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For 25 years, the Mexican singer-songwriter admits she was unable to learn how to get angry. “It drained my energy and self-respect,” she reflects. Melancholy, however, was something she always understood: “I live with her very close to me.” Now 28, Estrada was raised near Veracruz, a city on the Gulf of Mexico, exposed to multifaceted violence: rampant femicide, narcoculture, and ecological destruction on coffee plantations and waterways. As a lonely teenager, she discovered Billie Holiday, Sarah Vaughan, Ella Fitzgerald. Their music illuminated her inner turmoil and introduced her to vocal improvisation.

Hailing from a lineage of instrument makers, she began composing her own songs, using a Venezuelan cuatro and drawing from Mexican folk traditions. Her 2022 debut, Marchita, meaning “withered,” and the record offered a spare, devastating, deeply poetic account of first love gone awry.

“She stands among the most profound artists today,” notes fellow musician Natalia Lafourcade. “Her voice embodies liberty, exotic beauty, and Latin American spirit. It reflects a deep connection to love, nature and human relationships.”

Estrada still loves that album, she says today, during a New York interview. It earned her a Latin Grammy for best new artist and critical raves. But afterwards, she says, “I aimed to incorporate more humor. Post-Marchita, I felt confined to a somber, solemn persona. That is also me, but I wanted to show myself in a way that’s even closer to how I really am.” Estrada talks with tender humour about that serious young girl so animatedly that her sparkly rose-shaped earrings swing. Tracks from Marchita originated in her teens, she notes: “All this eloquence, darkness, I see it as so much naiveness because I thought that was the only way to talk about love and dreams.”

A New Direction and Darker Themes

Her second album, she decided, would be poppier, lighter. But then unexpected losses forced her to get acquainted with an even darker side of her personality. Estrada’s new lyrics are stark with recrimination and brutal despondence: toward former partners who didn’t return her feelings; for a friend who ditched her “because he couldn’t stand that my career was” – she shoots her hand upwards – “and his wasn’t. That betrayal led to deep depression. She wondered how years of brotherly love could end over insecurity. That shocked me so much.”

She transformed her anger into Good Luck, Good Night, a fabulously melodramatic, comic kiss-off for something as pathetic as “el ghosting”. Each verse evokes the image of a tipped wineglass. “Sometimes our lives are like a telenovela – infinite drama and suffering,” she says, referencing the high-octane Latin American soap operas of her youth. “Which is true, to be alive is to suffer, but being ghosted, the fact that someone who is alive decides to be a ghost for you – it’s so miserable!” Her offense remains palpable. ‘It’s funny because I guess it shows how small we can be.”

The Power of Anger

During the process of writing, “I was like, wow, anger is really helpful,” she says. “Anger drives you to uphold your boundaries and desires. It’s a peculiar, almost grandmotherly nudge toward self-awareness. We need anger, actually, to fight for our lives and the lives of others.”

However, Vendrán Suaves Lluvias conveys serenity; it stands as a breathtakingly beautiful record. Following unsuccessful collaborations with producers, Silvana decided to do it herself. She realised: “‘You’re the only one that knows what you want.’ Trusting others over her instincts felt irresponsible.” She augments her cuatro with swooping flourishes of strings, piano and woodwind, her powerful voice overflowing with empathy. The bright, dewy Como un Pájaro (Like a Bird), a Latin Grammy nominee, evokes springtime freshness. Joyful tunes emerged unexpectedly. “As I get older, I understand the importance of pleasure and joy, even during hard times. This album is like a pendulum between beauty and terror.”

Loss and Homage

Ghosting’s sting faded compared to losing her friend Jorge, who was brutally murdered alongside his brother and uncle in December 2022. “I used to undervalue friendship in my youth,” she says. “I was a little bit weird. I liked music that nobody was listening to. I was very isolated. Even the friends I had were super mean to me. I’ve always been highly sensitive.” Her first real friend, Jorge taught her what friendship was. “A person who loves, accepts, and honestly communicates with you. We were always together.”

When Estrada wanted to move to Mexico City, her parents were unsure until they heard that Jorge was going too. “They loved Jorge so much. He was like an older brother to me.” When she started touring, he came too. “I enjoyed so much feeling loved, not so like this super lonely child.”

Regarding Jorge, she shares: “I rediscovered childhood joy. My heart felt weightless. And now my heart is heavy. I’m adapting to it.” Grave and sharpened by sudden bursts of strings, Un Rayo de Luz (A Ray of Light) is her tribute to him. Composed at Chavela Vargas’s home, her idol, and interpolates her words: “¿Cómo será de hermosa la muerte que nadie ha vuelto de allá?” “I really want to believe that,” she says.

Advocacy and Empowerment

The perpetrators were apprehended. “They’re gonna die in jail,” says Estrada, “but justice is the minimum. The state, everybody, failed us. I don’t fully trust incarceration. I advocate for rehabilitation.”

Estrada has always been vocal about justice: a 2018 video backing abortion rights gained early traction, predating legalization. In 2022, she released Si Me Matan following a student’s murder. “I try to use the voice I have and the space that has been given to me as an example of empowerment, especially for little girls,” she affirms.

Lafourcade inspired her. She reciprocates the praise. “She is undoubtedly the voice of young generations, with a soul and heart of great sensitivity,” Lafourcade comments. “She possesses ancient wisdom in a vibrant, beautiful form.”

Music, Culture, and Conversation

In 2023, her music was used to counter corridos tumbados, the genre of regional Mexican trap popularised by Peso Pluma that has been accused of glorifying drug cartels and stoking violence. Estrada says she was “honoured”, but feels otherwise conflicted. Instead of cancelling this kind of music, she suggests, “we should talk about why people are admiring people who are killing us, killing our freedom, killing all the things we love.” “Mexico needs open dialogue involving all. Conversation is important to change your reality.”

Listening to herself helped Estrada become accountable to her own feelings. Writing the ultimatum Dime (Tell Me), she realised she didn’t want an ex to stay. She sought departure. “It was such a useful thing to realise you can always turn around and walk away,” she explains. “For me, it was hard to understand that I could just say no.”

She links it to Greek mythology, specifically the Furies: goddesses of vengeance depicted with horrifying facial features. “My interpretation is that they were angry because of all the injustice on Olympus. Society shuns them due to misogynistic views on female anger. But I align with their spirit over other goddesses: Even with snakes for hair, I embrace it. I strive for happiness, vitality, and growth.”