Francisco González, Los Lobos founding member and guitar-string pioneer, dead at 68
González would leave the group within a year, just before they went on to become the most famous Chicano rock group of them all. But the East L.A. native nevertheless became a musical icon of his own. He became an apostle for son jarocho, fostering relations between jaraneros in the United States and Mexico. He released solo albums and performed in venues as varied as colleges and prisons.
His handmade strings for Mexico’s family of guitars — the sonorous requinto, the high-toned jarana, the deep-bottomed guitarrón, the warm bajo sexto, and others — were lifelines for musicians with no other options in the United States for their instruments.
In Mexico, old-timers said that González’s handiwork made instruments resonate with a sound they hadn’t heard in decades.
https://www.latimes.com/obituaries/story/2022-04-04/francisco-gonzalez-los-lobos-guadalupe-custom-strings
