Sixto Rodriguez, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
Sixto Diaz Rodriguez (born July 10, 1942), known professionally as Rodriguez, is an American singer-songwriter from Detroit, Michigan. Though his career was initially met with little fanfare in the United States, he found success in South Africa, Australia (touring the country twice), and New Zealand. Unbeknownst to him for decades, his music was extremely successful and influential in South Africa, where he is believed to have sold more records than Elvis Presley, as well as other countries in Southern Africa. Information about him was scarce, and it was incorrectly rumored there that he had committed suicide shortly after releasing his second album.In the 1990s, determined South African fans managed to find and contact Rodriguez, which led to an unexpected revival of his musical career. This was told in the 2012 Academy Award-winning documentary film Searching for Sugar Man and helped give Rodriguez a measure of fame in his home country. In May 2013, Rodriguez received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from his alma mater, Wayne State University, in Detroit.
Rodriguez has been living in Detroit's historic Woodbridge neighborhood, through which he is seen walking in Searching for Sugar Man. He lives a simple life, possessing no telephone or cell phone, and occasionally visiting bars in the Cass Corridor section of Detroit near Woodbridge and Midtown Detroit, such as the Old Miami pub, where he has performed live concerts for small local crowds.