Salvador Santana

Keyboardist Salvador Santana was born in the San Francisco Bay area in 1983, the son of guitarist Carlos Santana and poet and writer Deborah Santana, a pedigree that certainly gave him a lot of creative DNA. He began playing the piano when he was only five years old, going on to study at the San Francisco School of the Arts High School, where he also took up playing the timpani. He later attended the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia and was a skilled enough musician to collaborate on “El Farol” from his father’s 1999 album, Supernatural. In 2004 he formed his own group, the Salvador Santana Band, with Emerson Cardenas (bass), Quincy McCrary (keyboards), Woody Aplanalp (guitar), Tony Austin (drums), and José Espinoza (saxophone and percussion). The band released an album, the eclectic SSB (for Salvador Santana Band), in 2008 before parting ways. Santana next released a solo album, Keyboard City, which he co-wrote and co-produced with Money Mark, in 2010, and it was an effective blend of Santana's various influences and streams, mixing funk with jazz, hip-hop, and soul.