Mexico, Mexico | AFP | The kidnapping of one of his children and alleged links with the drug trafficker of another of them are passages from the life of the Mexican music icon Vicente Fernández narrated in an unauthorized biography, published while facing serious health problems.
“The Last King” (Planeta, 2021), by the Argentine journalist Olga Wornat, reveals the human and fragile side of the “Charro de Huentitán”, admitted since August in a hospital in Guadalajara (Jalisco, west) after a fall on his ranch The Three Foals.
The writer reconstructs for the first time the abduction in 1998 of Vicente Fernández Junior at the hands of the band “Los Mochadedos” and his 121 days of captivity.
“It was the episode that devastated Vicente Sr. and could destroy him. He never stopped singing, but he did it crying and when he got to his hotel he collapsed,” Wornat told AFP in a video call interview.
While “Chente” prostrated himself on stage to sing to his audience “until they stopped clapping,” he suffered in silence that family tragedy, to which is added an absent life as a father and infidelities to his wife Cuquita, according to the publication.
In addition, the book reveals “dark” relationships between Gerardo Fernández, the second of three sons, with the boss of the famous Sinaloa cartel Ignacio “Nacho” Coronel and his alleged responsibility in the kidnapping of his brother Vicente.
“Vicente Junior continues to suspect that his brother had him kidnapped or participated in the kidnapping,” says Wornat, who based his account on testimonies from family and friends.
Life “full of labyrinths”
The author, who wrote the biography of the idol inspired by her mother, who loves her music, describes the harsh personal and professional tests that Fernández underwent to become one of the maximum representatives of Mexican popular culture.
“I wanted to tell what was behind the last idol of Mexico (…) the one that survived everything,” he says.
Born on February 17, 1940 in Huentitán el Alto (Jalisco), to a ranchero father and a housewife mother, Fernández became part of the Mexican collective memory with songs like “Por tu maldito amor” and “Volver, Volver”.
In more than five decades of career, his music has accompanied several generations inside and outside of Mexico in all kinds of celebrations.
During that time he also garnered multiple accolades and accolades, including three Grammys and eight Latin Grammys.
In contrast to a life of success, Fernández has dealt with health ailments and various personal scandals over the past decade.
“While there was a Vicente who appeared on stage, dressed as a charro, with that brave macho posture, behind him there was this thing so full of labyrinths,” says Wornat.
In the journalist’s opinion, Chente’s “great musical heir” is his famous son Alejandro FernándezBut the one who will be left with an “incalculable” fortune will be Gerardo Fernández.
“The day Vicente father is no more, there will be no possibility of union in that family”, sentence.
