Photo: Kanya Iwana / Courtesy of Sabrina ClaudioĬlaudio also credits her stylist, Kristine Urzua, with cultivating her newfound interest in fashion. I would find a random instrumental that I thought was super dope, and I would fit the melody over it.” “Still, growing up in that environment helped me musically because it influenced certain sounds. “I love the type of music that comes out of Miami, but it’s not the artist that I want to be,” she says. Claudio ultimately put dancing aside when she began covering songs on YouTube and Twitter at the age of 14 (a quick search produces covers of Gnarls Barkley’s “ Crazy,” Willow Smith’s “ Female Energy,” and Beyoncé’s “ Heaven,” among many others), but salsa and merengue’s sensual rhythms had stuck with her by that point. “Dancing was what I thought I would be doing for the rest of my life,” she explains.

As a teenager in Miami with Hispanic roots-she’s half-Cuban and half–Puerto Rican-she grew up listening and learning how to dance salsa and merengue. It’s a simple concept, but one that extends beyond “Stand Still.” Specifically, “movement” may seem like a one-off idea explored in a very physical way through dance, but “moving”-both figuratively and literally-is what has allowed Claudio to chase her career and what sets her apart from other singers.

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