What is Salsa? Does Anybody Care?

A Short History of Salsa

As great as salsa is, there is a wide variety of rhythms and musical styles in the genre known as "latin" that are even more danceable and swing just as much.

Did you know that the basic structure of what we call "salsa" today is rooted in Son, a slower yet funkier style developed in Cuba's Oriente province in the early 1900's?

The clever percussive improvisation that makes salsa so exciting has its origins in Rumba and Guaguanco from Havana, two rhythms with very heavy African roots; in fact, it is the FOUNDATION of all Cuban music. Without it, salsa would not exist.

Then you have Cha Cha Cha, Guajira, Son Montuno, Mambo, and Guaracha, slow to fast tempo styles, each unique in their own cadence and brilliance. So, when you hear a "salsa" tune that is very fast, it's most likely a fancy variation of a mambo, guaracha or guaguanco-all Cuban music!

Old School Salsa

Old School salsa evolved in the mid 1960's to late 1970's. In the forefront of what would become a worldwide phenomenon was the Fania label which showcased many of the great bands that played this style: Johnny Pacheco, Willie Colon and Hector LaVoe, Ray Barretto and Larry Harlow.

The Puerto Rican wing of the salsa empire was headed by El Gran Combo, Sonora Poncena, Roberto Roena y su Apollo Sound, Willie Rosario, Ricardo Ray and Tommy Olivencia, all magnificent orquestas in their own right, often exceeding the musicianship of those on the mainland.

Two seminal recordings: The Fania All Stars Live at the Cheetah Volumes 1 and 2 recorded in 1971, and the documentary film "Our Latin Thing" ignited the public's fire, passion and hunger for latin music, spreading to the remotest parts of the world. In those euphoric days, it seemed that every record shop and radio station was playing salsa, and man, those LP's were flying off the shelves!
During this era, Pacheco, co-founder of Fania Records, the latin equivalent of Motown, came up with the phrase "salsa" (sauce) to describe this "new" sound likening it to a sauce made from various ingredients, in this case, elements from rock, r&b, soul, and jazz. Don't deceive yourselves. Salsa is Cuban music with layers of all those genres on top.

But not all salsa artists played hybrid music. Artists such as Pacheco and Harlow also recorded strictly traditional Cuban songs in tribute to the Masters. Thankfully, these guys remained faithful to the Afro-Cuban Roots of salsa for the benefit of present and future generations. Larry Harlow's Tribute to Arsenio Rodriguez album is an ABSOLUTE MUST if you want to truly understand and appreciate salsa and Cuban music. The songs range from soulful and melancholic to exhilarating and swinging.
Arsenio is credited with introducing the conga drum and
adding a two trumpet line and piano to the traditional Cuban conjunto, a blueprint most 1970's bands used to create "salsa". Often imitated, his songwriting and virtuosity on the tres (a three double-stringed Cuban guitar with an exotic oriental sound) has no equal more than forty years after his death.

The Cuban embargo marked the end of that island's most venerated artists' performances in the United States. Cuban recordings were also hard to come by as all commerce between the two nations was prohibited by law.

This dark age of Cuban music opened the door for New York musicians to revive the old Cuban classics and embellish them with their own urban American musical influences.

In New York, Miami, and San Fransisco, Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, Jewish-Americans and expatriated Cubans kept this music alive, but with a new commercial name, style and attitude. Thus, by 1970, the Third Latin Music Renaissance in the U.S., preceded by the Rhumba Craze of the 1930's, and the Mambo and Cha Cha Cha Craze of the 1950's was in full swing.