Biography of Carlos Santana

Biography of Carlos Santana

A short biography of an amazing guitarist, with a unique sound on his amplifier, a pioneer for pure instrumental music

            It was a remarkable performance at Woodstock in 1969 that Carlos Santana and his band, Santana Blues Band, realized that they have a space  in International music industry and . Carlos, together with his other band members, David Brown and Gregg Rollie, awed the crowd in that music festival playing blues, salsa and jazz fusion since then he had captured the hearts of guitar enthusiasts around the world.  

            To be able to play violin and guitar at such an early age is a talent he inherited from his father but his skills about application of guitar soloing and style was from his guitar teacher, Javier Batiz, a well known guitarist from Tijuana.  Before they were in this town, his family were originally from in Autllan de Navarro, Jalisco, Mexico. Looking back to his childhood years in his home town, this Mexican American guitarist was greatly influenced by Ritchie Valens, the artist behind the hit “La Bamba”.  He was also a big fan of BB King, Lee Hooker and T bone Walker.  When the young Carlos moved to San Francisco to follow his family he was exposed to a variety of music and since  then he has fallen in love with jazz and folk music.

  After their performance for the Woodstock Festival, where they gave their audience a dose of Latin music with his distinct style of guitar playing, Santana and his band got their first contract with Columbia Records. It was a self-titled album that ranked number 4 on the Billboard 200 and in 2003 it was listed 150th on Rolling Stones Magazine’s 500 greatest albums of all time.

In 1971, while they are doing their third album, Neil Schon joined the group as the second lead guitarist. This decision gave the group a thicker and flavorful music resulting another victory for them. The album sold more than 2 million copies and has reached number 1 on the charts. Along with these success conflicts arise, there have been financial breaks, drug addiction issues Involving David Brown and differences between Santana and Michael Carabello. When the two members David and Michael, decided to leave the group, Carlos continued playing with the other members.

The year 1973 was Santana’s love year. It was when he and Deborah King, daughter of the late blue artist Saunders King, met and get married in the same year. The two have three kids Salvador, Stella and Angelica. Doing charity work for people who are in need are the things that Deborah taught her husband. The two of them founded Milagro Foundation focusing on educational and financial assistance for the needy.

After 22 years, Santana decided to move from Columbia Records to Polygram. It took him a while before his big comeback came. It was his 1999 album “Supernatural” that brought him back to the charts. He’s worked with mostly younger artists but it was  the song “Smooth” that was co-written and sung by Rob Thomas that stayed on the Billboard Hot 100 for twelve weeks at number one. The legend’s career revival opened a lot of gates to him and most important he, again proved the world  that a true and raw talent is timeless.