He was born Francisco Sánchez Gómez in Algeciras in 1947, and learned guitar because his father sat him down for hours until his fingers bled. By his teens he was touring. By his twenties, Paco de Lucía was the most gifted flamenco guitarist alive — and getting restless.

What he did next split opinion and then conquered it. He brought the Peruvian cajón into flamenco, sparred with jazz players like Chick Corea and John McLaughlin, and formed a sextet that added flute and bass to a music that had always been guitar, voice and hands. Purists gasped; the world listened.

His partnership with the singer Camarón de la Isla produced records that flamenco fans still speak of in hushed tones — two once-in-a-generation talents pushing each other higher album after album.

When he died suddenly in 2014, Spain mourned him like a head of state. He had taken the most local music imaginable and made it belong to everyone, without ever letting go of where it came from.