Ismael Serrano

He was born in the neighbourhood of Vallecas of Madrid (Spain) on 9 March 1974. After studying Physics in the Complutense University of Madrid, Ismael Serrano started his musical career in the early nineties in Madrid, singing folk based guitar music in a café circuit, at political venues like Libertad 8, Galileo and Nuevos Juglares. The movement proved to be very popular, inspired by the 20-year-old ‘Protest’ song movement under the dictatorship of Francisco Franco, as well as the Nueva canción movement of Latin America.

In 1997 Ismael Serrano signed with Polygram (now Universal) and released his first album, Atrapados en Azul, featuring the songs "Papá cuéntame otra vez", "Vértigo" and "Amo tanto la vida" that became hymns for youngsters in Spain and Latin America. For this work he was nominated for Best New Artist at the Spanish Musical Awards of the Sociedad General de Autores y Editores.

The follow-up album, La memoria de los peces (1998), increased https: youtube.com/watch?v=EdXWkvKodIo&feature=share popularity (sales level for Platinum in Spain, Gold in Argentina). On his third production Los paraísos desiertos (2000), Serrano moved more to jazz styles and African sounds. Two important music nominations for this work: Best Original Song for the Goya Movie Awards (the "Spanish Oscars") for the song "Km.0" (of the feature with the same title) and Best Sound Engineering at the 2001 Latin Grammy Awards.

In late 2006, 10th anniversary from the release of his first CD, a retrospective of his work was released as a double CD under the name "El Viaje De Rosetta" (in reference to the Rosetta spacecraft). This deluxe box set contains a disc with all his singles, another disc with rarities, live tracks and collaborations, and a 48-page booklet, and is also available in a single CD and DVD edition.