Juan Leonardo Santillia Rojas (born 18 October 1984) is an Ecuadorian musician. He won the fifth season of the television show '' Das Supertalent'', the German version of ''

Britain's Got Talent ''Britain's Got Talent'' (often abbreviated to ''BGT'') is a televised British talent show competition, and part of the global '' Got Talent'' franchise created by Simon Cowell. Presented by Anthony McPartlin and Declan Donnelly (colloquial ...

''.

Biography

Rojas came from his home country to Spain in 2000 while his family remained in Ecuador. From there, he went to Germany with a tourist visa repeatedly. He lives with his Polish wife in Berlin, where he made money as a street performer. A passerby informed him about the

talent show A talent show or talent contest is an event in which participants perform the arts of singing, dancing, lip-syncing, acting, martial arts, playing an instrument, poetry, comedy or other activities to showcase skills. Many talent shows are p ...

'' Das Supertalent''. He applied for the fifth season in 2011 and was able to qualify for the final rounds. With an interpretation of "

El cóndor pasa EL, El or el may refer to: Arts and entertainment Fictional entities * El, a List of Shugo Chara! characters#El, character from the manga series ''Shugo Chara!'' by Peach-Pit * Eleven (Stranger Things), Eleven (''Stranger Things'') (El), a fiction ...

" with the panflute and other South American

wind instruments A wind instrument is a musical instrument that contains some type of resonator (usually a tube) in which a column of air is set into vibration by the player blowing into (or over) a mouthpiece set at or near the end of the resonator. The pitch ...

, he came through the semi-finals. This resulted in a reunion of the musician with his mother from Ecuador, causing an emotional performance. At the finals on 17 December 2011, Rojas played the instrumental track "The Lonely Shepherd", written by

James Last James Last (, ; born Hans Last; 17 April 1929 – 9 June 2015) was a German composer and big band leader of the James Last Orchestra. Initially a jazz bassist, his trademark "happy music" made his numerous albums best-sellers in Germany and ...

, which had become a hit in 1977 when performed by Last and Gheorghe Zamfir. Rojas won the competition with a distinct lead. His winning song was released after the competition and ranked at #48 on the German sales chart during the week of Christmas. On 27 January 2012, his first album of known instrumental pieces was released, titled "Spirit of the Hawk". Produced by

Dieter Bohlen Dieter Bohlen (; born Dieter Günter Bohlen on 7 February 1954) is a German songwriter, producer, singer and television personality. He first achieved fame as a member of the pop duo Modern Talking in the 1980s, and has since produced numerous G ...

, the album reached the Top 5 on the charts in the German-speaking nations, and by the end of February had achieved gold status in Germany.

Discography

Songs

" (2012) *''Nature Spirits'' (2017)

Albums

*''Spirit of the Hawk'' (2012) *''Flying Heart'' (2012) *''Albatross'' (2013) *''Das Beste'' (2015) *''Leo Rojas'' (2017) *Colours of Nature (2022)

External links

Official Web site

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rojas, Leo 1984 births Living people Ecuadorian musicians Folk flautists Das Supertalent participants Ecuadorian expatriates in Germany