Check Out Machiran’s Story

Today we’d like to introduce you to Machiran.

Hi Machiran, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
I’m Machiran, a Cuban singer, songwriter, and performer, born on July 19, 1998, in Santos Suárez, Havana. For as long as I can remember, I’ve known I wanted to be an artist. As a child I danced and acted, but at eight years old, the first time I stepped onto a stage to sing, I discovered that my voice would be my path. I took part in every festival and cultural event throughout my school years, and as a teenager I joined the ensemble of a professional choir, where my professional training began. Over the years, I collaborated on and founded several musical projects that shaped me into the artist I am today.

In 2022, I launched my solo career. Over the next two years, I began hearing my name in more and more places, and people would stop me on the street because of my first single, “Alex.” Thanks to that song, the U.S. Embassy in Cuba recognized me as one of the new faces of the LGBTQ+ community in music, and through one of its programs, I was granted a visa. With it, I arranged a cultural exchange and traveled to the United States in 2024, fully intending to return home, because Cuba is where my mother, my family, and the beginning of everything are. But the crisis on the island deepened, and I decided that if I had to make sacrifices to support my family and pursue my dreams, it would no longer be there.

I stayed in New York. I’ve worked in construction, cleaned houses, done moving jobs, tended bar, and made sandwiches, but I have never stopped being the artist I was born to be. This city has placed me in rooms and in front of people I had only ever seen in my dreams. Here, I’ve learned that we only grow when we’re willing to break and rebuild ourselves.

Today, after two years without returning to Cuba or hugging my mother, my dream is still alive. With a new structure I’ve built and the doors I’ve knocked on, 2027 will bring new music and another chapter of Machiran’s universe.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
It hasn’t been an easy road at all. When I chose to love art, I never imagined money would become such a big obstacle. That wasn’t the picture I had in my head. Still, if I were born again, I would choose to be an artist all over again, despite everything.

I’ve been writing songs since I was eight years old, and I’ve always dreamed of recording them, of being on TV more often, of traveling the world telling my story and connecting with people. But where I come from, there was no money to invest in building a music catalog. Even when my career started generating some income, I almost always had to put that money toward supporting my life, and that meant taking on certain roles and responsibilities for my family too.

Still, I always had my family’s support. My mother is a highly educated woman. She holds degrees in biochemistry and clinical laboratory science, plus a specialization in cytogenetics. She traded her white coat for cleaning floors so she could pay for my singing lessons.

The second obstacle has been the system itself. Cuba has no real music industry, yet to work as a singer there, you need the government, the Cuban Music Institute, and a commercial agency willing to represent you to all recognize that you have the ability and the legal standing to be an artist. Without that endorsement, you can run into legal trouble. But being an artist is something you’re born with, and no one can ever take that away. I was an independent artist in Cuba, and I still am today.

Those have been the two biggest obstacles in my career. The economic one still is.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
My music is the fusion of my roots and my influences: it’s where bolero, rumba, and filin, which my ancestors carried to the world, meet R&B, pop, and dance. It’s my way of feeling Cuba: from what I inherited, through what I’m living today, and toward the future. I think people recognize me for my stage presence and for doing it all as who I truly am, without hiding anything. In Cuba, many people first knew me as the lead singer of Bocarriba, one of the bands I founded. Others knew me from jumping on stage to sing at friends’ concerts, or as the friend and classmate I was during my school years. And others came to know me through “Alex,” my first single, and the concerts I gave during my last two years in Havana. From each of those worlds, a community has formed that has supported my growth and witnessed it along the way. That’s what I’m proudest of, along with carrying my country’s name onto every stage I perform on and hearing how much people admire the place I come from. Above all, I’m proud to make my mother proud: to know that every sacrifice she and I have made has paid off, and that I haven’t let her down, neither in the education she gave me nor in everything she has done for me. More than standing out, what I strive for is to represent. Through my experience as a Black, Latino, queer, and immigrant man, I bring Cuba to the center of pop and R&B. I don’t make museum-piece Cuban music, or pop that could have come from anywhere: I do both at once. My image and my style are also part of my universe, so when I step on stage, the voice, the presence, and the story all come together.

If you had to, what characteristic of yours would you give the most credit to?
For me, there are three essential qualities for success. The first is identity, because authenticity comes with it. The second is flexibility. Things don’t always happen when we want them to; they come at the right time, and all we have to do is learn to flow along the way. You have to be flexible in character, know how to play the cards life deals you, and move along the paths that open up. The third is consistency, which goes hand in hand with discipline. If this is what you want, work for it and stay consistent, because so often, right when you decide to stop because you’re tired, that’s when the opportunity arrives. We never know when it’s going to come, and that’s why we have to keep going.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/machiran_oficial/?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet
• Youtube: https://youtu.be/th09K42_95k?si=UXp3S8dCxH1U3ho8
• Other: https://open.spotify.com/intl-es/artist/2G9YVfs6LKoJeFnGj4K3yx?si=m5lAIRSBTdGEX7-RtWUH5g