The hottest stars of Latin music strutted down the red carpet last night in South Florida, for the annual Billboard Latin Music Awards. Host Michel Martin checks in with NPR Music's Alt.Latino co-host Jasmine Garsd to take a look at the winners, the losers, and the surprising snubs. Copyright 2012 National Public Radio. For personal, noncommercial use only. See Terms of Use. For other uses, prior permission required. MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: The stars of Latin American music were in the Miami area last night for the 2012 Billboard Latin Music Awards. We've been previewing the awards all week with Jasmine Garsd. She's the co-host of NPR's ALT.LATINO podcast. Now it's time for a review. Jasmine's in the studio once again after watching - what was it - five hours of the show? JASMINE GARSD, BYLINE: It certainly felt like it. MARTIN: Was it five? GARSD: No. I don't think it was five, but it definitely felt like an all-nighter. MARTIN: So who were the big winners? G...

Univision will as usual punctuate its upfront presentation with an A-list musical performance. This year, not only will the top-rated Spanish language broadcaster have Pitbull entertaining Madison Ave. executives, but the rapper will share the bill with Shakira . The announcement came Tuesday morning via an internal video message from Univision news anchors Jorge Ramos and Maria Elena Salinas .Univision is known for its lively upfront presentations. Pitbull performed last year and Ricky Martin was the musical act in 2010. With the U.S. Hispanic population surpassing 50 million, according to the 2010 Census, Spanish-language media is on a major growth curve. And Univision expects to write double-digit gains in upfront sales this year. Last year, Spanish language media raked in $2.15 billion at the upfront with Univision accounting for $1.75 billion of that total. It was a new upfront record for Spanish-language networks, but still a fraction of $9.2 billion take for English-language...

The hottest stars of Latin music strutted down the red carpet last night in South Florida, for the annual Billboard Latin Music Awards. Host Michel Martin checks in with NPR Music's Alt.Latino co-host Jasmine Garsd to take a look at the winners, the losers, and the surprising snubs.

Shakira was one of the big winners at the 2012 Billboard Latin Music Awards. The Colombian pop star whose hits include Whenever, Wherever and Underneath Your Clothes took home four gongs from the ceremony in Miami. Puerto Rican native Don Omar and the Bronxs Prince Royce took top honours as they each received eight awards. They are among a growing group of Latin artists who mix English and Spanish into their songs. Mexicos Mana took home five awards, while Jennifer Lopez ex-husband Marc Anthony received a Billboard Hall of Fame Award for his global, artistic influence. Billboard winners are selected based on sales and radio airplay.

Shakira broke up with her longtime beau broke up in early 2011, so this year the petite singer made Zimbio's 100 Hottest Celebrity Couples list with a new man, soccer star Gerard Pique . They placed at No. 32 with the help of popularity and good looks. Shakira kisses Gerard Pique (Bauer Griffin) There might be 15 inches and 10 years between them (she's 5-foot-1 and 35, he's 6-foot-4 and 25), but they do have some serious chemistry. They love showing off for the cameras, perhaps a little too much. Apparently some vacation pictures of the couple got the Barcelona player in some hot water with his team in March. But these two started dating soon after Shakira split from Antonio de la Rua after 11 years, and rebound relationships rarely last. Just ask Jennifer Lopez . Speaking of J. Lo, she also made our list with a new man this year. She and Marc Anthony rounded out the top 10 on last year's list and a lot has changed since then. The couple split in July 2011 and by t...

As The Huffington Post reported, Latin American pop superstar Shakira joined over 30 world leaders at the 6th annual Summit of the Americas held over the weekend in Cartagena, Colombia, to advocate for children. At the summit focused on regional integration, poverty reduction and drugs, the Colombian singer -- the most recent addition to President Barack Obama's Advisory Commission on Educational Excellence for Hispanics -- was there to promote universal early childhood development and the eradication of poverty. Taking the stage alongside President Obama and Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos on Sunday, Shakira, 35, reflected over the successes of the summit, stating that she felt "optimistic" about the "commitment of the presidents to work on education and early childhood development". She added that this was the first time in history that the issue of early education had been treated so directly in a Summit of the Ame...

AFP Relax News Mon, Apr 16, 2012 American singer Britney Spears has overtaken Colombian singer Shakira to become the fifth most followed person on microblogging site Twitter. This week, Britney Spears fan count has topped 15.6 million fans while Shakira is sporting close to 15.5 million followers on the site. Theres been movement in the charts over on Sina Weibo (the Chinese-language alternative to Twitter) too, with Chinese actress Zhao Wei overtaking Taiwanese TV host Kevin Tsai to become the sixth most popular user on the platform. The fight for fifth, sixth and seventh places on Sina Weibo is a close one. Leehom Wang, Zhao Wei and Kevin Tsai are all within 200,000 fans of each other. Canadian pop star Justin Bieber has become the second ever Twitter user to hit the 20 million follower milestone. He marked the record by tweeting 20 MILLION STRONG! U MAKE ME SMILE! Rihanna welcomed her 17 millionth follower with 17 million #NAVYDEEP ! Thank you, and welcome to the fam. The an...