After the Knicks, Rosalía Delivers a Musical Miracle at Madison Square Garden

I’ve felt the presence of God three times. First, 18 years ago, staring into the newly born retinas of my son. Second, in 2021, in a pandemic-emptied Sagrada Familia, as red and blue light bathed me through the stained glass. The third time was last week at Madison Square Garden, the sweat barely dry from the Knicks’ epic comeback. A 32-year-old Catalan musician, Rosalía, sat atop a white grand piano and, with gold rain falling behind her, sang “Sauvignon Blanc,” about love and spiritual liberation. The response from the 19,000-strong audience, waving cellphones like votive candles, was collective rapture.Rosalía is still unknown to many. Last November, when her fourth album, “Lux,” came out, I gave a signed vinyl copy to my 15-year-old daughter. She still hasn’t taken it out of its sleeve. Nevertheless Rosalía is a global phenomenon, with 27 million monthly Spotify listeners, two Grammys, and a role on the third season of “Euphoria.” Her breakout record, “El Mal Querer” (2018), reimagined flamenco as a vehicle for modern heartbreak. Her follow-up, “Motomami” (2022), won Album of the Year at the Latin Grammys. “Lux” is her most ambitious and beautiful work yet and the trigger for her current world tour.Rosalía at Madison Square Garden. Sebastian DoggartRosalía is the most eclectic performer in popular music today. She sings in 13 languages, including Spanish, Hebrew, Arabic, and Japanese. Through her broad horizons, she explores light, pride, pleasure and suffering and tells moving stories of our shared humanity, drawing on a girl-gang of female mystics: Catholic Teresa de Avila, Jewish prophetess Miriam, Muslim poet Rabia Basri, and Buddhist nun Ryōnen Gensō. Her work also features darker voices: a sample of Mike Tyson’s statement, “I’ll fuck you ‘til you love me” anchors the techno-operatic “Berghain,” her best-known song.Rosalía composes in a dizzying range of musical genres including opera, pop, reggaeton, techno, merengue, jazz, and bachata. For her live show, she used the UK-based Heritage Orchestra, placed in a cross-shaped stage at the arena’s center. The 20 musicians were conducted by Cuban musician, and TikTok sensation, Yudania Gómez Heredia, who was enlisted to join Rosalía’s creative team after posting an Instagram reel tracing the sound of “Berghain” back to Mozart, Vivaldi and Fauré.I asked my concert neighbor, Luana Llanes, a Brazilian scientist, why she came. “I am in love with her,” she cooed, “because her voice penetrates my soul.” That voice is central to her success. Her training began with flamenco, learning from masters like Camarón de la Isla. The velvety falsetto on “Divinize,” dreamily folded in with Dido’s “Thank You,” revealed a sound entirely her own. She also proved an accomplished crooner performing a witty cover of Frankie Valli’s “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You.”Her greatest vocal achievement was “Mio Cristo Piange Diamanti,” sung in Italian, a language she spent a year learning in tribute to her Pavarotti-loving grandmother. She stripped everything back and simply sang, with a soprano mastery that evoked Maria Callas. Tears streamed down her cheeks, like Titian’s “Penitent Magdalene.” The song’s anguished purity had Luana and most of the audience weeping too, before a standing ovation as long as a Palme d’Or winning-film at Cannes.Rosalía at Madison Square Garden. Sebastian DoggartRosalía’s physical presence was incandescent: feral and fragile, resembling both the Virgin Mary and Penelope Cruz in her “Jamón Jamón” era. She moved with the rigor of her ballet training and the invention of choreographer Dimitris Papaioannou. For “La Perla,” her 13-strong ensemble of dancers, dressed in black but for white opera gloves, caressed and suspended her, evoking that iconic scene in “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” when tuxedoed dancers held aloft Marilyn Monroe.Rosalía at Madison Square Garden. Sebastian DoggartRosalía-as-Marilyn had no need for diamonds or a hot-pink gown. She rejected the gimmicky fashion shows of Taylor Swift and Lady Gaga, relying instead on skin, lingerie and angel wings. Her palette was black and white, with rare splashes of color, like the wicked red panties she let dancers grab.The staging was a mash-up of a Met opera and a rave. Her entrance came to the strains of Jimi Hendrix’s “Angel,” as stagehands prized open a wooden crate. Rosalía’ images raced through art history. She stood motionless, in a tutu — evoking a Degas ballerina — before “Sexo, Violencia y Llantas” detonated the arena; a gilded frame made her a living Mona Lisa; Goya’s “Aquelarre,” a coven worshipping the Devil as a goat, underpinned the horned headdress of “Berghain.”Rosalía at Madison Square Garden. Sebastian DoggartThe whole show felt like a mystical ritual. Many spectators wore white lace robes and veils, mirroring Rosalía’s own vestments. A huge incense-burner swung and smoked over “La Rumba del Perdón,” both holy metronome and perilous sword of Damocles. A Gothic confessional booth housed a mystery guest to unburden their heartbreak before Rosalía sang of her own.On the first of her two sold-out shows, this segment became instant tabloid fodder. Pop star Maggie Rogers confessed to a “late-night make-out session” with a New York Times journalist in the newspaper’s offices, only to discover the next day that he was already involved with someone in her circle. “You can never trust a journalist,” Rosalía quipped, before launching into “La Perla,” slang for “scoundrel.”Rosalía at Madison Square Garden. Sebastian DoggartOn her second night, the guest was Cuban-American SNL star Marcello Hernández, confessing to a Valentine’s date gone wrong. He had prepared dinner for a special lady, two bottles of wine and a table laid via YouTube tutorial. Soon after the appointed hour, she texted that she was running late. Then later. Then “super late.” “I ended the evening,” he lamented, “sharing a bottle of wine on FaceTime — with my mom.” We agreed his flaky date was a total Perla.Marcello Hernández and Rosalía at Madison Square Garden. Sebastian DoggartRosalía used humor to entertain and connect. The show ran to five acts, each with a comedic interlude, spectators enacting Munch’s “The Scream,” or fans performing ridiculous karaoke versions of her songs. Between numbers she joked, “Last time I was in New York, I played to only 20 people,” she said. “Now I’m playing Madison Fucking Garden!”Rosalía at Madison Square Garden. Sebastian DoggartThe show had a collective joy, and a spiritual impact, which I’ve often sought, but rarely found, in church. As Ms. Luana told me, “Rosalía takes me to a place where I feel ecstasy.” Over the past decade, Spanish-language artists have rewritten the script of what the US mainstream will celebrate. Bad Bunny, who has released four consecutive number-one albums and wowed the world at this year’s Super Bowl, has proved that a primarily Spanish-speaking artist need not genuflect to the Anglophone market to conquer it.Rosalía is more arthouse, formally trained and eclectic. But she shares his proud refusal to sand down her Spanishness. Her final song was “Focu’Ranni,” “great fire” in Sicilian, the language of her saintly namesake, Rosalía of Palermo, who fled her own wedding to become a hermit. As it ended, Rosalía climbed a staircase, raised her hands in a gesture of crucifixion, and fell backwards, out of sight. Breathtaking as that finale was, she is clearly not done. More than any other musician working today, I am excited to see how an artist this young, curious, and gifted will make us see, hear and feel in the future.

After the Knicks, Rosalía Delivers a Musical Miracle at Madison Square Garden

After the Knicks, Rosalía Delivers a Musical Miracle at Madison Square Garden

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