María José

In August, María José walked onto the stage of Mexico City’s Auditorio Nacional for the 25th and 26th time in her career. Both nights were sold out, with 10,000 people filling the venue for the first show alone. She will be back in December for two more. After 35 years in music, the singer, affectionately known as La Josa, is still adding dates.

That pace suits her. “I don’t stop. I like to work,” she told ¡HOLA!. She turned 50 in January, a milestone that arrived during a year packed with concerts and new music. On September 15th, she headlined Toluca’s Grito de Independencia celebration at Plaza de los Mártires. Then she heads to the U.S., where she will joins Moenia for eight shows beginning October 21st in San Antonio and ending November 1st in Las Vegas.

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María José has been performing for most of her adult life. She first became famous with Kabah in the early 1990s before building the solo career that made songs such as “Prefiero ser su amante” and “No soy una señora” fixtures of her shows. That catalog also makes choosing new material more complicated. She knows that whatever she records now eventually has to stand alongside songs her audience has been singing for years.

Her next album, Alma de mujer, is expected in March 2027 around International Women’s Day. Its first single, “Respirar,” is about moving forward after heartbreak. María José worked with Paty Cantú, Ana Bárbara and Leonel García on the project and described the album as “a portrait of my soul.”

There is a personal side to this period, too. During one of her recent, August concerts, her daughter Valeria, who is almost 12, joined her onstage to sing “Frente a frente.” Away from touring, María José has spent the past four years serving on her daughter’s school committee, something that places her in a much more ordinary setting than the Auditorio Nacional.

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What she hopes Valeria takes from watching her has little to do with fame. María José wants her daughter to see a woman who works for what she wants and does not depend on anyone else. “We have to raise strong women here in Mexico and around the world,” she told ¡HOLA!

At 50, María José is getting to show her daughter what that looks like while living it herself. Alma de mujer will make that conversation even more personal when it arrives next year.