Carlos Santana will release his biography, The Universal Tone, My Life on November 4, 2014. The book will be published by Little, Brown and Company, a publishing group of Hachette Book Group.
The intimate and long-awaited memoir of guitar legend Carlos Santana
In the realm of guitar gods, Santana stands alone for what’s come to be called his “universal tone”-both the fact that you can recognize a Santana song from just one note and the fact that Santana is well known to believe music and soul are interconnected.
In the category of major rock memoirs yet undone, this is at the top-a big autobiography by one of the most mysterious and influential musicians of the last 50 years.
From growing up dirt poor in Mexico and suffering abuse to becoming a lowly dishwasher in the US with a hot guitar hand, to a person whom you might almost think is perpetually in a state of nirvana or at least bliss, this is the story of a fascinating man who brings the ideal combination of storytelling gold and a major marketing machine.
This is one of the most sensory (and sensual) major rock bios you’ll ever read. His voice comes through, it’s deeply honest and frank, and from imagining the wisps of smoke from a long gone Miles Davis before Carlos’s shows to describing the depths of his connection to sound, Santana brings a remarkable book to his huge following this fall.
Collaborators
The C in Carlos stands for collaboration. The Santana album, Supernatural commenced Carlos Santana’s collaboration era. All of his next albums evidence that cooperative spirit. It stands to reason that Carlos Santana would collaborate his personal journey with his two close music writer/historian friends, Ashley Kahn and Hal Miller. Carlos Santana, Ashley Kahn and Hal Miller share a common bond, the spirit of jazz embodied by Mr. Miles Davis and Mr. John Coltrane. I feel it is important that my readers gain an appreciation for the backgrounds of these two prominent music journalists. It will increase your anticipation of the quality of the biography we will receive later this year.
I also point you to a Web article about Ashley Kahn interviewing Carlos Santana at the New Orleans Jazz Fest 2014.
Ashley Kahn
Ashley Kahn has authored three of the best jazz books you will ever read. Two of those three books are about major jazz albums, Kind of Blue by Miles Davis and A Love Supreme by John Coltrane. Each book is a masterpiece of research, rich in history and facts about these classic recordings. I own both books, signed and I love to read them as I listen to these two amazing albums to gain more insight about the respective jazz geniuses.
Kind of Blue: The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece, foreword by Jimmy Cobb, 2001, Da Capo Press, USA, ISBN 0-306-81067-0
A Love Supreme: The Story of John Coltrane’s Signature Album, foreword by Elvin Jones, 2002 for the first edition, Viking Penguin, USA, ISBN 0-670-03136-4
The third jazz book covers the definitive jazz label, Impulse Records. Nate Chinen just wrote a fantastic article in the New York Times about Impulse Records resurgence.
The House That Trane Built: The Story of Impulse Records. (2006) W. W. Norton, ISBN 0-393-05879-4
Ashley Kahn is also a prolific liner note writer for a variety of music reissue labels, for which he has earned three ASCAP/Deems Taylor awards, and two Grammy nominations.
Ashley Kahn presently is an adjunct professor at New York University, teaching various courses for the Clive Davis Department of Recorded Music in NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. I’d love to attend one of his courses.
Hal Miller
Hal Miller is a longtime personal friend of Carlos Santana. Hal Miller is Carlos’s documentarian. Hal is a subject matter authority on Carlos Santana and the world of jazz. Hal has authored insightful liner notes for recordings in the Santana catalogue. Hal’s liner notes proved noteworthy for the Santana reissues, Caravanserai, Love Devotion and Surrender, and Moonflower.
Hal Miller has documented many of the Santana concert tours which you can read on the Santana.com Tour Blog. Hal Miller is also a great photographer, look here for you many of his Santana photographs.
Hal Miller shuns publicity on the InterWeb which I respect about him. This Website had the best tribute and information links about Hal.
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