Fania: The Motown of Salsa

[bonk...@my-deja.com]

As promised in the TOp Fania CDs thread, here is an article in Pulse
Magazine (by Tower Records} that talks about how Fania is
reissuing some classic CD's.

There's a couple of good quotes in here and some background for the
beginner.
Pulse! Magazine
www.towerrecords.com
November 1999

Reissues Report

Fania: the Motown of Salsa
Remembering the glory days of New York's Afro-Cuban convergence

By Ernesto Lechner

How many record companies can claim helping to define an entire genre?
The Fania label did that and much more. It brought the word salsa, a
late 20's Cuban import, to the mainstream. It launched the careers of
Ruben Blades and Ray Barretto. It made Celia Cruz popular again. And
through its many imprints and label acquisitions, it has given the world
of the Afro-Cuban music more than a thousand albums of addictively spicy
dance music.

Thanks to an aggressive reissue campaign, most of Fania's treasures are
available on CD. While the latest batch of releases is made up of more
obscure records, even these sound better than most of the tropical music
recorded today.

The Fania explosion was the result of a fertile musical time and
serendipitous convergence of dozens of extremely gifted singers and
musicians in the Latino barrios of New York.

In 1964, flutist, composer and arranger Johnny Pacheco joined forces
with businessman Jerry Masucci to create a label from the low-budget
safety of their apartments. "I started a record business by using the
Yellow Pages to contact all the companies that pressed records, printed
and made the jackets," wrote Masucci in the liner notes to 1964-1994 30
Great Years, a two-volume, four-CD summation of Fania's catalog.

The label's first release was Pacheco's "Cañonazo," a huge hit which
enabled the company to add new names to its roster. One was pianist
Larry Harlow, and his ambitious works, such as the 1974 Salsa! LP and
1977's concept album La Raza Latina, became best sellers as well.

"We spent a lot of time looking for the right songs to record,"
remembers Pacheco. "I think our dedication to the material was one of
the keys to the success we enjoyed."

Until then, Cuban rhythms such as the guaracha, the rumba, and the
guaguanco had migrated successfully to the United States through artists
like Tito Puente and Machito. But the Fania aesthetic went a step
further, by mixing the Cuban beats with the sass of big band jazz and
the groove of rhythm & blues. This volatile combination became the music
that today is identified as salsa.

By the mid-70's, anybody who was somebody in tropical music was a member
of the Fania family. The label had its own 20-piece touring band, the
spectacular Fania All Stars, where every singer, backup vocalist and
instrumentalist was literally a star. In the '80's, virtuoso pianist
Eddie Palmieri joined joined the company and recorded three
Grammy-winning LPs. And the Queen of Salsa, Celia Cruz, produced some of
her biggest hits for the label, like "Kimbara" and "Bemba Colorá."

"Masucci had talked repeatedly to my husband Pedro [Knight] about
signing me to Fania," says Cruz. "They asked me who I wanted to record
with, and I immediately mentioned Johnny Pacheco, because his sound, was
similar to that of my first group, the Sonora Matancera. Through the
years, I did albums with all the label's bands, from Willie Colón to
Sonora Ponceña."

The label's biggest contribution to Latin music, however, lies in the
discovery of three people who would change the landscape of salsa:
Hector Lavoe, Willie Colon, and Ruben Blades.

Lavoe was the ultimate salsero. Street-smart and charismatic, he infused
his material with bittersweet pathos. With the help of Colon, a young
trombonist with a remarkable talent for composing, arranging and
producing hits, Lavoe released masterpiece after masterpiece. 1975's La
Voz, 1976's De Ti Depende, and 1978's Comedia are required inclusions in
any comprehensive collection of Latin music.

Colon then teamed up with Blades, an innovative Panamanian
singer/songwriter who brought an idealistic political discourse to the
lyrics. Their collaboration peaked on 1978's Siembra, which for many
years was the best-selling album in the genre.

"They were very different times," recalls Colon, "There were no
prejudices in our quest. I would start a number with a merengue beat,
turn it into an aguinaldo, finish it as a guaguancó. And add to the mix
of new music, the other sounds - the Beatles, Herb Alpert."

This inspired momentum lasted until the mid-1980's, when a series of
tragedies and personal feuds brought an end to Fania's creative nirvana.
Many of the artists accused Masucci of ripping them off over their
royalties, which he denied.

Soon after, Blades left the label and spent most of the 1980's recording
a string of ambitious albums for Elektra. A heroin addict, Lavoe died of
AIDS in 1993. Harlow also left the label because of money issues.

Although Fania never officially closed its doors, Masucci stopped
recording and organizing tours; he died in 1998. "He pretty much lost
interest in the music business," explains Cruz. "He suffered too many
disappointments from many of his artists."

The times were also changing. A new genre called "salsa romantica" made
its appearance in the mid-80's, and became a rage that dominated the
following decade. A syrupy, water-down version of the real thing, the
romantica style was heavy on synthesizers and double-entendre lyrics. It
was as close to mainstream pop as Afro-Cuban music ever got.

The '90s saw a couple of reunion concerts by the Fania All Stars, and
the reissues that allowed new fans to discover the label's grandeur.
Like Motown in the '70's for r&b, the Fania label became synonymous with
its music. "Some people blame Fania for exploiting all of their
musicians," offers Colon. "But it's also true that their owners allowed
for an experimentation that is no longer possible today."

Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.