Los Romeros: The Royal Family of Guitar

"Spain has a childlike innocence that gives tremendous power to its music."

— Celedonio Romero

The musical legacy of the late Celedonio Romero lives on in the legendary guitar quartet he formed with his sons Celin, Pepe and Angel, and continues today with grandsons Celino and Lito. In this clip, he brings the next generation of the Romeros to Mallorca to experience the "magical thing that comes from that land"




The Romeros: The Royal Family of Guitar

Website Biography for The Romeros
http://www.romeroguitarquartet.com/

A veritable institution in the world of classical music, the quartet has dazzled countless audiences and won the raves of reviewers worldwide. Celedonio Romero, founder and creator of The Romeros guitar dynasty, died on May 8, 1996 in San Diego, California. As the family says, "the spirit of the quartet is him; all our concerts now will be to pay homage to him"; his sons and grandsons continue Celedonio's legacy.

To some fortunate musicians, it is given to rise to the peak of a musical art form; to some very few musicians, it is given to originate an art form. The Romeros have achieved both. In a lengthy feature article The New York Times said: "Collectively, they are the only classical guitar quartet of real stature in the world today; in fact, they virtually invented the format."

The legendary Celedonio Romero, with his sons Celin, Pepe and Angel, founded the internationally renowned ensemble known to millions as "The Royal Family of the Guitar." With the introduction of Celin's son, Celino, into the quartet in 1990, and Angel's son Lito joining his father in duo recital, The Romeros encompasses three generations of concert artists. To have so many virtuosi of the same instrument in one family is unique in the world of musical performance, and in the realm of the classical guitar it is absolutely without precedent.

Those who are privileged to hear these world-renowned musicians perform have the delightful opportunity to experience a musical phenomenon: "One of the enduring mysteries of musical talent is how skills seem to flow genetically from musical parent to musical child. In the Romero family the flow has been swift and unimpeded. The virtuosity of the four Romeros was uniformly solid and finely considered, as if these techniques had derived from a single mold" (The New York Times)

Celedonio Romero was a renowned soloist in Franco's Spain. As each of his sons reached the age of two or three, they began learning the guitar from their father. All of his sons had made their debuts in Spain by the time they were seven years old. In 1957, the family immigrated to the United States where "The Romeros" walked onto the world stage as its first guitar quartet while the boys were still in their teens. Since then The Romeros have given hundreds of concerts all over the world and have consistently dazzled audiences everywhere and have inspired enthusiastic praise from critics coast to coast. They continue to this day to produce music, which is extraordinary.