Ten years ago, Zhamira rose to fame as one of the finalists on the Univision music competition La Banda. After the show, she struggled to find her artistic identity and even considered quitting. But with encouragement from her husband, Jay Wheeler, the Puerto Rican star that she married in 2022, she decided to continue — and her 2025 debut album, Curita Para El Corazón, established her as one of pop’s breakout stars.
Jessi Uribe, like Zhamira, got his start on a music competition show — Caracol Televisión’s A Otro Nivel in 2017. His wife, Paola Jara, started in the music business as a teenager, eventually opening on tour for the legendary Vicente Fernández. A collaboration on “Como Si Nada” (for Jara’s fourth album) led them to fall in love, and they married three years later.
“Having Pao as my wife at home is lovely, but the added bonus of singing together really moves me,” Uribe says over Zoom with Jara in Medellín, Colombia, while Wheeler and Zhamira join together from Miami.
Wheeler feels similarly, while Zhamira says that in their relationship, “we are always trying to elevate each other.”
Both couples are now balancing the demands of their careers with raising young children — Wheeler and Zhamira have a 2-year-old daughter, Aiunii, while Jara and Uribe welcomed baby Emilia last November. On Oct. 21, they will all dive deeper into that balance during the Love and Music panel at Billboard Latin Music Week.
Related
What are the best and worst aspects of working together as married couples?
Paola Jara: Almost everyone asks, “Don’t you get tired of each other, working in the same field?” But I actually feel the opposite is true. Being able to share those same schedules, having the same passion and truly understanding what the other person is talking about — that’s a real plus.
Jay Wheeler: The worst part for me will always be having to deal with the fallout; since I’m [helping with] many aspects of her project, whenever she gets upset, it all lands on me.
Zhamira: Since he’s my husband and we work together, he’s my confidant. With him, I don’t need a filter. And after I’ve let it all out, I can go give him a kiss. We have the openness to tell each other, “That doesn’t work.” It helps us grow.
Do you share professional teams — and if so, have you seen benefits or detriments?
Jessi Uribe: Sharing team members really didn’t work out well for us at all. There are people who make it look like a competition — and I don’t like that. At one point, I felt that tension: We’re a couple, living together 24/7, yet people wanted to pit us against each other. But the truth is, she will never be a rival to me, nor I to her. That is not possible.
Wheeler: Same thing happened to me. There are certain people on my team who just don’t mesh with my wife — with her mindset or the way she works. I’m just more relaxed. Part of my team has had to adapt to Zhamira, and they did.
Zhamira: But amidst all that, I think there’s huge value in being on the same team; if we were with completely different labels or teams, scheduling would be much more complicated.
As first-time parents, what has been your biggest challenge professionally?
Uribe: In Colombian popular music, we can easily end up doing 20 shows a month. So there’s the issue of not knowing where to leave our daughter, especially since some of the venues where we perform aren’t exactly safe. That has been the hardest part for us.
Wheeler: It’s really complicated for us, since we expose our daughter to social media. [Fans] say things like, “Oh, I want a photo with her, I want a video with her.” She’s famous because of me, so we try to let the world know: “Thank you for loving my daughter, but she’s still a baby, so be careful.”
Do you have any advice for young musician couples trying to make it work in this industry?
Zhamira: Be a couple first. It’s very easy to lose your way amidst the hustle, fame and constant changes. If we have a strong foundation at home, then everything else becomes secondary.
Uribe: The best advice that has worked for me is to always keep God at the center of our lives.
Jara: That is the best formula. We also try to coordinate where each of us will be, so we can join forces when possible.
This story appears in the Oct. 10, 2026, issue of Billboard.