On this episode of Strings and Things, Daniel Reyes Llinas loosens the pegs on his custom Strat while our host, Patrick Grant tunes up a sparkly Danelectro.

Daniel takes us back to his childhood in Colombia, where he sang in the choir until his godfather gave him money for his first guitar. He was self taught until beginning formal instruction with Carlos Castilla and he went on to study classical guitar at Andes University in Bogotá.

But like many young musicians, Daniel was also drawn to pop and rock and formed a couple of bands with frends. He points to his early love of the Beatles, his Dad’s Pink Floyd and ELO records, New Wave and Latin rock, and finally, the discovery of King Crimson, as signposts in his musical development.

Proving that one does get to meet one’s heroes, for the last decade, Daniel has studied in Robert Fripp’s Guitar Craft courses, and performed in Fripp’s Orchestra of Crafty Guitarists. He released a first album called “Molino” and has worked on the scores for several films. He’s the composer and co-founder of Parias Ensemble, “an instrumental group dedicated to blurring the lines of improvisation and written music”.

Find out more about Daniel’s work at his website, llinasmusic.com.