Echo a volar is a fantastic phrase that literally translates to "I throw to fly," but idiomatically means "to take flight" or "to start flying." The structure echar a + [verb] is a common way in Spanish to express the beginning of an action.
In this upbeat song, Alvaro Soler uses it to capture a feeling of pure freedom and spontaneity. He sings about putting his hands in the air and deciding to just fly, leaving all complications behind. It’s the perfect expression for starting a new, carefree adventure.
Spanish singer Alvaro Soler kicks off "Volar" by tossing all his worries out the window. Right from the opening line, Hoy me levanto sin pensar / Voy a dejarlo todo y luego yo ("Today I get up without thinking / I'm going to leave everything behind and then..."), he decides to stop overthinking and just live. He uses the metaphor of flight—echo a volar ("I take off flying")—to describe that weightless feeling when you decide not to complicate your life. Instead of being stuck looking backward, he tells us to stop wondering about what could have been (para de pensar / En que podría haber sido ["stop thinking about what could have been"]) and look at the future knocking on the door.
The energy in the chorus is all about motion and pure optimism. When he sings Volar con el viento / Y sentir que se para el tiempo ("Fly with the wind / And feel time stand still"), he creates an image of speeding through the streets so fast that houses blur together (las casas quedan atrás / Desenfocado ya ["the houses stay behind / already out of focus"]). His motto is straightforward: Ni un minuto que perder ("Not a single minute to lose"). It is an upbeat, breezy pop track that invites you to chase the clouds and enjoy the ride without looking back.
Álvaro Soler was ten when his family moved to Tokyo, and seventeen when he came back to Catalonia with piano lessons and most of a second childhood behind him. He was born in Sant Cugat del Vallès in 1991, formed the band Urban Lights in 2010 with his brother and a few friends, reached the final eight of the talent show ¡Tú sí que vales! with them in 2013, and left in 2014 to work on his own.
The song that broke him was "El mismo sol" in 2015, a number one in Italy and Switzerland that was re-recorded as a bilingual version with Jennifer Lopez. "Sofia" did it again a year later, topping the charts in Italy, Poland, Belgium and Switzerland and going platinum several times over in Italy. His albums are Eterno agosto (2015), Mar de colores (2018), which carried "La cintura", Magia (2021) and El Camino (2025). He records in Spanish, English, Italian and German, wrote "Yo contigo, tú conmigo" with Morat for Despicable Me 3, and has coached on the German edition of The Voice Kids.