Jesuán arrived in Colombia fleeing the crisis and seeking his dream of becoming a singer. Now, after being discovered by a young artist promoter in the middle of his days on public transport, he is about to achieve it.
Jesús Jiménez grew up in Puertos de Altagracia, in the Venezuelan state of Zulia. He lived in his grandparents’ house and remembers having a happy childhood. At the age of 2, while she was singing a song from a novel, her mother began to discover that she had a particular talent. And so he began to believe it. He was in charge of livening up family parties, performing at cultural events at school, and was part of bagpipe musical groups. Childhood and adolescence are full of music and art.
Parallel to his studies of social communication and journalism, he managed a liquor store to help out at home. And just at that time, he felt the need to be part of the change that began to take shape to face the crisis that his country has gone through and that has forced millions of people to emigrate. Together with some colleagues, he founded a student front, the first of the private universities.
Through politics and peaceful demonstrations, they differentiated themselves from the popularly called ‘guarimbas’, resistance groups against the government that blocks streets in protest. With a passion for politics and his interest in changing the situation that was getting worse and worse, in an act of hope, he supported a candidacy for popular office that they ended up losing.
“They stole the elections from us and at that moment I stopped believing. I felt that my homeland was being killed and that I couldn’t do anything, that the government was not going to be able to change and that I couldn’t do it anymore,” Jesús recalls about that painful 2018.
With immense disillusionment and tiredness of the situation, at the age of 25, he undertook the trip to Colombia together with a cousin. They arrived in Maicao without having a stamp in their passport, which forced them to present themselves before Migration Colombia to legalize their entry into the country.
New Directions
After 19 hours of travel, they arrived in Bogota to meet another cousin who had promised to help them while they found work. But this relative never arrived at the meeting at the terminal. They were left, as he says, stranded in an unknown city and without enough money to pay rent.
After several phone calls, it was a friend who reached out to them and allowed them to get to his house in the Divino Niño sector, in Ciudad Bolivar, south of Bogotá.
There they began their search for a job. He worked as a kitchen assistant but things did not work out for her: she ended up unemployed and with many economic difficulties.
It was at the invitation of a friend of his that he decided to get on a TransMilenio bus for the first time to sing. “I felt in my heart that the Lord was encouraging me and I dared to do it. Now I was going to be the person who would get on the bus, perhaps to annoy the passengers, and that’s why I tried to look good to sell talent and not pity,” he says.
She remembers with nostalgia that first time singing in TransMilenio because she never imagined she would get to be in that situation. “I released the first song and when I finished I cried like a child. I didn’t believe it but people liked it,” he says, moved by what became his job.
And so, with his early morning commute on the capital’s mass transit system, he stayed for several months. But love called him to another city. “I went to Villavicencio after the one who is now the love of my life. And there I started from scratch again,” he says gracefully. In the capital of Meta, he started singing on city buses and selling candy in the streets. He knew he had to start somewhere to fulfill his dream.
On one of those days, Miguel Ávila, who today is his manager, heard his voice and immediately proposed working together. “A young man approached me and told me he wanted to talk to me because he liked the way I sang. He proposed to work together because he wanted to be an artist manager,” says Jesús, who only hesitated for a couple of minutes before accepting the invitation.
Thus began what they both consider a brotherly relationship. “I almost cried when I heard him sing, it gave me a lot of feeling to see such a talented person singing on the buses. I wanted to support him in any way I could and after two months we were able to start opening doors,” says Avila.
Cristian Díaz soon joined this team to be his producer and to look for opportunities in events and radio stations. The goal was for more people to get to know their talent and become interested in their music. With that goal in mind, they recorded a cover of the song ‘No te vas’ by Venezuelan singer Nacho, who ended up promoting Jesuan through his social networks after learning about his interpretation. From then on, social networks have become a platform for the diffusion of his music.
Prophet in distant lands
Richard Jiménez, his father, told us that in Colombia they found what their own homeland denied them: an opportunity. “I am a Venezuelan who is grateful to Colombia for all the opportunities they have given my son. He is a very talented boy with an interpretative facility who today is fulfilling his dreams,” he says.
Jesús bet on salsa and dreams of sharing the stage with Oscar de León and Gilberto Santa Rosa. In this genre, he released his first single, Corazón de Acero, which he considers his anthem. “To record that song we had the support of many people who came together and helped with makeup, models, and production. God has always given me the tools and has put very good people in my path,” says the artist.
Despite all the difficulties and the arrival of the pandemic, he has made a place for himself in nightclubs and radio stations in Villavicencio. The work has been hard and he has had to make sacrifices he never thought of making. But he is living his dream in the country that welcomed him and has given him opportunities.
“I miss getting up in the morning and seeing the beach in Maracaibo. I miss my old Venezuela. Colombia has been like a surrogate mother and I hope that God allows me to return to my country with my talent,” says this young man of just 28 years.
He is projected as one of the most popular artists in the department of Meta and hopes to be a recognized salsa performer in Colombia and Venezuela, not only to show his talent to many people but also to be able to return the help that many have given him along the way.
Today, he says, he hopes that the Colombian flavor will also fill his music with new styles, and with it, he hopes to give back some of what Colombia has allowed him: to fly to fulfill his dreams.
