In a Peru that has come to own chicha — that colorful culture brought to Lima by migrants — perhaps the most emblematic star of 2010 would be Wendy Sulca. The child singer's most popular songs are odes to the mother's breast and beer (the aptly named "La tetita" and "Cerveza"), which have sparked a good amount of jokes against Wendy, using her as a symbol of backwardness. But conventional pop lyrics and Western teen outfits aren't a requirement for stardom on Youtube, where people have watched Wendy's music more than 11 million times on her channel alone.
Wearing dresses typical to Peru's highland folk songs and singing in a voice that can be sweet and strident in the same line, the girl from Lima's dusty slums transformed from Youtube anomaly to an actual star in 2010. With collaborators El Delfin and La Tigresa del Oriente (see their wildly popular kitsch hit here), she most recently performed at the Youfest in Argentina, the country that featured her in Rolling Stone. Wendy has arrived.
After calling a Lima phone number listed online to contract Wendy for shows, I found myself chatting with her mother. She passed me to Wendy, who was more interested in talking about future projects than acheivements in 2010. A new Wendy CD is coming out soon and she is going on a solo tour in Colombia, she says. But she seemed most excited about her 15-year birthday celebration in May. "It will be in San Juan de Lurigancho," she said. "Everyone's invited."
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