Toni Solà

This jazz saxophonist has been moving with ease through the blues of the Catalan capital for almost four decades, ever since he played rock’n’roll with Los Rebeldes or added his instrument and arrangements to the first blues album recorded in Barcelona, Stratto Blues by Harmònica Zúmel Blues Band. Pioneering times into which he plunged at the age of eighteen and in which he met legends such as the pianist Lucky Guri, who introduced him to the world of jazz, where he has developed a solid, award-winning career at international level. This excellent instrumentalist confesses himself seduced by the vocal essences of the blues: “The blue notes, which are there in the middle of the intonation, are alive. The blues is always sung, whatever the instrument. If it doesn’t sing, there’s no blues.” This tightrope walk between two genres was passed on to him by his foremost musicians, people like Jay McShann, Eddie «Cleanhead» Vinson or Ray Charles: “Versatile artists who had one foot in the blues and the other in jazz, uniting the genuine side of the former with the sophistication of the latter.” It is the journey to the essence of an artist who has made black music a fundamental part of his life.