaker 03

  My drink of choice? You mean alcoholic drink?

• 40:34Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 40:34Speaker 03

  I make a mean Cosmo.

• 40:36Speaker 02

  I know.

• 40:37Jessie Ware?

  Do you know this is Lenny's favorite drink?

• 40:38Speaker 02

  Very favorite drink.

• 40:39Speaker 03

  I'm gonna, I'm gonna give you the recipe.

• 40:42Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 40:42Speaker 03

  You are going to love it. Uh, every time I go to a party of my family, they will bring the Cosmos and I'll make them in.

• 40:50Speaker 02

  A big picture.

• 40:50Speaker 03

  Jugs like this, four gallon jugs. And we will go through them, like for my birthday weekend, we went.

• 40:57Speaker 02

  That would just start me off.

• 41:00Jessie Ware?

  What's the, what's, what is the secret to the Gloria Estefan um Cosmo?

• 41:05Speaker 03

  I prefer Cointreau to Grand Marnier. Okay. So it's one part vodka, I like to use Grey Goose Laurent. This is not a paid political.

• 41:18Jessie Ware?

  No, you're literally, you're gonna have to make one in a minute. You don't have to drink it, but you may have to make your, uh, us the Gloria.

• 41:23Speaker 03

  So what I do is I'll, I'll take that jug and I'll fill it with big ice cubes that don't melt easily. I keep the vodka in the freezer.

• 41:31Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 41:31Speaker 03

  So then I'll, I'll fill, let's say you take uh two cups of vodka. It's a quarter of that of Cointreau, so it will be.

• 41:41Speaker 02

  Two cups, not triple sec, sometimes people use triple sec.

• 41:45Speaker 03

  Cointreau.

• 41:45Speaker 02

  Me too.

• 41:45Speaker 03

  I prefer Cointreau. Then I will do equal parts orange juice to vodka and equal parts, no, equal parts cranberry juice. But the juice, not the cocktail mix thing.

• 41:59Speaker 02

  Okay. Proper cranberry juice.

• 42:01Speaker 03

  Yeah, I, in Miami, I mean, in the States, we have one called Northland.

• 42:04Speaker 02

  Yeah, I know.

• 42:05Jessie Ware?

  We have Ocean Spray.

• 42:07Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 42:07Speaker 02

  They have that in here, yeah, but it's not the same.

• 42:10Speaker 03

  It's not the same, but you can use it in a pinch.

• 42:12Jessie Ware?

  Okay.

• 42:13Speaker 03

  That's what they use at bars, they don't spend the money.

• 42:15Speaker 02

  Slightly sweetened, it's good for your.

• 42:18Speaker 03

  Mm hmm.

• 42:18Speaker 02

  Blood.

• 42:18Speaker 03

  Personally, I think that's why everybody wakes up the next day fresh as a daisy.

• 42:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 42:25Speaker 03

  It rushes rushes through your kidneys.

• 42:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's very good.

• 42:29Jessie Ware?

  So it's actually, you're saying it's actually good for you.

• 42:31Speaker 03

  It's good for you.

• 42:31Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 42:32Speaker 03

  So then, uh, I also add half part of either seven up or Sprite or.

• 42:40Speaker 02

  Really?

• 42:41Speaker 03

  Yes, if or if you wanna be, you know, healthy, you could use Perrier.

• 42:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 42:46Speaker 03

  I don't waste my time on the Perrier. I will do half of of seven up or Sprite. Then the juice of four, if it's the two gallons, it'll be the juice of either two very juicy limes or.

• 43:00Speaker 02

  Oh, you put lime in yours as well.

• 43:01Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, you've got it.

• 43:02Speaker 02

  No, I've never put lime in mine.

• 43:04Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 43:05Speaker 02

  I I take orange zest, squeeze the orange zest in and then put the the orange peel in.

• 43:10Speaker 03

  I use the juices and then a splash. If you're gonna do the gallons, it'll be like an eighth of a cup of grenadine.

• 43:18Jessie Ware?

  I love that you're making for like an army. I love this. It's not just like.

• 43:22Speaker 02

  Does everyone love your Cosmo?

• 43:23Speaker 03

  They love them.

• 43:24Jessie Ware?

  Who who taught you this Cosmo?

• 43:27Speaker 03

  Well, I had tasted it. You know, did you ever watch Sex and the City?

• 43:31Speaker 02

  Of course.

• 43:32Jessie Ware?

  I mean.

• 43:33Speaker 02

  That's why I like to bet it.

• 43:35Speaker 03

  I got curious about it and I ta- I would taste it or we'd have that drink if we went somewhere. And I felt so good the next day. I go, hmm, let me, let me see. So I tasted it. I looked at the recipe. And then I thought, hmm, for me, I started tweaking it and perfecting it. Took me a bit of time. And everybody, I send them the recipe. They love it. They make it. But ideally, what I do is I'll make it the day before and put it in the freezer. So that when you serve it, it's got that nice little, you know, icy thing on the top of the Cosmo.

• 44:07Jessie Ware?

  You you must send us this recipe and we are going to film ourselves.

• 44:11Speaker 03

  I have it in my phone. I will give it to you. Let me see again how delicious that was.

• 44:17Jessie Ware?

  Glorious. They found lots to cook in, mum. Um, I've got a bit of pudding, a bit of, uh, it's it's like a cake. You can have a tiny sliver. You don't have to have.

• 44:24Speaker 03

  Of course I can.

• 44:25Jessie Ware?

  Okay, I love you. I love you.

• 44:27Speaker 03

  No, I'm not gonna say no.

• 44:29Jessie Ware?

  I actually don't know if the recipe, I'm really bad at baking, but it's a recipe, so if it's.

• 44:35Speaker 03

  You baked it?

• 44:36Jessie Ware?

  I did.

• 44:36Speaker 03

  All right, let's see.

• 44:37Jessie Ware?

  Um, but it's.

• 44:39Speaker 03

  Is it a cheesecake kind of thing?

• 44:40Jessie Ware?

  It's um, it's a a blackberry crumble cake.

• 44:44Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 44:44Jessie Ware?

  So it's made with yogurt and o- oil.

• 44:47Speaker 03

  That's healthy.

• 44:48Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, yeah, I did avocado oil instead, but I'm worried the taste will be weird. Um, but blackberry's in season and then it's done like a little crumble on top. I don't know, I, it's not my recipe, so I'm kind of like, and I'm crap at baking, so I've.

• 45:00Speaker 03

  Do I slice or are we gonna let mum slice?

• 45:02Jessie Ware?

  Whatever you want, do you wanna slice?

• 45:04Speaker 03

  I'll, I'll, I'll take a sliver.

• 45:06Jessie Ware?

  So.

• 45:06Speaker 03

  Would you, I'll, I'll get you a slice.

• 45:08Jessie Ware?

  I want the tiniest slither, please, Laura.

• 45:09Speaker 03

  Yes, you and I are in the same.

• 45:11Jessie Ware?

  Okay, yeah, in the same industry, aren't we? Yeah, yeah.

• 45:15Speaker 03

  But you know what, at this point, I don't care.

• 45:16Jessie Ware?

  I don't care.

• 45:17Speaker 03

  That's the beauty of.

• 45:18Jessie Ware?

  Let him, let him eat cake. Um, so you have performed to six different presidents.

• 45:24Speaker 03

  I have.

• 45:25Jessie Ware?

  Can I ask who gave the best food? Who did the best spread?

• 45:29Speaker 03

  Well, it's always the same, you know, that when presidents come in and out.

• 45:33Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 45:34Speaker 03

  The White House staff does not. They, because they're the ones that know where everything is.

• 45:40Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 45:40Speaker 03

  Emilio goes there and everybody knows him from all the times he's been.

• 45:44Jessie Ware?

  Do you think you need a knife or just can you manage?

• 45:47Speaker 03

  I think I can ma- well, let's see, no, let's open it up.

• 45:49Jessie Ware?

  Anything this one.

• 45:50Speaker 03

  Well, I don't know about this, though. Here we go.

• 45:52Jessie Ware?

  Don't worry, if it's just, it's, I'm so scared, it's either not cooked or like.

• 45:58Speaker 03

  Well, it's cooked.

• 45:59Jessie Ware?

  Okay, too cooked.

• 46:00Speaker 03

  No, no.

• 46:01Jessie Ware?

  Okay.

• 46:02Speaker 03

  Were you assuming that you've been bad at?

• 46:04Jessie Ware?

  No, I'm really bad at baking.

• 46:06Speaker 03

  Is that too?

• 46:06Jessie Ware?

  That's fine, that's perfect. Let me just taste before you have to put it in your lips.

• 46:11Speaker 03

  No, a, a, like, bit, yeah, a bit bit, though. Yeah, you gotta taste your daughter's cake.

• 46:17Jessie Ware?

  Hmm, do you want cream fresh, darling? No, thank you. It's not bad. So, so the White House, it's always the same food?

• 46:25Speaker 03

  It's the same food, they, they cook it and, um. But the most fun we had was performing Mitierra for Barack Obama, who also gave us the Medal of Freedom, first time a couple gets it, the highest honour that a civilian can get in the States. And my father took me to the States to be in freedom, so that day was so emotional for both Emilio and I, and my mum was watching on television from Miami. That was a very special moment. And he had a giant party celebrating Hispanic music before that.

• 47:02Jessie Ware?

  How did you celebrate?

• 47:04Speaker 03

  Celebrate that medal?

• 47:05Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, did you celebrate with Barack and Michelle or did you go out after?

• 47:09Speaker 03

  No, we we we did a lot. There was a party afterwards. Uh, I think that day that I got the medal, Spielberg got one, Streisand got one. Um, she she said to me, you know, you're you're pretty young to be getting this medal. And I go, well, I'll take that as a compliment because I'm not as young as you think I am. Um.

• 47:32Jessie Ware?

  Do you think she was a bit jealous?

• 47:33Speaker 03

  No.

• 47:34Jessie Ware?

  Oh, fine.

• 47:35Speaker 03

  Well, she's just, she's Barbara.

• 47:37Jessie Ware?

  Is she?

• 47:37Speaker 03

  She's Barbara.

• 47:39Jessie Ware?

  Okay, what's Barbara Streisand like when you meet her? When two divas collide?

• 47:44Speaker 03

  She's pretty insular, like she's not, she won't go out of her way.

• 47:48Jessie Ware?

  She's quite reclusive, isn't she?

• 47:50Speaker 03

  Yeah. I mean, I I started listening to her audio book because I like to read. I read very fast, but I wanted to hear her voice.

• 47:58Jessie Ware?

  But also, how far in, you know, because it's never ending. I'm doing the audio and it's really nice listening to her. Because she adds things to it as well. She's like, oh, yeah, I I forgot about that score. And you're like, oh, yeah, I love it.

• 48:11Speaker 03

  But I love it. But yeah, I it just fell off because of work. But I will, look, now you reminded me on the.

• 48:17Jessie Ware?

  You've reminded me too.

• 48:19Speaker 03

  You know, I don't sleep on any moving vehicle since I had that accident. My my subconscious won't surrender, no matter how tired I am.

• 48:26Jessie Ware?

  For people that don't know, uh, Gloria, on your way to a concert and you were hit by a truck and paralyzed.

• 48:33Speaker 03

  Yeah, March twenty nineteen ninety. It is sold out world tour. We were at the top of our game and from one moment to the next, boom, back broken. The fear that I had because my dad had been in a wheelchair, so that was one of my biggest fears.

• 48:51Jessie Ware?

  You were in a wheelchair for how many months?

• 48:54Speaker 03

  Bit, uh, you know, until my doctor thought it was nothing short of a miracle, but I knew that it had to do with. That's the first time I really experienced what prayer does. Because there were so many people worldwide praying for me. And I felt it like, uh, like an energy, like a, I felt like electricity, like I was plugged into the wall. And I would absorb it and imagine nerves reconnecting. I'm spiritual. I was raised Catholic, you know, nun school, the whole thing. But I do believe that, you know, every, I, I believe that everything is God.

• 49:35Speaker 03

  Like that we are all a piece of God, like, and God is gonna express himself in every possible way. Hence, everything will happen. And that's why I think that we are collectively creating with our thoughts. If we're incredibly powerful beings, our reality. And we can create for good and we can create not good. So since I don't believe that death is the end. It's almost like if you're in a play or a movie, if they kill you off in the movie, you're still alive. So you're, you know, you're, you're living the life that you chose for the experiences and for the learning. And we're all doing it together.

• 50:20Speaker 03

  If we could realize this and accept each other as part of each other, we could make this place so much better. But it's like school, I think. That's what I think. But I, I am spiritual in that way.

• 50:31Speaker 02

  Do you know which song do people want to hear most when they go to a Gloria Estefan concert?

• 50:38Speaker 03

  Well, you'd have to ask my fans, you know, but probably Kanga.

• 50:43Jessie Ware?

  It's such a mouthful, though. I've tried and I, I, you know, it, it's such a mouthful. Dua Lipa just did it on her tour in Miami.

• 50:55Speaker 03

  I am so bummed because she invited me to do it with her on stage. And I was not in town. I was rehearsing for the show in Madrid. And I was so bummed, but that is the sexiest conga I've ever seen in my life. The sexiest, hands down. And I was really honored that she would, you know.

• 51:17Jessie Ware?

  She did a good job.

• 51:18Speaker 03

  She did.

• 51:19Jessie Ware?

  Quickly as well. She got all the words out. She's a pro, that dobelika.

• 51:23Speaker 03

  She did it, but let me tell you, we we have a tiny desk. You know where a tiny desk is? We have a tiny desk coming out. And the version, we did a, we did a very unique way to do conga and it is even faster.

• 51:38Jessie Ware?

  Oh, my goodness.

• 51:39Speaker 03

  Wait till you hear that, you know, you have to do little snippets and they you you have one mic, there's no monitors.

• 51:46Jessie Ware?

  I know. I did it and I really regret. I did it ten years ago. And they never have people come back. And I feel like I've got so many more songs that I could do on Tiny Desk now.

• 51:56Speaker 03

  But you know what? They're gonna run out of people and they're gonna have to start coming back.

• 51:59Jessie Ware?

  Did you have a good experience with Tiny Desk?

• 52:01Speaker 03

  I did. We we did it because there's um El El Tiny, because they they highlight the Latin part for like a month for Hispanic heritage. So these people have been trying to invite me to the show for years, but I I kept saying like, but I don't have anything new right now. Why would, you know? I'm gonna wait till the right moment. And boy, was this ever the right moment. It's just everything clicked in and my fiftieth year, it's it's it all worked great, but it's a challenge for musicians. You've got to cut everything down, you know, you don't have monitors. For the band, it's not that bad, but for singers, like, literally, not even a little speaker.

• 52:45Jessie Ware?

  Gloria Estefan, before we let you go, which I don't really want to because I it it's a good, I'm taking no credit apart from that I put it together. I did make it.

• 52:55Speaker 03

  You have kids, right?

• 52:56Jessie Ware?

  I have three, yeah.

• 52:57Speaker 03

  How old are they?

• 52:58Jessie Ware?

  Nine, six and four.

• 53:01Speaker 03

  They'll love this.

• 53:02Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, they actually, they would, yeah. They will. Okay, I'll make sure that I bring some back for them.

• 53:07Speaker 03

  You've got to. Take it all, darling.

• 53:09Jessie Ware?

  I'll say, Mother Gloria said, um, I just want to ask you before you go, what is a nostalgic taste that can transport you back somewhere?

• 53:18Speaker 03

  Oh my gosh. I know, croquetas.

• 53:21Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, your grandma.

• 53:23Speaker 03

  Croquetas, my grandma's croqueta. I will forever be judging everyone's croquetas. Looking down my nose at them.

• 53:31Speaker 02

  What's in them?

• 53:32Speaker 03

  They use, uh, well, it depends. She would make them of ham and the pechamel sauce, which is to die for. She would make them out of cod, the salted cod, with chicken. She would make them out of chicken. But she just, it was just perfection in a croqueta and a tamal. You know, uh, a lot of Latin American countries have their own version of tamales. In Mexico, certainly Venezuela has, they call it ayacas. But the cube in tamal is corn, right? Corn. And I love tamal en cazuela. I think that even more so.

• 54:11Speaker 03

  Which is tamal, but it's, it's in a, in a pot. It's almost like if you made a pudding out of the corn, but not sweet. Just the corn. And then you could either put lechon, like the pork with it, or crab, or anything on top of it. They eat it in New Orleans. It's delicious.

• 54:29Speaker 02

  What language do you talk to your husband in?

• 54:32Speaker 03

  Spanish.

• 54:32Speaker 02

  Uh, and yes, Spanish.

• 54:34Speaker 03

  Absolutely. He's so funny. He, he changes words because he'll say whatever occurs to him first.

• 54:40Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 54:41Speaker 03

  Like, for example, Aretha Franklin adored him, right? But when he talks to me, he calls her urethra Franklin.

• 54:49Speaker 02

  Oh, oh my goodness.

• 54:51Speaker 03

  And I go, babe, that's even harder. I don't understand. And why is that word stuck in your head? Since when do you use the word urethra? Like, that kind of thing? It's constant. It is constant. He'll say, I had a nightmare last night.

• 55:08Jessie Ware?

  Nightmare?

• 55:09Speaker 03

  Nightmare. Like, not nightmare. He, he's just so funny, even when he's not intending and that. It's so endearing to me. I have a list of emiliadas.

• 55:22Speaker 02

  Emiliada.

• 55:24Speaker 03

  He's very absent minded, but for business, because he's all business, but for normal life, oh my gosh.

• 55:30Speaker 02

  And do your, your kids just talk to you in Spanish as well?

• 55:33Speaker 03

  In English, probably, and with such, I really had to make it a point to speak to him in Spanish. Because English is easy for me. I was two when I went to the States. So, and it depends, we talk in Spanish too. We go back and forth. It's Spanglish. We literally mix words in one sentence.

• 55:51Speaker 02

  When you say things in Spanish, it sounds so exotic, doesn't it?

• 55:56Speaker 03

  It's romantic.

• 55:57Speaker 02

  It's romantic.

• 55:58Speaker 03

  The love songs in Spanish, you know, you can't be too sweet or too romantic in Spanish and English. You have to be careful, cause then they'll say, oh, it's saccharine. How could love be saccharine? But if you're too expressive in English, it's a problem. So. I love to be able to live in both worlds, but for ballads and romance, oh, the Spanish.

• 56:20Speaker 02

  The chorthon.

• 56:21Jessie Ware?

  I was, the chorthon. I was seeing a Spanish guy for a bit and he would like.

• 56:26Speaker 02

  What's that?

• 56:28Jessie Ware?

  When I wasn't with Sam.

• 56:30Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 56:31Speaker 03

  You were with Sam.

• 56:32Jessie Ware?

  Some other moment. We had like two years off.

• 56:34Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 56:35Jessie Ware?

  And, and he gave me Pablo Neruda poetry.

• 56:38Speaker 03

  Oh, my God, that's so beautiful.

• 56:40Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, but like, see, España's like, yeah.

• 56:42Speaker 03

  But you could say things like, if I say, arroz con pollo.

• 56:47Speaker 02

  What's that mean?

• 56:47Speaker 03

  Chicken and rice.

• 56:52Jessie Ware?

  Gloria Estefan, you are amazing. Thank you for coming here.

• 56:57Speaker 03

  Thank you, and thank you for that delicious meal. Oh, my gosh.

• 57:02Jessie Ware?

  Can't wait to see.

• 57:02Speaker 03

  That really was wonderful.

• 57:04Speaker 02

  Good.

• 57:05Speaker 03

  You could have a restaurant if you want to.

• 57:07Speaker 02

  I don't think so.

• 57:08Speaker 03

  Nor do you want to.

• 57:09Jessie Ware?

  Can't wait to see the new musical.

• 57:11Speaker 03

  Thank you so much. I'm super psyched. Of course.

• 57:14Jessie Ware?

  And when you decide that you fancy doing a little gig, just let us know, okay?

• 57:17Speaker 03

  I'll do things here and there, like, you know, I, I will be out there. I like to connect with the fans and, you know, just say, hey, like. For Spain, it was wonderful, cause I, I literally went on Spotify. I checked all the charts for the past twenty five, thirty years. And saw what the top songs of my catalog, cause I can't do every song. It's impossible.

• 57:39Jessie Ware?

  I love that you can just check where you were in the charts. I love that.

• 57:43Speaker 02

  We'd be doing the backing on one, two, three.

• 57:45Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 57:45Speaker 02

  One.

• 57:46Speaker 03

  Exactly. Four, come on, baby, say you love me. Five, six, seven, ten. I love that Sesame Street used that as a counting game for kids.

• 57:55Jessie Ware?

  Yes.

• 57:56Speaker 03

  Absolutely.

• 57:58Speaker 02

  With, with the baby.

• 57:59Jessie Ware?

  Yes.

• 58:00Speaker 03

  And you know, I love to do parodies of my own songs. And one that would go with this meal would be. Anything for food. Just bring it here. I haven't said I'm through. And where's my beer? I've been waiting for so long. All my appetizers gone. And still my hunger pangs are strong. That's just the beginning. Thank you for this.

• 58:27Jessie Ware?

  Thank you.

• 58:41Jessie Ware?

  I think we may have just met. The most. Warm, fabulous icon, pop star, mother, grandmother. She just stayed, by the way. She has a really busy day today. She's going to Abba Voyage later. She's about to go and do a junket at her label. She has been on the breakfast radio show this morning. She is exhausted, probably. And she still signed everything and talked and kept on talking. I just, you, you didn't hear me just talking to her about all her pets. She has a parrot. Who mimics everyone in the house. She says that the parrot goes, then. Like, come on, puppy, then, when she's, the parrot's talking to her husband. She's amazing.

• 59:26Jessie Ware?

  I'm sure we could do a part two. If she ever wants us to come to Miami, we will have a part two. I love Gloria Estefan. And I actually feel like. She's like an unreal icon because. Not only has she's been so successful, she's like the most down to earth woman.

• 59:44Speaker 02

  Jessie, I think you have to have one of her songs in your new repertoire.

• 59:48Jessie Ware?

  I'm gonna do a cover.

• 59:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 59:50Jessie Ware?

  Of a Gloria song.

• 59:51Speaker 02

  Toy Boy.

• 59:52Jessie Ware?

  It's called Love Toy.

• 59:53Speaker 02

  A Love Toy, okay.

• 59:55Jessie Ware?

  And mum just asked what Love Toy was about.

• 59:57Speaker 02

  Actually, I haven't listened to all the.

• 59:59Jessie Ware?

  Gloria said, well, it's about. I said, a vibrator, a guy that's like a vibrator. You're my love toy, no batteries required. Um, wind me up and I'll start to move. And mum was like, what's going on? Um, anyway, she's amazing. Gloria Estefan just gave us everything that I needed and so much more. The stories.

• 1:00:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:00:21Jessie Ware?

  She loved the meal.

• 1:00:23Speaker 02

  Good, good idea, Jess.

• 1:00:25Jessie Ware?

  Thank you.

• 1:00:26Speaker 02

  Did it taste okay?

• 1:00:27Jessie Ware?

  Executed excellently, mum.

• 1:00:28Speaker 02

  Good, darling.

• 1:00:29Jessie Ware?

  And Sophie Weiberg's cake was really, I hate to use the word, moist, but delicious.

• 1:00:35Speaker 02

  It's making me feel a bit faint, that.

• 1:00:37Jessie Ware?

  But delicious and uh, I'm just absolutely reeling over that.

• 1:00:41Speaker 02

  And she sang.

• 1:00:42Jessie Ware?

  And she sang, well done mum. I love her. Um, thank you to everyone who just listened to a completely gorgeous episode. We'll see you next week for another round of table manners and more meeting of icons, I guess. Thank you for listening.