Remembering 2025’s Music Losses: Flaco Jiménez

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One thing is for certain: the music list is all over the place! As I salute the losses from the world of music from 2025 you’ll see country, rock, pop, heavy metal, folk…and tejano! Today I celebrate one of the greatest tejano artists of our generation. Flaco Jiménez Your Spanish lesson for today: flaco means skinny. That was Leonardo Jiménez’ nickname, and it stuck. Despite the fact that Jiménez was primarily known for the Mexican styles of music, he was everywhere. He played on albums by The Rolling Stones, Dr. John, and Bob Dylan. He was a member of the Texas Tornadoes with Freddy Fender and Doug Sahm. He played accordion on Dwight Yoakam’s rendition of “Streets of Bakersfield” (a Buck Owens song where Yoakam duetted with Owens). Over the course of his career he won seven Grammy awards and was given the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2015. The sad thing is that this wonderful style of music, almost guaranteed to make you happy when you hear it (try to control yourself ), doesn’t have much of a following outside of Texas and the Mexican-American community. That’s sad, because it’s fun music…and Flaco Jiménez was one of its biggest ambassadors. Flaco Jiménez Born Leonardo Jiménez, March 11, 1939, San Antonio, Texas Died July 31, 2025, San Antonio, Texas (long illness) (age 86) HALL OF FAME: Austin City Limits The joy of tejano music from Flaco: