Santana concert @ Bethel, New York, Woodstock Festival august 1969
***** SANTANA.COM
A posting that is definitely due for this journal's music/ arts honour roll society will look at a legend in rock, latin, jazz music, trademark guitarist and songwriter Mr. Carlos Santana, and because also Santana is one of my all time favourites as far as guitar style. Carlos is also married to the most talented and beautiful well rounded rock/ jazz drummer Cindy Blackman Santana too, and Cindy is plain Hell who really rock's! Probably one of the strongest influences to Carlos as a child would have been Ritchie Valens as far as going into the rock genre early in his start and folk's like BB King as far as blues, then being around that whole 1960's San Francisco scene had the later impact on molding his style, so quite a combination molded young Carlos.
Carlos originally out of Mexico though started in the trenches doing the club circuit's in the San Francisco Bay Area and got his break I reckon around early/ mid 1960's when called to fill in for some work at the Fillmore West, just by chance and association, and spent alot of time in the San Francisco 60's scene which was a hot period for music at the time, even Journey's Neal Schon was with him year's back, a history that is lengthy, and another who has played with everybody who is anybody in the industry, and Kirk Hammett (Metallica) had told me that Carlos had an impact on him as far as guitar work influence. But also Carlos was playing violin too as a child as young as 5 I believe before even getting into guitar at around 8. For me though, when I hear a song like "Oye Como Va" it takes me spiritually and distinctively to East LA.
When it comes to his guitar work, Carlos is as picky as they come as well, you may as well just let him be his own guitar tech on the road, to try to keep up with this man and what he does as far as his guitar and amp work, engineering and so forth, you would have to be almost in his mind in my opinion, he is as un- conventional as they come, whether it's customized design's, instrument modification's from neck's to fret board's to multi- amp switches and effect's, etc, etc ... even having a line of guitar's designed after him at that! ... similar to Page of Led Zeppelin , Jerry Reed , Jimi Hendrix, or Sonic Youth as examples in that area/ category. And over decades he has became one of the most noted in such work, especially the smooth style and sound that is so distinctively Santana is a trademark of it's own.
Even though he really came off commercially large in his work during "Smooth" back around 1999/ 2000 and back into the top on chart's, numerous Grammy Award's, Hall of Fame, Walk of Fame, etc ... there was a time many year's before that when he was in those rank's, especially in the rock genre and a outstanding showcase that he and his crew presented at Woodstock back in 1969 (he also played the 2nd Woodstock), so I wanted to focus on his early dayz in this post to try to recapture that spirit of then, which I had the opportunity to experience. Probably one of the thing's that really blew me away in a Santana show that I did not expect, was the outstanding African, Caribbean, Latin percussion's/ drum show that came in it, which I would listen to and cover myself doing various percussion's of like year's back just for fun and jamming (I actually still have bongo's from 40 year's back), but the percussion's show alone is almost as awesome as Santana's distinctive guitar work.
I also wanted to do this posting in memoriam of a dear old friend Isabella Rivera (and somewhat of a mentor) who passed away and was a fan of Santana's music from the City of Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas (Mex), because it was Isabella who took me to my first Santana concert down in San Antonio back in the 1970's which was a treat, I also seen Santana again in the early 1980's ... but enough from me ... Enjoy!
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***** "RCJ MUSIC/ ART'S HONOUR ROLL SOCIETY" A THRU M
***** "RCJ MUSIC/ ART'S HONOUR ROLL SOCIETY" N THRU Z
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Santana- Soul Sacrifice 1969 Woodstock live concierto HQ ... Thanx to GuitarDocs
Oye Como Va Live 1971 Original Santana Band ... Thanx to Margel Cazacu
Santana- Hope You're Feeling Better- Tanglewood- 1970/ 08/ 18 (Official) ... Thanx to SANTANA ON MV
Santana- Black Magic Woman- Tanglewood- 1970/ 08/ 18 (Official) ... Thanx to SANTANA ON MV
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***** RANCH CHIMP JOURNAL "WELCOME" POST
***** RANCH CHIMP JOURNAL/ YOUTUBE (posting's preview)
***** RCJ MUSIC/ ART'S HONOUR ROLL SOCIETY (my hand- selected music/ arts picks)
***** THE RESISTANCE/ PERIL'S OF THE POWER POSSE (inspiration for hope & change)
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