Gipsy Kings
Biography Gipsy Kings
Begin in Catalonia and follow the coast into France, curving through fishing villages, farming communities, wild lands where white horses run free and huge black bulls are bred for fighting. Nearby stand the ancient cities of Perpignan, Montpellier and Arles. This is fertile terrain, fought over across millennia, home to Roman aqueducts and amphitheatres, once host to Cezanne, Van Gogh and Gauguin, long renowned for fine wines and fierce people. And today the region's celebrated as the land of Gipsy Kings.
The Gipsy Kings are that rare thing - a household name famous solely for their music; the most successful French musical outfit ever are big in Brazil and popular (extremely so) in Persia, honoured at The Alamo in Texas and celebrated in China. All this achieved without MTV videos, hype, reality TV appearances, famous girlfriends, bad behaviour... an international audience won over purely by the music and the big, welcoming soulfulness of its creators. That's no ordinary achievement. Understandably, the Gipsy Kings are extraordinary characters: to play guitar and sing is something their fathers, grandfathers and ancestors did. The Gipsy Kings make music as communion, artistry rooted in the past yet focused on the future.
