Paco de Lucía
photo: cornel putan · cc by 2.0 ↗Francisco Sánchez Gómez, known as Paco de Lucía, is widely regarded as the greatest flamenco guitarist of the 20th century and the central architect of 'nuevo flamenco,' blending traditional toque with jazz harmony, Latin American rhythm, and classical technique. His decade-long partnership with Camarón de la Isla (1969–1977) reshaped flamenco song, and his later solo and ensemble work — including collaborations with John McLaughlin, Al Di Meola, and Chick Corea — carried flamenco guitar into concert halls and jazz festivals worldwide.
Paco de Lucía called Niño Ricardo his 'first guitar hero,' learning and absorbing Ricardo's intricate falsetas (melodic runs) as a teenager before developing his own voice — a debt so direct that de Lucía later wrote and recorded an entire tribute soleá in Ricardo's name.
listen forRicardo's dense, harmonically inventive falsetas on 'Por Soleares' are the template; de Lucía's own 'Gloria al Niño Ricardo' takes that same soleá vocabulary and pushes the harmony even further outward.
De Lucía met Sabicas — by then a New York-based virtuoso pushing flamenco guitar toward concert-hall solo composition — on an early US tour, and Sabicas encouraged him to write original material rather than only accompany singers, a nudge historians credit as pivotal to de Lucía's solo career.
listen forSabicas's showy, harmonically adventurous solo pieces like 'Ay Mi Huelva' anticipate the concert-guitar ambition de Lucía would later realize on records like Entre Dos Aguas.
Mario Escudero was, alongside Sabicas, one of the mentor figures de Lucía connected with on his early trips to the United States — part of the generation of touring virtuosos, trained in Ramón Montoya's concert-guitar tradition, who normalized the idea of flamenco guitar as a solo art form outside Spain.
listen forEscudero's 1955 solo recordings already treat the guitar as a self-sufficient concert instrument rather than pure accompaniment — the same ambition audible in de Lucía's own solo showcases a generation later.