Santana on Music’s Healing Powers + Reuniting With His Band – Exclusive Interview
You dedicate your book to your mother Josefina, and on the back of the book you note that you “want to play from the center of my heart” the way your musician father Jose did. How have your mom’s conviction and your dad’s charisma fueled you as a man and musician?
They both bring certainty. My father was a very, very charismatic person and he was really assured that he was the cat’s pajamas. He’d just walk into the room and women and men and children — everybody adored him. You thought he was Michael Jackson or something. And when I was a kid I was like, I want that. The word is called adored. People adored my father because of his charisma. And my mother’s supreme conviction — just supreme conviction. ‘God’s gonna give me this, and God’s gonna do it and God’s gonna give me this,’ you know. Next thing you know, she gets it! So, I learned from both of them certainty and assurance. When you’re playing music and you’re standing next to John McLaughlin, B.B. King or Buddy Guy, you’re not there to compete or compare. You’re there to compliment, so you know you can hold your own, and people will wait for either Buddy or me to finish. There’s always room for Carlos (laughs).
Define ‘The Universal Tone’ and how you carry it and others receive it?
You carry it with grace, elegance, dignity and integrity, and people receive it as an invitation to their own light, to their own luminosity. The Universal Tone means a frequency of ‘A Love Supreme.’ Of course John Coltrane, Bob Marley, Michael Jackson, musicians like that; Marvin Gaye, Jimi Hendrix. I’m one of them, you know and I don’t flinch saying it. I’m one of them because I aspire to constantly be a conduit to the same frequency of luminosity.
You’re wearing the mighty Bob Marley on your chest right now. You wear it proudly. Why still to this day?
Because he’s still here. One love. You need to play ‘One Love’ with all these riots happening, all these protests. I invite all peaceful protesters to wear all white only, and play music to shock the world’s foundation, conquering fear. Create banners that say what is the collective lesson we can all learn from this about love. If you dressed in white, police know that you’re there not to burn, loot or destroy. You’re only there with integrity to make a point. Hopefully, next time people protest, if you wear all white, police got to know that your intensions are noble and they shouldn’t hurt you. Otherwise, we do have some issues with police, and they will be really in trouble. Otherwise we will retaliate. We will retaliate, because I belong to people who on one hand — I am spiritual, which is I want compassion. On the other hand, I do believe that it’s better to die on your feet than live on your knees. So don’t push us, because you don’t have enough bullets for all of us. We will take over.
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