Carlos Santana Barragan

Carlos Alberto Santana Barragán (born July 20, 1947) is a Mexican rock guitarist. Santana became famous in the late 1960s and early 1970s with his band, Santana, which pioneered rock, salsa and jazzfusion. The band's sound featured his melodic, blues-based guitar lines set against Latin and African rhythms featuring percussion instruments such as timbales and congas not generally heard in rockmusic. Santana continued to work in these forms over the following decades. He experienced a resurgence of popularity and critical acclaim in the late 1990s. In 2003, Rolling Stone magazine listedSantana at number 15 on their list of the 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time. He has won 10 Grammy Awards and 3 Latin Grammy Awards.
His father was a mariachi violinist, and Carlos learned to play theviolin at age five and the guitar at age eight. His younger brother, Jorge Santana, would also become a professional guitarist. Young Carlos was heavily influenced by Ritchie Valens at a time whenthere were very few Latinos in American rock and pop music. The family moved from Autlán de Navarro to Tijuana, the city on Mexico's border with California, and then San Francisco. Carlos stayed inTijuana but joined his family in San Francisco later and graduated from James Lick Middle School and Mission High School there. He graduated from Mission High in 1965. Javier Bátiz, a famous guitarist fromTijuana, said to have been Carlos's guitar teacher who taught him to play a different style of guitar soloing. After learning Javier Batiz's techniques, Santana would make them his own as well.
InSan Francisco, he got the chance to see his idols, most notably B.B. King, perform live. He was also introduced to a variety of new musical influences, including jazz and folk music, and witnessed thegrowing hippie movement centered in San Francisco in the 1960s. After several years spent working as a dishwasher in a diner and busking for spare change, Santana decided to become a full-time...