Carlos Santana: Sound of the Heart, Song of the World

Carlos Santana tells the true story of a young musician struggling to create his own voice amid the pressures of his father's authority as a musician and the hold of his Mexican musical culture. As a child, Santana was born in a musical family who encouraged him to learn the violin and become part of his father's mariachi group. But the music of his father and the music of his culture doesn't satisfy his spirit. Santana longs to fuse elements of Mexican mariachi with the new sounds he is hearing from the larger American culture, the blues. Gradually, Santana finds a way to blend his roots into that of the blues and to create a new sound that electrifies the world.

There are so many things about this story that I love—the struggle the child Santana feels with his father for creative authenticity, the depiction of the Mexican culture where Santana grew up, the blending of culture with novelty to create something surprising and alive. The illustrations are as vivid as Santana's music, and reflect both Santana's Mexican roots along with the interweaving of the vibrant blues of the American 60's. The story is well-told in present tense that acts a feeling of immediacy to the story.