SESAC Latina Celebrated Its 2018 Honorees at the Historic Beverly Hills Hotel Last Night

SONGWRITER OF THE YEAR: EDÈN MUÑOZ, HIS FIRST IN THIS CATEGORY 

SONG OF THE YEAR: “DESPACITO” CO- WRITTEN BY ERIKA ENDER

PUBLISHER OF THE YEAR:  SONY/ATV

GLOBAL ICON AWARD:  ERIKA ENDER

SESAC Latina celebrated the worldwide successes of its songwriters and publishers at its annual SESAC LATINA MUSIC AWARDS last night at the Beverly Hills Hotel.  SESAC Latina, the music rights organization, presented its performance awards, television awards, and top honors to its affiliate songwriters and publishers.

On hand to present the awards were Celeste Zendejas, Director of SESAC Latina, Sam Kling, SESAC’s Senior Vice President of Creative Operations and Eliezer Ponce, Associate Director of SESAC Latina.  During the course of the evening, SESAC executives gave a special thanks to the event’s official sponsor, City National Bank, as well as presenting sponsor Sound Royalties.

Edén Muñoz was awarded his first-ever Songwriter of the Year award for hit songs he penned for Julión Álvarez, Calibre 50, Banda Carnaval and others.  Muñoz is the songwriter and lead singer of the superstar group Calibre 50, and this year was nominated for Songwriter of the Year at the Billboard Latin Music Awards.

In the category of Song of the Year, which is determined by the longevity of a song’s presence on the charts, the SESAC Latina Award went to “Despacito”, recorded by Luis Fonsi & Daddy Yankee feat. Justin Bieber, written by Erika Ender.

In addition, SONY/ATV was named Publisher of the Year.  With his team accepting in person at the celebration, Jorge Mejia, President of SONY/ATV Music Publishing for Latin America and U.S. Latin, addressed the audience via video.

Acclaimed Mexican singer-songwriter Christian Nodal performed an incredible set of his top hits including “Me Dejé Llevar”, “Adiós Amor” and “Probablemente”, the last two were #1 on the Billboard Regional Mexican chart for which Nodal won a SESAC Latina performance award as songwriter. Earlier this month at the Billboard Latin Music Awards 2018, Nodal received the award for Regional Mexican Song of the Year for his hit “Adiós Amor”.  He also took home the awards for Regional Mexican Artist of the Year, Solo and Artist of the Year, New.  In addition, SESAC’s Celeste Zendejas, Director, Creative Services, surprised Nodal with a #1 Award for his song “Me Dejé Llevar” earlier this month at the SESAC Latina office in Santa Monica, California.

Latin GRAMMY® winner and GRAMMY® nominee Erika Ender was honored with the SESAC Latina Global Icon Award.  As a singer-songwriter, Ender has released six studio albums and songs that she has written are featured on more than 140 albums, and 40 of them have topped charts around the world.  Ender’s place in the history books has been secured by her song “Despacito” which she wrote with Luis Fonsi.  The ground-breaking song has been streamed over 7.5 billion times, including 1.9 billion times on Spotify and more than 5.6 billion views on YouTube, and has influenced the acceptance of Spanish language music around the globe.

Additional winners include Luciano Luna, last year’s Songwriter of the Year, Nicky Jam, Joey Montana, Tony Montoya, Juan Diego Medina and others.

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