Leonardo “Flaco” Jiménez, the singer, songwriter, and grasp accordionist, has died. Throughout a profession spanning over 70 years, which included collaborations with Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones, and lots of others, Jiménez helped to popularize the Mexican music birthed in his native South Texas alternatively known as conjunto, norteño, or Tejano, although Jiménez typically most well-liked to label it Tex-Mex. No reason for loss of life was given in the Facebook post from Jimenéz’s household asserting his loss of life. He was 86 years previous.
Born in San Antonio, Texas, Jiménez got here from a lineage of accordionists, together with his grandfather, Patricio, and father, Santiago Jiménez Sr. A pioneer of conjunto who injected his sound with accordion melodies impressed by the German and Czech polkas and waltzes he heard at dance halls in South and Central Texas, Santiago didn’t want to show his son how one can play the instrument; as a substitute, the youthful Jiménez realized the instrument himself at age seven merely from listening to his father play. “I used to be self-taught,” Jiménez defined to NPR in 2014. “You recognize, I used to observe my dad play at residence and feeling the instrument—not simply taking part in it, however feeling it, you understand.” He shortly earned the nickname “Flaco,” or “Skinny,” the identical moniker that his father used when he started taking part in music.
Jiménez’s unmatched exuberance and ability on the accordion made him a fast-rising star in his native Texas. He was an everyday within the dirt-floor dance corridor scenes of cities and cities within the Sixties throughout the state, and he finally paired up with Douglas Sahm, the founding member of the Sir Douglas Quintet and a key inventive collaborator; the pair would go on to discovered the Texas Tornados, a conjunto supergroup that recorded seven albums. In 1973, Sahm recruited Jiménez to contribute to his Doug Sahm and Band album, the place he brushed shoulders with luminaries like Bob Dylan and Dr. John, paving the way in which for Jiménez’s personal breakthrough. “Doug informed me ‘you’re not presupposed to play simply that easy, conventional conjunto music,’” he stated in a 2000 interview. “There are such a lot of gamers who stayed in the identical crater like my papa did. Doug confirmed me there have been different worlds on the market.”
Over the next a long time, Jiménez introduced his expressive accordion taking part in to collaborations with the Rolling Stones, Linda Rondstadt, Dwight Yoakam, and Ry Cooder, amongst many others. He launched over 25 studio albums of his personal and obtained six Grammy Awards in his lifetime, together with trophies for Finest Nation Instrumental Album, in 1996, and the inaugural Finest Tejano Music Efficiency, for 1998’s Stated and Finished. “I began making conjunto extra progressive due to the flexibility that I consider in,” Jiménez stated in an interview for PBS’ American Roots. “I believe it’s good to alter it just a little.”
