Whenever there's a conversation about the greatest guitarist in history you can't have it without mentioning Carlos Santana. Santana developed a rock n' roll sound that was distinctly his own in the '60s and '70s. He combined blues melodies with Latin American and African percussion instruments that at the time were not typically heard in rock music. His innovative style and signature guitar sound have made him a rock n' roll legend and one of the greatest guitarists of all time. But his rise to the top wasn't all smooth sailing. Santana's life was filled with heartache and tragedy. Here are the details.
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00:00Life hasn't been easy for guitar legend Carlos Santana. In fact,
00:04it's been a long and bumpy road to legendary status for the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer,
00:09and his real-life story is full of tragedy. Here are some of the things he's had to tough through.
00:14Born in southern Mexico, Carlos Santana's family moved to Tijuana when he was seven.
00:19He told Rolling Stone his father put him and his brothers to work, selling gum on the street,
00:23shining shoes, and eventually singing Mexican folk songs.
00:27Showing an aptitude for the guitar, he soon accompanied his bar musician father to gigs
00:32in dirt-floored saloons full of shady characters. By age 14, Santana went off on his own,
00:38earning $9 a week providing musical accompaniment to strippers.
00:42He didn't get a lot of pleasure out of the work, saying,
00:45"...it's just watching an assembly job. After a while, you learn the most sensual thing is innocence."
00:51During this time, Santana says he was abused by an American man who would buy him food,
00:56clothes, and toys, and then take him into the U.S. and abuse him.
00:59After the man slapped him for watching a woman through a window, Santana explained,
01:04"...I looked at him for the first time for who he was. A very sick person."
01:08Santana's family moved to San Francisco when he was a teenager, but he didn't want to move,
01:13nor attend what he perceived as a boring American junior high. Santana recalled to
01:18Rolling Stone that he was constantly angry and upset, even refusing to eat.
01:22"...it was a shock and a heart. It's like I was in this
01:27man's world and I come back to junior high school."
01:29Things got even worse when some of his money went missing. He'd saved up a small fortune
01:33to pay for immigration papers, only to discover that his mother stole it to pay for his sister's
01:38dental work. She left $300 behind, which Santana planned to use to buy a new Stratocaster guitar.
01:45When he asked his mother for the $300, she revealed that she'd spent it on rent.
01:49Santana was so angry that he took the $20 his mother offered him and went back to Tijuana.
01:54He returned to the strip club world until a year later when his estranged family
01:58forcibly retrieved him. He said,
02:00"...they actually kidnapped me, put me in a car."
02:04In the spring of 1967, while fronting the Santana Blues Band in Stillen High School,
02:09Santana had gone from busking on the streets of San Francisco to opening for The Who.
02:13His work impressed the likes of Steve Miller and blues legend Howlin' Wolf,
02:18and both invited Santana's band to open for them on tour. Sadly, the group didn't get the chance,
02:23because 19-year-old Carlos Santana was diagnosed with tuberculosis. He told Rolling Stone that he
02:28spent three months in San Francisco General Hospital getting regular penicillin treatments.
02:33At one point, he developed an aversion to the drugs,
02:36so medical staff started injecting the antibiotics into his rear end. Unable to sit down for weeks,
02:42Santana worked with a tutor to finish up his high school education and graduated while hospitalized.
02:48The first three Santana albums deftly fused jazz, Latin music,
02:52and psychedelic rock to create something fresh and popular. The self-titled Santana
02:56hit number one on the album chart and was certified double platinum, while follow-ups
03:00Abraxas and Santana 3 did as well or better, going quintuple and double platinum, respectively.
03:07But when it came time to release album number four, Caravan Sarai, in 1972, Santana and his
03:13bandmates faced resistance from the record label. It was an almost vocals-free experimental jazz
03:18record recorded with an almost entirely new band to reflect Santana's new spiritual side.
03:24Columbia Records didn't want to release it, and Santana wrote in his memoir that company
03:29president Clive Davis said it would end his career, but it was a top ten hit.
03:33Two years later, Santana once again earned Davis' ire. The live album Lotus,
03:38as originally presented, was a three-LP set. Citing its commercial risk, Columbia only released
03:44it in Japan, killing some momentum for Santana and representing another professional setback.
03:49Unless they shelled out for an import, fans couldn't buy it in the U.S. until a CD reissue in 1991.
03:56Columbia Records dropped Santana after the release of 1990's Spirits Dancing in the Flesh,
04:02his third straight album not to go gold or platinum. The label Polydor released Santana's
04:071992 record, Milagro, which also flopped. After that, Santana couldn't get a record deal,
04:13and he couldn't record anywhere without a contract. In 1997, after the death of his musician father,
04:18Santana found that even listening to music was too much to bear. After a mourning period,
04:23he finally felt ready to try again. His wife at the time, Deborah King Santana,
04:28suggested that he reconnect with Davis, then an executive at Arista Records.
04:32The result was Supernatural, one of the most significant comeback albums in pop history.
04:36A 1999 collection of collaborations between Santana and young pop and rock stars,
04:42it sold 13 million copies in the U.S. and won eight Grammy Awards.
04:46Santana probably wouldn't have his storied, successful career without a well-timed big
04:51break from Bill Graham. The powerful manager and concert promoter convinced Woodstock's organizer
04:56to book a slot for Santana's band. The group gave an electrifying performance.
05:01We were in this helicopter, and I'd never seen so many…
05:04It was like an ocean of hair and teeth and arms."
05:08Within a year, they were topping the charts. Graham and Santana remained close until Graham's
05:12tragic death in November 1991 in a helicopter accident in Vallejo, California. Graham was 61.
05:19Santana played through his grief at a memorial concert in San Francisco.
05:23Another friend, legendary trumpeter Miles Davis, died just two months before Graham did. Santana
05:29said in a 1992 interview with The Charlotte Observer,
05:32"[They sharpened my tenacity. They sharpened my convictions."
05:36Santana and his ex-wife Debra King went through a lot of ups and downs.
05:40They married in 1973 and had three children. Partners in business as well as life,
05:46they opened a small chain of Mexican restaurants, established a charity called
05:49the Milagro Foundation, and in 1994, King restructured and saved her husband's finances."
05:55But Santana wasn't always the most faithful husband. Debra told the San Francisco Chronicle
06:00that after their children were born, Santana was sleeping with people on the road.
06:04Santana admitted his infidelity in his memoir and publicly apologized for his indiscretions.
06:09But a little over two years later, Debra filed for divorce. Santana moved on,
06:13and in 2010 proposed to Cindy Blackman, the drummer in his band.
06:18After his divorce, the guitarist's life grew alarmingly dark. Santana seriously entertained
06:23thoughts of ending it all, and in 2008, he told Rolling Stone that he'd attempted to
06:27take his own life seven times. Not only did the failure of his marriage upset him,
06:32but so did lingering memories of the regular abuse he suffered in his youth.
06:36Santana credits his faith for helping him out of that very low place. He told Plain Truth,
06:41You have to go through the darkest night of the soul to get to the brightest light of the day.
06:45Forgiveness, man. Forgiveness is incredibly liberating."
06:49If you or anyone you know is having suicidal thoughts,
06:52please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK.