Juan Esteban Aristizábal Vásquez (born August 9, 1972), best known as Juanes, is a rock musician from Medellín, Colombia. When he was younger, his father started calling him Juanes, rather than Juan, a contraction of his two first names Juan and Esteban. As his friends grew to know him by this name, he chose to keep it for his musical career, which started when he, Andrés García, Fernando "Toby" Tobón and José David Lopera, formed the rock band Ekhymosis in 1988.