Rubén Blades Bellido de Luna (born 16 July 1948), known professionally as Rubén Blades (Spanish: [ruˈβem ˈblaðes], but [- ˈblei̯ðs] in Panama and within the family), is a Panamanian musician, singer, composer, actor, activist, and politician, performing musically most often in the salsa, and Latin jazz genres. As a songwriter, Blades brought the lyrical sophistication of Central American nueva canción and Cuban nueva trova as well as experimental tempos and politically inspired Son Cubano salsa to his music, creating "thinking persons' (salsa) dance music". Blades has written dozens of hit songs, including "Pedro Navaja" and "El Cantante" (which became Héctor Lavoe's signature song). He has received 21 Grammy Award nominations, winning twelve of them, along with twelve Latin Grammy Awards.
His acting career began in 1983, and has continued, sometimes with several-year breaks to focus on other projects. He has prominent roles in films such as Crossover Dreams (1985), The Milagro Beanfield War (1988), The Super (1991), Predator 2 (1990), Color of Night (1994), Safe House (2012), The Counselor (2013) and Hands of Stone (2016), along with three Emmy Award nominations for his performances in The Josephine Baker Story (1991), Crazy from the Heart (1992), and The Maldonado Miracle (2003). He portrayed Daniel Salazar, a main character on the TV series Fear the Walking Dead (2015–2017; 2019–2023).
In 1994, Blades managed to attract 17% of the vote in a failed attempt to win the Panamanian presidency. In September 2004, he was appointed minister of tourism by Panamanian president Martín Torrijos for a five-year term.
He made his U.S. debut with the Pete Rodriguez orchestra in 1970 on his album De Panamá a New York and among his most successful albums are Rubén Blades y Son del Solar... Live!, Amor y Control, Caminando, Salswing!, Son de Panamá, Tangos, Canciones del Solar de los Aburridos, Buscando América, El Que la Hace la Paga, Escenas, Salsa Big Band, Metiendo Mano! and his famous album Siembra released in 1978. In addition, he has collaborated with different artists such as Usher, Elvis Costello, as a soloist and as a guest Michael Jackson, Luis Miguel, Julio Iglesias, Ricky Martin, Juan Gabriel, Laura Pausini, Shakira, Thalía in the Spanish version of the song "What More Can I Give" written and translated by Blades as "Todo Para Ti". He has also participated in several productions by different Latino artists such as "Almost Like Praying", "Color Esperanza 2020", and "Hoy Es Domingo", among other tracks.
Blades was born in Panama City, Panama. He is the son of Cuban musician and actress Anoland Díaz (her real surname is Bellido de Luna), and Colombian Rubén Darío Blades Sr., an athlete, a percussionist and a graduate of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics in Washington, D.C. His younger brother, Roberto Blades, is also a musician. His mother's great-uncle, Juan Bellido de Luna, was active in the Cuban revolutionary movement against Spain and was a writer and publisher in New York City. Blades's paternal grandfather, was thought to be Rubén Blades, an English-speaking native of St. Lucia who came to Panama as an accountant. However, in 2025 it was revealed on Finding Your Roots that Blades is actually the grandson of poet Ricardo Miró. Blades says that the man he thought was his grandfather had come to Panama to work on the Panama Canal, as he states in the song "West Indian Man" on the album Amor y Control ("That's where the Blades comes from") (1992). He explains the source and the pronunciation () of his family surname, which is of English origin, in his web show Show De Ruben Blades (SDRB). Additionally, on Finding Your Roots it was revealed that Amelia Denis de Icaza, the first Panamanian woman to publish her poems, was the aunt of Ricardo Miró, making her Blades's great-aunt.
In Blades's early days, he was a vocalist in Los Salvajes del Ritmo, and also a songwriter and guest singer with a popular Latin music conjunto (ensemble), Bush y sus Magníficos. His strongest influence of the day was the Joe Cuba sextet and Cheo Feliciano, whose singing style he copied to the point of imitating his voice tone and vocal range.
Blades earned multiple degrees in political science and law at the Universidad Nacional de Panamá and performed legal work at the Bank of Panama as a law student.
Blades' first recording in the US was the solo album De Panamá a New York, with the Pete Rodriguez Orchestra, which included original compositions such as "Juan Gonzalez", "Descarga Caliente" and "De Panamá a New York", recorded in 1969 at The Sound Factory studio in California and released by New York City-based label Alegre Records in 1970. He then returned to Panamá and finished his degree.
In 1974, he moved to the United States, initially staying with his exiled parents in Miami, Florida, before moving to New York City where he began working in the mailroom at Fania Records. Soon Blades was working with salseros Ray Barretto and Larry Harlow. Shortly thereafter, Blades started collaborating with trombonist and bandleader Willie Colón. They recorded several albums together and participated in albums by plena singer Mon Rivera and the Fania All Stars.
Blades's first notable hit was a song on the 1977 album Metiendo Mano that he had composed in 1968, "Pablo Pueblo", a meditation about a working-class father who returns to his home after a long day at work. The song later became his unofficial campaign song when he ran for president of Panama. The Colón and Blades recording on the same album of Tite Curet Alonso's composition, "Plantación Adentro", which dealt with the brutal treatment of Indian natives in Latin America's colonial times, was a hit in various Caribbean countries. He wrote and performed several songs with the Fania All Stars and as a guest on other artists' releases, including the hits "Paula C", written about a girlfriend at the time; "Juan Pachanga", about a party animal who buries his pain for a lost love in dance and drink; and "Sin Tu Cariño", a love song, featuring a bomba break. The latter two songs feature piano solos by the Puerto Rican pianist Papo Lucca.
In 1978, Blades wrote the song "El Cantante"; Colón convinced him to give the song to Colón's former musical partner, Héctor Lavoe, to record, since Lavoe's nickname was already "El Cantante de los Cantantes" ("the singer of singers"). Lavoe recorded it that same year, and it became both a big hit and Lavoe's signature song; a biographical film about Lavoe took the same title. (The film El Cantante, starring executive producer Marc Anthony and then wife Jennifer López, told a fictionalized version of this story, in which Blades tells Lavoe he wrote the song for him.)
The Colón and Blades album Siembra (1978) became the best-selling salsa record in history, with Blades writing all but one of the songs. It has sold over 3 million copies, and almost all of its songs were hits at one time or another in various Latin American countries. Its most famous song was "Pedro Navaja", a song inspired by the 1928 song "Mack the Knife"; it tells the story of a neighborhood thug who is killed by a street walker who knows him (he stabs her, she shoots him, they both die, a bum finds them, and takes their belongings). The song inspired a 1980 Puerto Rican musical, La verdadera historia de Pedro Navaja, and a 1984 Mexican film, Pedro Navaja, neither of which had Blades' involvement. Blades wrote and sang a sequel song, "Sorpresas", (surprises) on his 1985 album, Escenas, which revealed that Pedro had survived the incident and was still alive.
Blades became dissatisfied with Fania and tried to terminate his contract, but was legally obliged to record several more albums, released after his departure.
His 1981 song "Tiburón" (with Willie Colon) protested against military interventions by the United States (the metaphorical "shark" in the song's title) in Latin America. It received little airplay in the US because of its controversial political message, with Blades being accused of sympathizing with communism and becoming particularly unpopular with the Cuban community in Miami. Blades would later state that "I was out of the radio for fifteen years in [the US] because of 'Tiburon'." Although he explicitly characterized "Tiburón" as "an anti-imperialist song", he also sought to distance himself from radical Anti-Americanism among the Latin American Left. A 2016 study concluded that "Regardless of his constant efforts not to be cornered ideologically [...] Blades always identified himself as a Panamanian and a Latin Americanist", inspired by Simón Bolívar.