My new friend Frankie Presto
















I met Frankie Presto about eight days ago.   I got to know him well.  I hope that you will meet him.

He is the central character in the book "the magic strings of Frankie Presto", and the ,love of his life Aurora..

This wondrous tale was written by Mitch Albom (author of "Tuesdays with Morrie") and published in 2015 by Harper Collins.

Frankie Presto was orphaned at birth during the Spanish Civil War., and then abandoned by the Nun who had rescued him from a burning Church in the town of Villareal.

He is taught to play guitar by a stern task master El Maestro.  Presto becomes the greatest guitar player in the world. At aged nine he is sent to America with his only possession -  a guitar with its six magic strings.

Along the way he meets (amongst many others) Little Richard, Duke Ellington, Lyle Lovett, John Lennon, Darlene Love, Paul Stanley (KISS)  he eschews the  great fame which comes his way, and falls from the public gaze and into drug addiction. He loves, loses, and loves again the tough and determined Aurora.

His journey takes him from Spain to the U.K., the U.S.A., Viet-nam, New Zealand, the Philippines, and back to his birth town of Villarreal where he dies at aged 74.

The story of his birth, life and death is narrated by Music.  Presto reached out and seized Music (or perhaps it was Music who seized Presto) when as a boy he hears the tune "Lagrima"  which his mother had sung at his birth.

Them's the bare bones, hardly enough to make you run out and buy the book.  But I hope you will.  Mitch Albom has created a fabulous book, So much so that I could almost believe that Presto was a historical person.    He was not historical, but by the skill of Albom Frankie Presto is real.

I got to know him so well that I delayed reading the last chapter for two days,  knowing it would relate the circumstances of Frankie Presto's death.


In the following videos you can hear Mr. Albom as he talks about his book, and you can listed to the haunting tomes of "Lagrima"

---------------------------------------

Mitch Albom talks about the book

https://youtu.be/zvTwuBUFHfM



Lagrima

https://youtu.be/ZxZpO2spoQg



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