Marcelo Rubio uses music to heal

The first person to realize that Marcelo Rubio had singing skills was his older brother, and he immediately told his parents.

“At 9 years old I started singing songs by other artists,” he said. “I was in a local contest and I won, and then I was in a national contest and I won, and I started touring the country, always singing other people’s songs.”

Marcelo was very young, and even though he had contracts and was paid, he did not take that job very seriously; Not even because he worked at the most important television station in Venezuela, where he grew up until he was 13 years old.

Everything changed a couple of years ago, when Marcelo, who now lives in the United States, decided to resume his career, but this time of his own free will and singing songs that he wrote himself.

The artist’s family left Venezuela in 2017 due to the political situation. Both of his parents are educators and immigrated first to Los Angeles, then moved to Minnesota, then Orlando and finally settled in Miami.

Marcelo began to write about his feelings and love breakups until at the age of 19 he decided to dedicate one hundred percent of his time to music. First he wrote songs for others and then began to build his career. He started singing at parties and for friends until he gained a small but loyal fan base.

At one of those parties he informally met a person who works at a major record label and some time later they offered him a contract. After a couple of years of production, Marcelo released “What I wrote while you were gone,” his debut album.

“It’s based on a breakup,” he said. “Everything that one goes through from the process of anxiety, panic attacks, when you meet someone new and you stumble, that person was not for you and you try again, until the end of the album, which is like you reunite with yourself and you start dating someone who maybe erases that past of yours.”

Each song represents a month of the year, and the title of the album is a mental game because it is dedicated not to the person who is no longer here, but to the one who is now, Marcelo said.

“It’s a pretty healing and super cute album,” said the 21-year-old artist.

Now he is planning a tour to bring his music to other audiences, and at the same time he is creating new songs because “I don’t like to sit still.”