Carlos Santana

Born in Mexico in 1947, Carlos Santana grew up steeped in musical tradition before moving to the United States, where he formed the band Santana in the late 1960s. The group pioneered a sound no one had quite heard - rock and roll married to Latin American jazz, his melodic blues lines riding over timbales and congas that had no place in rock yet. Fame came fast in the late 1960s and early 1970s, but by the late 1990s he pulled off a second act, a resurgence that brought new critical weight. Ten Grammy Awards and three Latin Grammys followed, and in 1998 he and the band entered the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Rolling Stone placed him at No. 20 on their list of the greatest guitarists in 2015, then moved him to No. 11 in 2023.