Gustavo Santaolalla

kubrick98 (40)in #music • 7 years ago (edited)

His professional musical career began in 1967 when he was sixteen years old and founded the group Arco Iris, an Argentine band that amalgamated rock and traditional Latin American music in cooperation with 'national rock'. The band was also part of a yoga community led by Danais Wynnycka (named Dana) and his partner Ara Tokatlian. Gustavo wanted to escape the strict requirements of Dana (which forbids meat, alcohol, drugs, and especially sex) and left the group in 1975.
A year later, he formed Soluna, where he played with pianist and singer Alejandro Lerner and his girlfriend (at the time) Monica Campins. Together they recorded only one album (Energía Natural, with Charly García, Mauricio Veber and Rody Ziliani as guests 1977). Santaolalla then went to Los Angeles, where he adopted a rock and roll sound and also played with his band Wet Picnic (with a former member of Crucis, Anibal Kerpel).

His trips to Argentina were mainly to produce the album by Leon Gieco, Pensar en Nada (1980). Santaolalla helped develop Rock en Español apart from Argentina for acting as a producer for Mexican artists Fobia, Molotov, Café Tacuba, Julieta Venegas and Colombian singer Juanes, and many more.

At the end of the 1990s he began his career as a composer of soundtracks for films such as Amores Perros, 21 Gramos or Diarios de motocicleta. One of his most recent works has been the instrumental part of the soundtrack to the movie Brokeback Mountain for which he won the Oscar. From this soundtrack, "A Love That Will Never Grow Old" won the Golden Globe for Best Song. He has also won a BAFTA Award for "Motorcycle Diaries" and another for "Babel", for which he received another Oscar (second consecutive time). It is currently settled in the state of California (United States).