by Keana Ramirez Acosta
Guaynaa is a Spanish rapper from Puerto Rico. While his birth name is Jean Carlos Santiago, he got the name Guaynaa from the term “guayna”. This term is an abbreviation for “guaynabicho”, a slang term in Puerto Rico that refers to the people who reside in Guaynabo. People in Guaynabo have a reputation of being high-class, snobby, and superficial. His friends called him “guayna” for his personality and style even though he’s not from Guaynabo. Before being known as Guaynaa, he had released music under the name Janko and was signed with the label Real Music. In this phase, he tried a ‘gangster’ persona, but didn’t connect with that music or personality so he stopped after making two music videos.
Although Guaynaa was already gaining traction in his career with the release of his song ‘Rebota’ in December 2018, it was in March, when Bad Bunny brought him on stage at a three-night event in San Juan’s El Coliseo, that Guaynaa gained even more attention. Since then, a remix of ‘Rebota’ was released on Spotify in July 2019 with well-known artists Nicky Jam, Farruko, Becky G, and Sech.
On August 1st, he performed at the Academy LA nightclub next to the Museum of Death, but the crowd that evening was anything but dead. The night started at 10pm and included several DJs and another performer from El Salvador. It was not until 1am that Guaynaa appeared on stage and performed ‘Rebota’ followed by several other songs. He sported an LA Dodgers Jersey with the number 14 for Kike Hernandez, a current Dodgers player who is originally from Puerto Rico. According to Kike Hernandez’s Instagram, Guaynaa and Hernandez met that night before the concert at Dodger Stadium, after the Dodgers beat the Padres 8-2. If you are familiar with the traffic leaving Dodgers Stadium, it makes sense that Guaynaa did not perform until 1am.
The whole crowd sang along to his top-hit ‘Rebota’. Most of his other songs were not as well known because he is still on the rise, but the crowd still continued to dance to the Reggaeton beats. I look forward to seeing and hearing more from this artist in the future. #Mamarre!
The music video for Rebota can be found through this link on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmKAn1MeB04
edited by Leni Milliken.