El Camaron de la Isla
El Camarón de la Isla (born José Monge Cruz) was one of the great voices of flamenco. Born in the small village of San Fernando as the son of a basket weaver, he became a musical revolutionary. He brought new sounds into the genre and recorded some of the most popular flamenco albums of the twentieth century. De la Isla stopped touring in 1979 and concentrated on recording. "Soy Gitano", his second-to-last album, was the first LP in Spanish history to achieve gold. His instrumentation was at the vanguard of world music with jazz, orchestral and oriental sounds. He died of cancer in 1992.
