César López Giraldo (born 1973) is a classically trained musician, composer, producer guitarist and pianist from Bogota, Colombia. In 2003, López founded the Battalion of Immediate Artistic Reaction which involves various musicians and activists seeking alternatives to the ever-present violence that has plagued Colombia over many years. The group mainly concentrates its efforts on the capital city of
Bogotá
Bogotá (, also , , ), officially Bogotá, Distrito Capital, abbreviated Bogotá, D.C., and formerly known as Santa Fe de Bogotá (; ) during the Spanish period and between 1991 and 2000, is the capital city of Colombia, and one of the larges ...
. When advised, the group is widely known to immediately convene together to play for the victims directly impacted by the violence within the country.
Cesar Lopez is officially a 'Non Violence Messenger' of the United Nations and an 'Emissary of Consciousness' for Amnesty International.
López is the creator of the Escopetarra, a largely symbolic musical instrument which is an
AK-47 converted into a guitar.
In 2010, he and his Audio Engineer,
Julio Monroy Julio is the Spanish equivalent of the month July and may refer to:
*Julio (given name)
*Julio (surname)
*Júlio de Castilhos, a municipality of the western part of the state of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil
* ''Julio'' (album), a 1983 compilation albu ...
, recorded the album "
Las voces del Salado", the álbum was recorded at the "
Montes de Maria" with the people from the town
El Salado who were involved in the .
Escopetarra
López's most well-known achievement is the Escopetarra, which are decommissioned
AK-47s converted into guitars. So far, only a few dozen of these guitars have been produced, but upon completion, López intends to give the guitars to high-profile musicians across the world, such as
Juanes
file:Juanes ZMF 2015 jm49108.jpg, Juanes at the Zelt Musik Festival 2015 in Freiburg, Germany
file:Juanes ZMF 2015 jm49211.jpg, Juanes at the Zelt Musik Festival 2015 in Freiburg, Germany
Juan Esteban Aristizábal Vásquez (born 9 August 19 ...
,
Fito Páez,
Bob Geldof
Robert Frederick Zenon Geldof (; born 5 October 1951) is an Irish singer-songwriter, and political activist. He rose to prominence in the late 1970s as lead singer of the Rock music in Ireland, Irish rock band the Boomtown Rats, who achieved ...
and
Manu Chao, and to political and religious leaders such as
Kofi Annan.
References
External links
Cesar Lopez official website.
DeltaRecords.net The escopetarra: a guitar with a violent background
TodaBalaEsperdida.com Cesar Lopez TODA BALA ES PERDIDA' website.
@CesarLopezMusic Cesar Lopez' Twitter.
Killer Sound Kevin Sites, Yahoo! News, 24 April 2006
Colombian musicians organise online BBC News, 1 June 2006
1973 births
Living people
Colombian musicians
Colombian activists
Colombian pianists
21st-century pianists
{{Colombia-musician-stub