Juan Luis Londoño Arias, better known as Maluma, is a Colombian singer of pop, reggaeton, and Latin trap, born in Medellín, Colombia, on January 28, 1994. His stage name is derived from the first two letters of his mother Marlli’s name, his father Luis, and his sister Manuela. After dedicating more than 8 years to soccer, a sport he is passionate about and in which his father hoped he would become a successful athlete, he decided in 2010, at the age of 16, to start taking vocal lessons to turn his life around and fully commit to singing, which has undoubtedly propelled him to stardom.
In 2011, he released the single "Farandulera," which catapulted him to fame in Colombia and attracted the attention of Sony Music, with whom he signed a recording contract in mid that same year. Following this, he released other tracks like "Loco," "Obsesión," and "Pasarla bien," which were well-received until the release of his first album "Magia" in 2012, achieving more than ten thousand copies sold in his home country.
With the song "La Temperatura," in 2013, he topped the charts in the United States and Latin America, and received a Latin Grammy nomination in 2013 for Best New Artist.
With a career that was starting to take off and after the release of his second album, Pretty Boy, Dirty Boy (2015), which features the song "Solos" recorded with the Cuban artist El Micha, Maluma released the single "Felices los cuatro" at the beginning of 2017. This song propelled him to fame, and its music video became the most viewed Latin video in the world within its first 24 hours, earning the singer a Vevo certification.
The bold lyrics that describe the love triangle between Maluma and a married woman, played by the Cuban-Croatian model Natalia Barulich, who later became his partner, do not go unnoticed. In the middle of that same year, Marc Anthony recorded a salsa version with the artist and appears in the music video for this version, filmed a month later.
Both versions are part of their third single, F.A.M.E., which won the Latin Grammy for "Best Contemporary Pop Vocal Album" and achieved Gold and Platinum certifications in various countries around the world due to the number of copies sold.
The friendship between Maluma and Marc Anthony has developed over the years, and it is common to see them sharing stages and projects. In 2019, the Colombian wrote the lyrics for the song "Parecen Viernes," a single that is part of the American artist's thirteenth studio album, "Opus."
In 2019, one of the most significant collaborations in the singer's career took place as he became part of Madonna's album Madame X. Medellín, the album's first single, reached the eighteenth spot on the Hot Latin Songs chart and became Madonna's 47th number one on the Dance Club Songs chart, further extending her record as the artist with the most entries at the top of that list. Two months later, also from the same album, the artists reunited for the song Bitch I'm loca.
That same year, in 2019, the Colombian artist released his fourth album, 11:11, under the Sony Music Latin label. The album features collaborations with Ricky Martin, Ozuna, Nicky Jam, Zion & Lennox, Sech, Ty Dolla $ign, Chencho Corleone from Plan B, Farina, and includes another song with Madonna, titled "Soltera."
Among his most notable collaborations is "Clandestino," featuring Shakira in June 2018. Rolling Stone ranked the song sixth on its list of the 20 Best Latin Singles of 2018, and it reached number 14 in Billboard's critics' choice for the 20 Best Latin Songs of 2018.
In 2018, he was selected by People magazine as the sexiest man in the world.
In 2019, as a guest on the famous show Jimmy Fallon's The Tonight Show, he confessed to the host that he would like to have a musical collaboration with Justin Timberlake, whom he cited as an influence on his musical style.
In 2019, he began filming his first movie, Marry Me, alongside Jennifer Lopez and American actor Owen Wilson, marking the Colombian artist's debut in cinema. In September 2020, Lopez announced via her social media that she was collaborating with Maluma on two tracks, Pa 'ti and Lonely, which will likely be part of the soundtrack for the film in which both of them star, although it does not yet have a release date.
