Gente de Mallorca: Paco ColombàsAugust 16, 2024

‘My family is 100% llonguet. That’s the name for people from Palma. I was born in Santa Catalina when it was full of gypsies and junkies, when it was dirty and dangerous. I played in Peña Arrabal, the Santa Catalina football team. I learned to sing the traditional habaneras, romantic songs the Santa Catalina fishermen sung out at sea when they’re missing their women.

My grandfather played guitar in a band of rancheros. There used to be a super-powerful choir in the San Francisco school, where I studied. Every Christmas, the director of the choir, a priest, would ask the nine-year-old boys to sing. Everyone would stand up and he would listen. If he tapped you on the shoulder, it meant you weren’t chosen for the choir and you had to sit down. I remember the day he left me standing. I was so proud.

I got my first guitar from my godfather when I was 14, made my first band when I was 16. Black Summers. When I was in Barcelona studying musical theatre and drama, I needed extra money, so I started my own parties. Around 23, I started to think “I have the power to move people with my music and I’m not happy with the music I’m providing”. DJing was the next step.

As a DJ, I’m tutti-frutti but I prefer house and whatever surrounds it. Disco, funky, Afro, techno, you know? I had a band called Oso Leone for 10 years. This was the most spiritual I’ve ever been in music. I cried when we played live. For the past few years, I’ve been DJing at weddings and playing covers with my band. I have my own business called Panela! I might hire 100 people for some weddings.

I have two sons. The oldest is five. He’s crazy about music. He just has to listen to a song once and he can sing the melody. As I turned 40 this year, I wanted to return to my spiritual roots in music. I’ve also come back to Palma after living in Deià and Sóller. I’m buying somewhere in Pere Garau, a neighbourhood making the change Santa Catalina made. I’m happy to go back to a rooted neighbourhood with my family. Yes, I feel most at home in Santa Catalina but I belong to the whole of Mallorca.’