For Carlos Santana, a Passion for Rock Began as a Walk in the Park

One day in 1961, she took me to the park to hear a band with electric guitars playing early rock ‘n’ roll. The guy soloing was Javier Bátiz, who turned my head around. I was 13 and started following him around.

My mother wrote my father asking him to buy me an electric guitar. He had a friend drop off a big fat Gibson. I listened to everything, took apart songs on records and taught myself to play, which is what blues players did.

The Mexican community in San Francisco had expanded, and my father played regularly at the Latin American Club in the city’s Mission District. He assembled one of the city’s first serious mariachi bands.
At the end of 1962, the club’s owner helped sponsor our move to San Francisco so we could join Dad.

There, I formed my first rock band. The turning point came in 1966, when Paul Butterfield was too stoned to play a Sunday matinee at the Fillmore Auditorium. I subbed and caught the ear of concert promoter Bill Graham, who booked my band. We needed a name, so we called ourselves the Santana Blues Band.