Biography

Leon Gieco was born right into a household of Italian origin on November 20, 1951 in Santa Fe Province, Argentina. At 6 years outdated, Gieco traveled along with his household from the sector to the village middle on account of financial issues. At age 8, Gieco purchased his first guitar on credit score, and shortly started enjoying music at native occasions along with his father’s band. All through his childhood, Gieco performed with native bands akin to a folkloric group referred to as Los Nocheros (The Night time Watchers) and Los Moscos (The Flies), a rock band that gained some reputation inside Argentina. In 1965, Gieco traveled to Bolivia as an change scholar. He studied music and performed guitar at native festivities.

When Gieco turned 18, he went to Buenos Aires to turn into a full-time musician. There, he took guitar classes from Gustavo Santaolalla, who launched him to necessary folks within the Buenos Aires musical neighborhood, akin to Raúl Porchetto, Charly García, Nito Mestre, and María Rosa Yorio, future members together with Gieco of the Argentine supergroup, Porsuigieco. Gieco was given the chance to carry out within the Buenos Aires Rock Competition in 1971, 1972, and 1973. In 1973, he recorded his first album, “Leon Gieco” ( it was recorded independently with Santaolalla). “En el País de la Libertad” (“Within the Nation of Freedom”), a success from his album, demonstrated Gieco’s concern for change in Argentina, his concern for social justice.

In 1976 Gieco launched El Fantasma de Canterville (“The Ghost of Canterville”). The file suffered a substantial amount of censorship from the army authorities forcing him to vary the lyrics of 6 songs and take away 3 others altogether. However, the file was successful, and he had concert events not solely round Argentina, but in addition in different international locations of South America. Two years later he launched IV LP, with one among his most well-known songs: “Sólo le pido a Dios” (“I solely ask of God”). Because of the political scenario in Argentina, Gieco was pressured to maneuver to the USA and Italy in 1978 for one yr. Within the US he lived with household buddies in Los Angeles and Ann Arbor, Mi. Whereas in Ann Arbor, he carried out on the well-known Artwork competition in the summertime of 1978.

On December 20, 1979, the Argentine Minister of Training introduced the closing of the Nationwide College of Lujan in Buenos Aires. Gieco participated in a protest in opposition to the closing by singing “La Cultura es la Sonrisa”. His lyrics say, “(Tradition) solely cries in a rustic the place folks cannot select it/it solely cries its unhappiness if a minister closes a faculty…”

In 1981 Gieco began a 3-year, 110,000-kilometre-long collection of impartial concert events throughout Argentina, enjoying for a complete of 420,000 folks. He gathered materials from the completely different locations he visited through the tour, and recorded the primary quantity of De Ushuaia a La Quiaca (“From Ushuaia to La Quiaca” in Buenos Aires with varied autochthonous musicians in 1985. The next De Ushuaia a La Quiaca 2 and De Ushuaia a La Quiaca 3 have been recorded in a cell studio in several areas of the nation.

In 1985, Gieco went to Moscow for the twelfth “World Youth and College students’ Competition” alongside Juan Carlos Baglietto and Litto Nebbia, representing Argentina. In 1986 and 1987, he held concert events in Germany along with his good friend Mercedes Sosa, together with that of Berlin’s Political Track Competition.

Gieco returned to Argentina and carried out free concert events, one for 40,000 spectators on the Nationwide Flag Memorial in Rosario, and the opposite for 35,000 folks in Buenos Aires. At Boca Juniors’ Stadium he had a live performance with Pablo Milanés and Chico Buarque, and visitor musicians Mercedes Sosa, Fito Páez, Nito Mestre, Juan Carlos Baglietto and Sixto Palavecino. On the finish of the yr he went on a world tour that included international locations akin to Mexico, Peru, Brasil, Sweden, Germany and Denmark.

In 1988, Gieco carried out in Germany and Austria. Again in Argentina he participated within the closing live performance of the Amnesty Worldwide Human Rights Now! Tour at River Plate Stadium, with Charly García, Peter Gabriel, Bruce Springsteen, Sting, and others.

After eight years of touring, Semillas del corazón (“Seeds of the center”) marked his return to the studio in 1989. That very same yr he carried out on the Teatro Ópera in Buenos Aires with United States people legend Pete Seeger. The next yr, Seeger requested him to hitch a tour that took him to Washington, D.C., Boston and New York Metropolis. There he performed with David Byrne, whom he had met in Buenos Aires shortly earlier than.

In 1992, he performed with Milton Nascimento, Mercedes Sosa, Os Paralamas do Sucesso, Gilberto Gil and Rubén Rada on the inauguration of the Latin American Parliament in São Paulo. In 1997 he participated within the memorial live performance for the Moms of the Plaza de Mayo, with bands akin to Divididos, La Renga, Los Piojos, and Attaque 77.

Gieco started his most up-to-date nationwide tour for social justice, Mundo Alas, in 2007. Argentine musicians, dancers, singers, and painters, all with disabilities, carried out alongside Gieco, expressing their distinctive skills and speaking with audiences. He gave these artists the chance to dwell out their desires as he does. Gieco created a documentary from the highway tour which was produced in March, 2009. The movie options rock music, people music, and tango, together with Gieco’s authentic hits.

Throughout his cease in Buenos Aires on his 2013 Wrecking Ball World Tour, Bruce Springsteen filmed a video for a solo acoustic efficiency of “Sólo le Pido a Dios”.^[1]

Discography

• León Gieco (1973)
• La Banda de los Caballos Cansados (1974)
• El fantasma de Canterville (1976)
• IV LP (1978)
• Siete años (1980)
• Pensar en nada (1981)
• Corazón americano / El gran concierto (1985)
• De Ushuaia a La Quiaca 1 (1985)
• De Ushuaia a La Quiaca 2 (1985)
• De Ushuaia a La Quiaca 3 (1985)
• Semillas del corazón (1989)
• Ayer y hoy (1989)
• Concierto en vivo con Pete Seeger (1990)
• Mensajes del alma (1992)
• Desenchufado (1994)
• Orozco (1997)
• En el país de la libertad (1999)
• De Ushuaia a La Quiaca 4 (1999)
• 40 obras fundamentales (2000)
• Bandidos rurales (2001)
• Por partida doble (2001)
• El vivo de León (2003)
• De Ushuaia a La Quiaca (re-edition) (2005)
• Por Favor, Perdón y Gracias (2005)
• El Vivo de Leon (2003)
• El Desembarco (2011)

See additionally

• Tradition of Argentina