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Music Review

A Mix of Flash and Idealism at the Latin Grammys

Glitz and heart-on-sleeve emotionality mingled, every so often, with political and social messages at the 10th annual Latin Grammy Awards. The awards were presented on Thursday night at Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas and broadcast on the Univision network. And it was unmistakably a Vegas production, with Cirque du Soleil performers, fireworks and pole dancing.

But at this year’s awards, two leading contenders — Calle 13, from Puerto Rico, and Mercedes Sosa, from Argentina — were generations apart but linked by idealism. Calle 13, a duo made up of the rapper Residente (René Pérez) and the producer Visitante (Eduardo Cabra), has brought political critiques, raunchy fantasies and globe-hopping musical eclecticism to the Latin hip-hop style called reggaetón. It received the most nominations for this year’s awards, in five of the 49 award categories, with its album, “Los de Atrás Vienen Conmigo” (“Those Behind Are Coming With Me”), and won them all, including Album of the Year.

Calle 13’s single “No Hay Nadie Como Tú” (“There’s No One Like You”), which was written and performed with the Mexican rock group Café Tacvba, was named Record of the Year, the award for a single, as well as Best Alternative Song.

Calle 13 also won awards for Best Urban Album and Best Short Music Video. The video was “La Perla,” a song about growing up in a poor neighborhood in San Juan, which Calle 13 performed with the Panamanian songwriter Rubén Blades.

For Album of the Year, Calle 13 was competing with the album “Cantora 1” by Ms. Sosa, the Argentine singer who was a voice of the Americas’ social conscience for decades. She died on Oct. 4, at 74. “Cantora 1” was named Best Folk Album. Ms. Sosa was a central figure in the Latin American “new song” movement that mingled politics and poetry, calling for social justice. She had been revered across Latin America. “Her music is going to live forever,” Residente said.

“Cantora 1” includes collaborations with leading Latin pop figures. Among them are Shakira and the Brazilian songwriter Caetano Veloso (a 2009 Latin Grammy winner for Best Singer-Songwriter Album for his “Zii e Zie”). The sequel, “Cantora 2,” includes songs recorded with Calle 13 and with Fito Paez, an Argentine singer whose “No Sé Si Es Baires o Madrid” was named Best Male Pop Vocal Album.

Other contenders for Album of the Year received awards in their own categories. The Nicaraguan singer Luis Enrique’s “Ciclos” returned him to the charts after nine years, and was named Best Salsa Album. The Brazilian songwriter Ivan Lins won the award for Best MPB (Música Popular Brasileira) Album.

The 49 awards categories strive to encompass the geographical, linguistic and stylistic multiplicity of Latin music. Alicia Keys joined the Spanish singer Alejandro Sanz for their bilingual duet single, “Looking for Paradise,” from his album due next week. Oscar D’León, from Venezuela, and Gilberto Santa Rosa, from Puerto Rico, shared a kinetic salsa duet, improvising praise to their fellow musicians. Wisin y Yandel, a reggaetón duo, sang their “La Abusadora,” named Best Urban Song, flanked by pole dancers. The Best Contemporary Tropical Album award went to Omara Portuondo, the 79-year-old Cuban singer who was part of the Buena Vista Social Club. The Best Female Pop album award went to the Italian singer Laura Pausini.

The best-selling Latin music in the United States is Mexican regional music and pop, which dominated the show’s performances. Alexander Acha, a Mexican pop crooner, was named Best New Artist, and Reik, a Mexican pop group, won the award for best pop album by a group. Marco Antonio Solís’s “No Molestar” won the award for Best Regional Mexican song. And the Person of the Year was the Mexican music titan Juan Gabriel, whose long, climactic medley performance had the crowd on its feet. It was an over-the-top extravaganza bursting with Mexican pride and pop bravado. In a song about drunkenness, he splashed a drink across the stage and himself, and did the same with a refill.

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section A, Page 19 of the New York edition with the headline: A Mix of Flash and Idealism at the Latin Grammys. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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