Highlights
- Beyoncé recorded B’Day in roughly two weeks after finishing Dreamgirls
- She had not initially planned to make another album so soon and kept the project largely under wraps
- The record was completed ahead of schedule despite Beyoncé working with a huge team of producers and recording at multiple studios
Beyoncé’s new collaboration with Selena Quintanilla may have arrived 31 years after the Tejano star’s death, but their connection goes back much further than the new song.
As part of her B’Day 20th Anniversary Deluxe Edition, Beyoncé has released Irreemplazable (Como La Flor), which combines her Spanish version of Irreplaceable with Selena’s iconic Como La Flor. The collaboration was approved by Selena’s estate.
For Beyoncé, however, Selena was not simply another legendary singer whose vocals could be added to a track. She was an artist she encountered while growing up in Houston.
Beyoncé has previously recalled seeing Selena at The Galleria mall in Houston when she was around 12 years old. She recognised the singer but, as Beyoncé later explained, she was not famous herself at the time.
“I did actually meet Selena in The Galleria mall in Houston,” Beyoncé recalled in an MTV interview. She remembered seeing Selena, saying hello and carrying on without saying much.
The brief encounter would become part of a much bigger connection between the two Texas-born artists.
Selena’s influence followed Beyoncé into the recording studio
Beyoncé’s admiration for Selena did not end with that childhood meeting.
Growing up in Texas, Beyoncé heard Selena’s music on the radio and later drew inspiration from her when she began recording music in Spanish.
When Beyoncé worked on her Spanish-language Irreemplazable project in 2007, she recalled that listening to Selena had helped her with her pronunciation. She had grown up hearing the singer’s music even when she did not understand all of the words.
That connection is particularly significant because Irreemplazable (Como La Flor) now brings together two pieces of that history.
Beyoncé’s Spanish-language version of Irreplaceable was already connected to the B’Day era. Selena’s Como La Flor, meanwhile, is one of the songs most closely associated with her legacy. The new track places them side by side, turning Beyoncé’s long-standing admiration into an official musical collaboration.
The song is therefore less a conventional duet between two artists from the same generation and more a meeting between Beyoncé’s interpretation of Selena’s influence and Selena’s original voice.
A Houston connection comes full circle
There is another reason the collaboration carries extra weight: both singers are deeply associated with Texas.
Selena became one of the defining figures in Tejano music before her death in 1995 at just 23. Beyoncé was born and raised in Houston and went on to become one of the world's biggest pop and R&B stars.
Their paths briefly crossed when Beyoncé was still a child. Decades later, Beyoncé is now using Selena’s voice in a new recording, with her family and estate approving the collaboration.
The timing makes the moment even more striking. Beyoncé released the expanded B’Day edition on her 45th birthday, exactly 20 years after the original album arrived.
The anniversary collection contains plenty of new material, including the Maluma collaboration Cuerpo Tumbao (Get Me Bodied) and previously unreleased recordings. But the Selena track carries a story that stretches far beyond the album itself.
A young Beyoncé once saw Selena in a Houston mall and barely spoke to her. Years later, Selena’s music helped influence Beyoncé’s Spanish-language work. Now, the two artists are finally sharing a recording.
What began as a fleeting childhood encounter in Houston has, more than three decades later, become one of the most unexpected full-circle moments in Beyoncé’s career.
