Saturday night (Aug. 26) will go down in Grupo Firme‘s history as the group set a new record at the Feria Nacional Potosina with 300,000 fans in attendance at their concert, according to figures provided by the Coordinación Estatal de Protección Civil in San Luis Potosi, Mexico. The numbers also represent a new record for the group, which in 2022 gathered around 250,000 people in Mexico City’s Zócalo.
However, what will remain etched in the memory of fans aside from the music is that frontman Eduin Caz shocked followers with a revelation about his health. In the last year, Caz underwent cancer surgery after suffering from Barrett’s esophagus, a condition associated with an increased risk of developing esophageal cancer.
“I gathered the best doctors, God bless, and I had the surgery,” Caz said. “I never revealed it because I don’t like to be looked at like, ‘Oh, poor thing.’ But I just had a study done and I’m doing great.”
“He had a tumor and they removed it, a sign that we beat the cancer,” Vicente Zambrano, Grupo Firme’s publicist, clarified to Billboard Español on Monday (Aug. 28).
On July 30, Caz announced on social media as he celebrated his 30th birthday while touring in Costa Rica that once the trip was over he would take a break from his career but the group would remain intact. He did not specify the reason or how long he would take but said it was a personal matter.
“I lost many things that are not coming back. The truth is that I balance out everything I have lived through, and honestly, that was how things had to happen,” he said at the time. “But I think I need to go back to putting myself first, and to feel good about myself.”
Grupo Firme’s temporary hiatus comes at the conclusion of its Hay Que Conectarla stadium tour, which began April 15 in Washington, D.C., and traveled through 13 cities across the U.S. The stint continued through Central America on July 14 in Guatemala through El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica.
On Aug. 5, they performed at the Estadio Atanasio Girardot in Medellín, Colombia, for their only show in that country, where they had Maluma as their guest to perform the song “Cada Quien,” one of the many successful collaborations with which Grupo Firme helped put the regional Mexican genre on the global map.
On the Billboard charts, Grupo Firme reached No. 3 on Latin Airplay with “Que Onda Perdida” with Gerardo Coronel, which also topped the Regional Mexican Airplay chart for three weeks in July. Most recently, “El Amor De Su Vida” landed on the Billboard Global 200, where it debuted and peaked at No. 60 on the Aug. 19 chart.
On Oct. 5, Grupo Firme will compete for the Billboard Latin Music Award for tour of the year. To see the full list of 2023 finalists, click here.
