A Bit Of A Feliciano Fan.

As Teenager in the mid to Late 60’s I grew up with that music and of the decade before. It was a period of many and varied styles of music and so when Jose Feliciano burst on to the scene with his own style of Music, he fitted in quite well with that scene.

Although it is only recently that I have gotten around to actually buying a CD of his, and a “Best of at that!” I have always been interested in his more famous songs. Whilst not totally into his style of singing completely, I have always greatly admired his guitar playing and resilience.

Although long from the charts now, his early hits of “Light my Fire”, “High heeled Sneakers” and his own "Feliz Navidad", which comes out every Christmas, made him so well known that he still tours the world today playing “His” Music and is currently in Australia. No, I don’t plan to go see him, but was interested to read that he is currently celebrating his 52^nd year in Show biz. Not bad when you consider that he is only 62 to start with, is it. Not bad for the 4^th son of 11 Children born in Puerto Rico, but raised in New York is it? Even more impressive when you learn that he was born blind? He learnt to play the Guitar by spending up to 14 hours a day playing while listening to pop records.

How did he succeed? He knew he was different and he used those factors for good and got on with doing what he liked.

In His words, “ I knew what I wanted to do. I guess I was a different type of kid. A lot of kids don’t know what they want to do when they are teenagers, let alone at nine. I didn’t know I would become famous, but I knew music was something I wanted to get involved in. I knew where I wanted my life to go, and I went. I haven’t stopped.” He is also known for his wicked sense of Humour and is often playing up to peoples consciousness of his blindness, like when he goes into a restaurant with his sunglasses on and the waitress asks if he would like to see the Menu now? He always replies with, “Lady, I’d like to se anything!”

However my favourite ait the moment is his response to why he plays a guitar. “ The Guitar? Because it’s portable. Have you ever seen a pianist try to serenade women at her window with a piano?”

I don’t know about you but I think his attitude to learning and his sense of humour are a couple of big reasons he has been so successful. He has worked hard to get where he has, and he has learned to take the hard knocks with a laugh and not to take himself too seriously and even to laugh at himself.

What about you? Like me, you were/are probably a lot older than nine when you worked out what you want a do, but having done that, you still need now to work at it and practise, practice, practise, and when you have done that, practice some more. All the time taking the knocks and learning from them and even using them to perfect your craft. The questions are, are you prepared to work for your goal and take the bad with the Good, or just sit there and complain how tough your life has been? Likewise are you going to use your problems for sympathy or laugh at them like Jose? Your choice!

My response to the question of whether I intend to just sit here and moan and complain, is a resounding and pun intended, “NO WAY JOSE!”