June 11, 2026
Fania Takes Nueva York | From Our Thing: The Birth of Salsa in Nueva York
The 1960s brings social and political change to the world and to New York City, where a young Johnny Pacheco keeps people dancing with his orchestra and charanga music. The Dominican musician is also going through a divorce and his lawyer, Jerry Masucci, happens to be a fan of Johnny’s music. The two form a music partnership that will forever change music. They call their music label Fania Records.
Hosted by Oscar and Emmy-nominated actress and Brooklyn native Rosie Perez and produced by Pulitzer Prize-winning Futuro Media. “Our Thing: The Birth of Salsa in Nueva York,” is the most comprehensive audio narrative yet made about the birth and wild heights of salsa, a genre that continues to shape global culture today.
Listen to Our Thing: The Birth of Salsa in Nueva York wherever you listen to podcasts.
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00:00:15
Speaker 1: Pushkin power thing. The birth of salsa in Nueva York was made possible by the Melon Foundation, which seeks to build just communities enriched by meaning and empowered by critical thinking, where ideas and imagination can thrive heads up. This episode contained some explicit language. There's a pretty legendary concert from nineteen seventy three, a concert that the day after it happened, everyone was sitting on our stoop in Brooklyn talking about it. People still talk about it to this day. It was at a venue you have to have Kohona to think you could play.
00:01:10
Speaker 2: Yankee Stadium at that time could hold fifty five thousands.
00:01:13
Speaker 3: I remember.
00:01:16
Speaker 1: Yankee Stadium. Initially this concert was supposed to attract a modest crowd.
00:01:22
Speaker 3: I said, how many people you expect? He said, I will get eight thousand people.
00:01:28
Speaker 4: Everybody sowed crazy for doing Yankee Stadium.
00:01:32
Speaker 1: Crazy because who the hell reserves a fifty thousand seed a venue for eight thousand people. Stadiums were reserved for big, big shows. I mean only a few years before the the Beatles played Shea Stadium beer. But there was a boutique music label in New York City, and well they had cohons These were underdogs from a forgotten corner of the city, El Barrio and the Bronx, making a new kind of explosive news. There's confusion this genre they were calling SASA and that little boutique label it was called Fania Records Records.
00:02:20
Speaker 3: It's not your Fania Records, Fania Records.
00:02:24
Speaker 4: I was sitting down with Jerry at five point thirty and there was nobody.
00:02:27
Speaker 1: There at first. It's seen Fania Records sped on Yankee Stadium. Wouldn't pay off.
00:02:33
Speaker 4: And we didn't have great ticket sales, and we put a lot of money into that.
00:02:37
Speaker 1: But they had something in their corner, or someone or several someones, the Justice League of Salsa. I was nine years old at the time, but that was old enough to know the means of these legends. The sounds of Willie Cologne and he were lasting at my family parties before this show ever hoppied. These were the supers of SISA. You really think only eight thousand people were going to show up to watch them when the Latinos in the city had grown exponentially.
00:03:21
Speaker 2: I please, little did he or I know that there was going to be forty two thousand people that.
00:03:32
Speaker 5: The Yankee Stadium.
00:03:33
Speaker 3: The vibe was explosive.
00:03:34
Speaker 5: It was so nuts that I saw the impending craziness coming on.
00:03:43
Speaker 1: On stage that night, the best percussion players of that time, Mungo, Santa Maria and Ray boret battling it out on the hugas. And if you hadn't seen this video, Fanni, you have homework. These motherfuckers were wailing on the drums like they don't even look human. At times. Ray Barretto was in a white button up shirt open just enough to show off his chest. At one point he takes the conga drum and starts banging it on the ground. Johnny Pacheco, want to Fani, A car owners and director is dancing while he's conducting. He can't contain himself. Like every person on that stage is dancing. It's electric, as if the drums possessed the people, and the crowd who was sitting in the stadium seats wanted to see their superheroes up close. They wanted to be on stage, Nan Bialero. Nikki Morrero remembers that moment, you.
00:05:09
Speaker 6: Know, sudden, I saw the public that were seating in the bleaches coming down with like ants coming into the grounds and comings in close and closing.
00:05:23
Speaker 1: Fanio Records co owner Jerry Masucci had made a deal with the stadium that prohibited the crowds from getting on the field or the label would lose their deposit. But the crowd didn't give a fuck about any agreement.
00:05:39
Speaker 4: I could see them coming down from the lows, down and down.
00:05:43
Speaker 1: Thousands of people swarmed the field.
00:05:47
Speaker 5: The groundskeeper goes over to the AC distribution panel and he's pulling out the power to the stage.
00:05:54
Speaker 1: The sound guy, Bernie Fox, did his best to keep the concert going as the groundskeepers threatened to shut it down.
00:06:02
Speaker 3: This is all life and the thing is flashing, you know.
00:06:05
Speaker 5: There is the sparks, and the sound system goes and it turns into what sounds like a kazoo.
00:06:18
Speaker 1: The show no one thought would draw a crowd took over Yankee Stadium. Not only did the fans rush the field, they jumped on the stage and took whatever was it nailed to the ground. Someone waved a giant Puerto Rican flag. It was nuts. Fania Mania, the little record label that people called crazy for booking Yankee Stadium, proved everyone wrong. Nikki Marito recalls it was the first time in my life that I felt Yankee Stadium.
00:06:57
Speaker 3: Where can you go up to?
00:06:58
Speaker 1: This from Pututro Studios. I'm Rosie Perenz and this is our thing, The Birth of Salsa Nuevao a podcast about the legends behind the music and the label who defined it, Bania Records. My work has always lived at the intersection of movement, film, and cultural storytelling. From my choreography days that earned me Emmy nominations to my life on screen with Golden Globe and Asconauts, it has all been about expression for me. But before the recognitions or other titles, I was just a girl in Brooklyn listening to salsa music. As a Eurekan, I sometimes questioned if I was Puerto Rican enough for the motherland. Salsa reminded me that identity is not just inherited. It is created, lived, celebrated, and it was born and raised right here on the streets of New York City. So that's where we're gonna start. Episode one, Faniac takes whoever your from Brookland to the Bronx. Music has always been a part of New York City's heartbeat, coming from windows, people's cars, family parties, check check and check. The high files up and bumping the latest tune. People would bring over their favorite records and share their latest fines for our family. That usually included artists from Fania Records, the Motel of Latin music. You know them, Willie Colon, the Level, Celia.
00:09:04
Speaker 7: Couls, Raby.
00:09:07
Speaker 3: Baby Red Old Reuben Blade.
00:09:08
Speaker 1: Tell you these artists were the soundtrack to our lives. And they were here in New York City because if you wanted to make music, New York was where you came to make.
00:09:30
Speaker 2: It in the world.
00:09:33
Speaker 1: And the sixties was a time of change, changing music, change in politics, change in culture.
00:09:41
Speaker 7: We're taking over schools to ask for black and Puerto Rican studies. The civil rights is going on. We're watching people a crossing the bridge in the South.
00:09:51
Speaker 8: And equal freedom for all about citizens regardless of race or regardless of color.
00:09:56
Speaker 7: And getting shot with poses from fire and being sick down with German shepherds.
00:10:03
Speaker 1: As is a Puerto Rican journalist and writer who once worked for Fanio Records and grew up in New York City. She remembers Puerto Rican activists mobilizing in the sixties.
00:10:14
Speaker 7: They were advocating for the liberation of Puerto Ricos and we're marching you know, against the Vietnam War.
00:10:22
Speaker 6: The war in Vietnam is the world and perilous depression against the colored people.
00:10:28
Speaker 7: In East Harlem. When more into civil rights, when more integrated with the black community, we went into a bottom genius, you know, and torn off T shirts and no.
00:10:41
Speaker 1: Bra The Sneaker generation, as they were nicknamed, were going against the grain, changing things up from what the parents used to do. Their parents who used to hit the big ballrooms and big mambo numbers, you know, the big bands and the boleros and marengez.
00:11:01
Speaker 7: The sixties was a big shift from big band, from mambo, from rumba and medinge chaanga to bachanga. In nineteen sixty, when the whole world was doing twists, New York Latinos were doing bachanga.
00:11:20
Speaker 1: And don't forget rock and roll was also taking over. In the sixties, young people in the US used rock and roll to rebel.
00:11:28
Speaker 7: American kids rejected the big band music of their parents. They out and out rejected it and embraced rock and roll. Then by the time sixty four came in, the Beatles that took over.
00:11:44
Speaker 1: We were listening to rock and roll and soul too. But many Latino teenagers didn't see the need to completely reject their parents' music.
00:11:53
Speaker 7: We didn't do that. We respected our parents' Puerto Rican music. We respected the Cuban music. But then we mixed it up with our music, our influences, with jazz, with rock, with what was going on with English, and we called it Sansa.
00:12:15
Speaker 1: Latinos were adapting the music of the past to vibe what they were feeling at the time, and at that time, it was all about a new kind of dance, the bachanga. It's kind of like salasta to the naked eye, but more funky, more street. Often involves a banuelo and some jumping whipper. This is musician Johnny Pacheco speaking to author Mary Kent for her book Salsa Talks.
00:12:47
Speaker 9: I started the dance of the jananger.
00:12:49
Speaker 1: Praise Tcharanga was a late feeling Cuban music, the music dance the bachanga to get it. The name Pachanga is actually a fusion of his name bah for bajaco and Changa for tcharanga, because Johnny is the one who started the dance craze and he was literally bringing down the house as shows. As he told Ura Flores in an interview.
00:13:17
Speaker 9: When I opened up palladium that seeing fell down and there was a car dealer and a drugstore. All the medication went on the floor and they had to put still being in order for me to come in with a pachanda.
00:13:32
Speaker 4: Johnny was like my big brother, you know, just a very lovable guy.
00:13:36
Speaker 3: Is really not a bad bone in his body.
00:13:39
Speaker 1: This is Alex Basucci, who worked alongside Johnny Alfanio Records.
00:13:44
Speaker 4: Always had a smile on his face, cigar in his hand, you know, and a joke on his tongue.
00:13:48
Speaker 3: He was always telling jokes.
00:13:50
Speaker 1: Let me tell you more about Johnny because he's one of the main characters in this whole story. Juan Asarias Pacheco Nipping aka Johnny Pacheco was born in the Dominican Republic and was exposed to music young.
00:14:08
Speaker 9: Thank father was the bandleader used to have Oeta Tantacilia, which was the number one orchestra in that era.
00:14:15
Speaker 1: His father, renowned band leader and clarinetis, gifted him a harmonica one year and that was that.
00:14:22
Speaker 9: The first systeman that I got was a harmonica that was given to her. By the time I was about seven, I was playing marangas a writer.
00:14:32
Speaker 1: Johnny's family fled the Dominic Kim Republic because of the infamous dictator, Fafio Throuillo. The Pacheco family did not sympathize with the dictator, and if you weren't down with Ruio, it was very easy to turn up missing. So Johnny's father worked tirelessly to get his family out of the country, finally able to bring Johnny over to New York City when he was eleven. After going through the public school system, he eventually studied percussion at Juilliard, the world renowned music school. By the late fifties, Johnny was gaining traction with his orchestra Bajako Isu Taranga.
00:15:09
Speaker 9: I was trying to get the group recorded. I never gave up, so I went in the studio and I did a demo nobody wanted. They said that's the crap. He's gonna die Forget about that.
00:15:21
Speaker 7: Then comes Allegi Records al Santiago.
00:15:25
Speaker 9: Al Santiago came man and he says, you want to record kid, I'll give you a contract.
00:15:30
Speaker 1: Al Santiago was a record producer who started Allegra Records aka Out of the Bronx.
00:15:37
Speaker 7: Al Santiago was the first one to record these guys when nobody else would record them.
00:15:44
Speaker 1: Johnny also trusted Al Santiago. Al had grown up enthralled with loud music, even as a kid hanging out at the Palladium, the legendary New York City Council Hall. Here is El speaking with journalist David Karp in the nineties before he passed.
00:16:02
Speaker 10: I used to be the band boy to my uncle's band who played the Palladium, and at least I was on the penstine giving out the music. I remember going up those long flight of stairs, those many many steps, and hearing the brass section.
00:16:17
Speaker 8: Da da dada. That is my favorite Mumbo phrase, and I'll never forget it.
00:16:32
Speaker 1: The Palladium Bolvroom was one of the most famous establishments of the time, a legend in the heart of Midtown. The club was home to the biggest acts and best dancers.
00:16:43
Speaker 10: They wanted you to be dressed appropriately.
00:16:46
Speaker 3: You had to have a jacket.
00:16:47
Speaker 10: You couldn't get in unless you were a tie, and if you didn't have one, you were forced to runt a real.
00:16:53
Speaker 3: Ugly, wrinkled, horrible tie.
00:16:58
Speaker 10: And of course in those days, we didn't have jeez and we didn't have sneakers and all would there.
00:17:02
Speaker 3: Go like that.
00:17:03
Speaker 1: The big bands played at the clubs all over town, but they all wanted top billing at a lady. The players were dressed to the knives, the best dancers all up front, absorbing the sounds of the percussion, fill in the glave, ba ba ba ba.
00:17:20
Speaker 7: So all this has happened, and then clubs are happening, not only its.
00:17:24
Speaker 3: Harmm all over the Bronx.
00:17:26
Speaker 7: One of the reasons clubs came out was because the factory is you know this the whole you know, industrial revolution and the way it happened on the islands and all of that. People needed a place on the weekends to just relax. This was not farm work anymore.
00:17:44
Speaker 1: The people needed this music. They craved it, and that created competition all over the city because you had to get out and dance at the best spots with the best orchestras. You needed an outlet. And let me tell you something, dancing does something to your brain. It changes you. It makes you more confident. Let me be blood. You may not be very good looking, but boy, if you could dance, people waited in line for you. And the dancing at these clubs it was hot, it was sensual and man didn't make you sweat with your clothes on, so without even meaning to it was a big outlet, and packed clubs meant packed wallets for the owners, so the music had to be top notch. So back to our hero story. A young Johnny Pacheco had just signed with Alegre Records and Al Santiago. His first album with the label, Pacheco is Sucharanga was a hit. In one of his early songs, he repeats a an African term meaning joy or happiness. The percussion is the backbone, still marking that glave ba ba ba ba ba with a cowbll walking the mambo section. The whole song is a party and mark my word, it made you want to dance mucho swing. Johnny was a genius. He could play everything well. He had refined playing percussion at Juilliard, but thanks to that he also played clarinet, violin and one of the signatures the flute.
00:20:00
Speaker 2: Her Checko was incredibly knowledgeable about music.
00:20:04
Speaker 1: That's Bernie Fox, one of Fania's original sound engineers. You heard him.
00:20:09
Speaker 2: If Pacheco had to overdub a Morocca part or a Guido part on a live recording. He didn't have to look at music if once he heard the music, once he knew all the breaks, he knew all the everything, and he would just go and play it.
00:20:25
Speaker 1: There was nothing Johnny couldn't do. Johnny even worked on The Tonight Show on NBC. So anyway back to Allegra. After that initial honeymoon phase ended, Johnny realized something was a miss at the label.
00:20:42
Speaker 11: We were selling records and the money wasn't coming in.
00:20:45
Speaker 9: They were spending money like it was going out of style, and that really take me off.
00:20:50
Speaker 1: So Johnny Butcheco decided he would leave Allegre for bigger dreams. As he told Ura Flores in an interview.
00:20:57
Speaker 9: That I was to have the best orchestra ever, getting all the best musicians, putting them together.
00:21:04
Speaker 1: And by this time Johnny he was a star. His record had been a hit.
00:21:11
Speaker 7: This record at that time sold over one hundred thousand copies.
00:21:16
Speaker 1: Making sure you heard that right, one hundred thousand copies in nineteen sixty one. This is not streaming sales or digital downloads. This was pushing music on the radio and physical album sold without any of the modern tools to get your name out there. Think about that Johnny was huge, but his personal life was suffering.
00:21:40
Speaker 7: He was getting divorced.
00:21:41
Speaker 1: At the time, Johnny needed a divorce lawyer.
00:21:44
Speaker 7: His divorce lawyer was Jerry Masucci.
00:21:49
Speaker 3: It's starting at a party.
00:21:51
Speaker 1: That's Jerry Masucci, the other central character of our story. He speaks here to author Mary Kent for her book Salsa Talks.
00:22:00
Speaker 9: He was worth a leg record.
00:22:03
Speaker 3: He was unhappy.
00:22:04
Speaker 1: Johnny met Jerry about the divorce, but soon the two hit it off when they talked about their mutual love for Latin music.
00:22:12
Speaker 3: He's very charming guy, Jerry, you know, very charming.
00:22:15
Speaker 1: This is Alex Masucci, who you heard from earlier, who is also Jerry's younger brother.
00:22:21
Speaker 4: And he was really a jock, you know, he was always playing ball.
00:22:25
Speaker 1: Jerry and Alex grew up in Brooklyn, New York. Their parents were immigrants from Italy, and Alex remembers that even as a kid, Jerry loved Latin music.
00:22:36
Speaker 3: When I was a.
00:22:37
Speaker 4: Kid, we shared a bed, so he would come home and he put on Latin music and I'd say to myself, you know, what the come I don't.
00:22:45
Speaker 3: Understand how does he understand this?
00:22:47
Speaker 4: What is the is this guy?
00:22:53
Speaker 1: Before he was a divorce lawyer or a cop. Jerry was in the Navy, and the Navy sent him to Cuba.
00:23:01
Speaker 12: I worked in Havana, so I went to school in Mexico. I was always sort of had a feeling for lat things.
00:23:09
Speaker 1: Jerry's time in Cuba really left a mark on him. Before the revolution, Havana was ultimately a US playground, filled with casinos and clubs and everything that was prohibited or taboo in the US at the time.
00:23:24
Speaker 4: Imagine leaving you lived behind the candy store in Brooklyn, and you know you're a jock, and you know the biggest experience has gone on a corner bar, you know, and all of a sudden, he's in Havana. Would sell your cruz singing on the corner and a cafe and all these girls dancing to Latin music and all these clubs, and then they would race, you know, cooker roches between the track. You know, it's just action town. You know. The richest people say that, and a cab driver who went there with no money would say the same thing.
00:23:58
Speaker 3: And it was a wild town, Havanah.
00:24:01
Speaker 1: Jerry got back to New York and tried to find his way.
00:24:05
Speaker 4: He was the youngest cop on the force. He became a cop on his twenty first birthday. Jerry was always trying to start businesses. You know. One time he started to see you know, the electric carts that they use now. He had it years ago, and I believe he was traveling around the country with Mario and Dretti trying to sell these carts. You know, he was always trying something. And then Jerry met Johnny.
00:24:28
Speaker 1: Johnny Pacheco, who happened to need a divorce and who also happened to be one of the hardest Latin musicians of the time. Soon Jerry invited Johnny to dinner at the Masucci's one weekend.
00:24:41
Speaker 4: My mother she worked eight hours a day in a factory selling pockets.
00:24:45
Speaker 3: You know what that is, just go.
00:24:47
Speaker 4: Boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom, boom boom boom.
00:24:51
Speaker 3: And then she would cook.
00:24:53
Speaker 4: She'd make antipasta that was like it was like a piece of art.
00:24:58
Speaker 3: You know.
00:24:59
Speaker 4: She'd row all the salami up, put it in certain spots and it was amazing. And then she'd make pasta, sausages meet for bra Joel, and then she made chicken cutlets. So one day Johnny comes over. I was sitting outside my mother was coming for a Sunday dinner, and all of a sudden, this Mercedes pulls up, you know, and they were no Mercedes in my neighborhood. I didn't know if I knew what a Mercedes was. And Johnny gets out and Mona gets out, his second wife.
00:25:33
Speaker 3: And she was gorgeous.
00:25:35
Speaker 4: I mean really, I'll never forget when she got out of that car.
00:25:41
Speaker 1: And then it became official. Here's Jerry again.
00:25:46
Speaker 12: John I said, start a rek, so we came far.
00:25:53
Speaker 1: Jerry had teamed up with Johnny to create Bania Records, a new label that they said would be favorable to musicians, one that would be like a family.
00:26:03
Speaker 4: My mother and father gave him the money to do the album, which was a lot of money for them to give. You know, they were making twenty eight dollars a week.
00:26:10
Speaker 1: The Masucci's mom gave them twenty five hundred dollars and they were off. Johnny would serve as musical director and Jerry would handle the business side, even if at first that was a work in progress.
00:26:26
Speaker 3: He didn't know anything about the music business.
00:26:29
Speaker 4: You know.
00:26:29
Speaker 3: They opened up a phone book and I got.
00:26:31
Speaker 12: The yellow pages out and called up a recording studio, Jacket Place, Label Place, and we made a record together.
00:26:40
Speaker 1: Johnny and Jerry. Jerry and Johnny a real dynamic tool.
00:26:45
Speaker 4: Johnny is probably one of the most talented showmen in the history of the business. An incredible songwriter, fabulous food player and a wonderful guy. You know. I mean, I don't think either one of that could have done it without each other period.
00:27:02
Speaker 11: Jerry was a true fan of the music. He really got into the music big time.
00:27:07
Speaker 1: Javi at Byrne popular music producer, a musician.
00:27:11
Speaker 11: Fania the name Fania is a coffee shop in Cuba where a lot of guys want to hang out.
00:27:17
Speaker 1: There's some debate about that name. Johnny is stuck by his version in many interviews that the name came from a Cuban song called Aania Boonche, originally written by Rinaldo Bolanos. He also said that there was a Cuban group called Fania.
00:27:36
Speaker 9: It was a group of individuals in Cuba that they had this club and was from good players only, and the name attracted me so much. I put Fania instead of Pania Fania and I said, this will sounding not only good to the Spanish, but to Americans they would say Funnie Records.
00:27:54
Speaker 1: Whatever the reason the name Fania stuck, I'll take it. Harvey got involved right from the onset through a mutual bandmate, one of Fania's first artists, Larry Harlow.
00:28:07
Speaker 11: Mike bookkeeper was Larry hollow mother. Okay, Larry see his mother during the day and tell her about that he just signed a contract with his new record company, owned by an Italian lawyer and Pacheco. He said, Oh, you wouldn't meet this guy, Jerry Masucci. I think you too would get along. As Jerry said, I want to continue my law practice and put all the money I make into Fania. I believe in Faia.
00:28:36
Speaker 1: So the two co founders now have a name, some producers and a couple of artists. Fania Records was up and running sort of.
00:28:47
Speaker 4: There were so many record labels on Tenth Avenue, you know, just in storefronts, and we were in a basically in a broom closet in Jerry's law office.
00:28:58
Speaker 3: You know, you know, we didn't sell a lot of records.
00:29:01
Speaker 1: Daniel Nassel was the first of Pacheco's album's release on the new Fania label, with eleven dance tunes. This marked the beginning of an era. They didn't even have space to store the LPs. Remember we're talking about physical products, giant heavy boxes. A team of two. They would deliver the records, sometimes out of the back of Johnny's own car. One person to watch the car and want to deliver the merchandise. If you know New York City, you know parking was a bitch even back then. Here's Johnny Pacheco again.
00:29:37
Speaker 9: I used to do Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and Jerry used to do Tuesday Furdiesday. On Saturday, we used to get in my car and put all the records. We used to go to every store delivered on own records.
00:29:51
Speaker 1: Despite Johnny already being a pretty big deal. Here he was in the middle of winter distributing records himself, and people got a kick out of me.
00:30:01
Speaker 3: It was scroll like hell, my nose was running.
00:30:05
Speaker 9: And one guy then look up a check a lane that bay making delivery and he took out a dollar billion into.
00:30:13
Speaker 3: And every then that came in, we put it back into the business.
00:30:17
Speaker 1: All of that paid off because the public took notice. Here's Jerry and.
00:30:22
Speaker 12: Just came together. Second recond Now he found no guide, and all of a sudden thing of.
00:30:33
Speaker 1: Jerry and Johnny were able to get it played on the radio because Jerry was well connected through his day job as a lawyer and a cop, and Johnny knew all the DJs. Between the two of them, they knew everyone. The public was into what they were selling because it was different, because, like we said earlier, the demographics were changing. Auror remembers the first time she noticed the change.
00:30:59
Speaker 7: So I'm listening to Symphony sid one night and I hear a gonga. I hear a lot of music, but I'm hearing this guy. But I'm saying, wait a minute. He's not singing about the farm. He's not singing about.
00:31:12
Speaker 3: The chicken and the rooster.
00:31:14
Speaker 7: He's singing about the projects. He's singing about riots. He's singing about us.
00:31:19
Speaker 1: This new generation of kids, the sneaker generation, was ready for change in society and in music, but with the flavor they grew up listening to at home. By nineteen sixty six, the Palladium shuttered its doors and Fanio Recas was poised to take the city by storm. But as the saying goes, the road to Hell is paved with good intentions coming up this season.
00:31:47
Speaker 4: That night Da Cheetah, they just played un fucking believable or slabe.
00:31:53
Speaker 12: It's somebody you didn't mess with, you know, one of things his way, if they were legal or not.
00:31:58
Speaker 4: Our rhythm is directly African.
00:32:00
Speaker 3: We cannot continue to act as if this is just Latin music. This is African music now.
00:32:05
Speaker 7: Lupe was the queen of Latin soul, different from Celia.
00:32:09
Speaker 3: Why is it, Jerry that you promote the commercial bands. Why aren't you promoting the black bands?
00:32:14
Speaker 1: Banya is making money in every direction.
00:32:17
Speaker 7: Johnny was sorry hard because Johnny trusted him.
00:32:21
Speaker 3: If you sold one hundred, that was unheard of. We sold millions.
00:32:25
Speaker 11: Didn't make a nickel, a fucking penny.
00:32:28
Speaker 3: I never made nothing of that. I said, Holy shit, I'm Joe Batan.
00:32:32
Speaker 11: I ain't got the money to pay for the flat tire.
00:32:38
Speaker 1: I can't wait for the next episode. Joined puturo Plus for early access to the whole season at free listening and exclusive bonus content. For our Thing, The Birth of Salasa in UEV, York. Go to Puturomediagroup dot org slash joint plus to get access today our thing, The Birth of Salsa in Uever York is an original podcast from Puturo Studios. It was made possible by the Mellon Foundation. Our senior producer is Genie Muntalvo. Our episodes were written, reported, and produced by her and Mark Pagan. The episodes were edited by Maria Garcia, additional editing by Marlon Bishop. Our post producer is Joaquing Cutler. He and Genie Montalvo sound designed our episodes. Our associated producer is Juliana Luis. Our production managers are Francis Poon, Jessica Ellis and Victoria Estrada. Mixing by Stephanie LAbau, Julia Caruso and jj Corubin, back checking by Tatiana Diaz and additional booking by jabiir Rejas. Editorial consultation by Ernesto Lechner. Special thanks to Aroa Flores, Martin Cohen, Alex Masucci, Mariso Negron, Mary Kent and Annsto Nukar. Special thanks to Craft Recordings, a con Company theme Swung and original music by Ella Brick. Additional music courtesy of David Frankel and Avanida bay Yours Truly recorded at Bridge Studios in Brooklyn by you Ros Giovanovitch and at full English post by Charles at Tangana and Ben Steiner. Special thanks to my manager Tarkanafari a Strand Entertainment and my glam Squad here Johnny Levoy and make up Karen Dupiche. Executive produced for Uturo Studios by Marlon Bishop and Maria Garcia from Concord Records. Executive producers are Bruce McIntosh and Wesley Adams. Show art by jose ostol OSTOLASA original show concept by Marlon Bishop and Genie Montalvo. Legal review by Neil Rossini, Michael Martin, Linn Hoist and Jonathan Bishop of Legal Arts. A marketing team includes Annello Reyes and Luis Luna. Futuro Media was founded by Maria Inajosa. I'm your host and resident Luregan Rosie Perez. You can hear all the music featured in this episode and this season on our Spotify music playlist. We've got links in our show notes, and don't forget to tap the heart to save it to your library because we'll be adding to it each week. And make sure you follow our thing, The Birth of Salta in Nueva York on your favorite podcast app. Thanks for listening.
Speaker 1: Pushkin power thing. The birth of salsa in Nueva York was made possible by the Melon Foundation, which seeks to build just communities enriched by meaning and empowered by critical thinking, where ideas and imagination can thrive heads up. This episode contained some explicit language. There's a pretty legendary concert from nineteen seventy three, a concert that the day after it happened, everyone was sitting on our stoop in Brooklyn talking about it. People still talk about it to this day. It was at a venue you have to have Kohona to think you could play.
00:01:10
Speaker 2: Yankee Stadium at that time could hold fifty five thousands.
00:01:13
Speaker 3: I remember.
00:01:16
Speaker 1: Yankee Stadium. Initially this concert was supposed to attract a modest crowd.
00:01:22
Speaker 3: I said, how many people you expect? He said, I will get eight thousand people.
00:01:28
Speaker 4: Everybody sowed crazy for doing Yankee Stadium.
00:01:32
Speaker 1: Crazy because who the hell reserves a fifty thousand seed a venue for eight thousand people. Stadiums were reserved for big, big shows. I mean only a few years before the the Beatles played Shea Stadium beer. But there was a boutique music label in New York City, and well they had cohons These were underdogs from a forgotten corner of the city, El Barrio and the Bronx, making a new kind of explosive news. There's confusion this genre they were calling SASA and that little boutique label it was called Fania Records Records.
00:02:20
Speaker 3: It's not your Fania Records, Fania Records.
00:02:24
Speaker 4: I was sitting down with Jerry at five point thirty and there was nobody.
00:02:27
Speaker 1: There at first. It's seen Fania Records sped on Yankee Stadium. Wouldn't pay off.
00:02:33
Speaker 4: And we didn't have great ticket sales, and we put a lot of money into that.
00:02:37
Speaker 1: But they had something in their corner, or someone or several someones, the Justice League of Salsa. I was nine years old at the time, but that was old enough to know the means of these legends. The sounds of Willie Cologne and he were lasting at my family parties before this show ever hoppied. These were the supers of SISA. You really think only eight thousand people were going to show up to watch them when the Latinos in the city had grown exponentially.
00:03:21
Speaker 2: I please, little did he or I know that there was going to be forty two thousand people that.
00:03:32
Speaker 5: The Yankee Stadium.
00:03:33
Speaker 3: The vibe was explosive.
00:03:34
Speaker 5: It was so nuts that I saw the impending craziness coming on.
00:03:43
Speaker 1: On stage that night, the best percussion players of that time, Mungo, Santa Maria and Ray boret battling it out on the hugas. And if you hadn't seen this video, Fanni, you have homework. These motherfuckers were wailing on the drums like they don't even look human. At times. Ray Barretto was in a white button up shirt open just enough to show off his chest. At one point he takes the conga drum and starts banging it on the ground. Johnny Pacheco, want to Fani, A car owners and director is dancing while he's conducting. He can't contain himself. Like every person on that stage is dancing. It's electric, as if the drums possessed the people, and the crowd who was sitting in the stadium seats wanted to see their superheroes up close. They wanted to be on stage, Nan Bialero. Nikki Morrero remembers that moment, you.
00:05:09
Speaker 6: Know, sudden, I saw the public that were seating in the bleaches coming down with like ants coming into the grounds and comings in close and closing.
00:05:23
Speaker 1: Fanio Records co owner Jerry Masucci had made a deal with the stadium that prohibited the crowds from getting on the field or the label would lose their deposit. But the crowd didn't give a fuck about any agreement.
00:05:39
Speaker 4: I could see them coming down from the lows, down and down.
00:05:43
Speaker 1: Thousands of people swarmed the field.
00:05:47
Speaker 5: The groundskeeper goes over to the AC distribution panel and he's pulling out the power to the stage.
00:05:54
Speaker 1: The sound guy, Bernie Fox, did his best to keep the concert going as the groundskeepers threatened to shut it down.
00:06:02
Speaker 3: This is all life and the thing is flashing, you know.
00:06:05
Speaker 5: There is the sparks, and the sound system goes and it turns into what sounds like a kazoo.
00:06:18
Speaker 1: The show no one thought would draw a crowd took over Yankee Stadium. Not only did the fans rush the field, they jumped on the stage and took whatever was it nailed to the ground. Someone waved a giant Puerto Rican flag. It was nuts. Fania Mania, the little record label that people called crazy for booking Yankee Stadium, proved everyone wrong. Nikki Marito recalls it was the first time in my life that I felt Yankee Stadium.
00:06:57
Speaker 3: Where can you go up to?
00:06:58
Speaker 1: This from Pututro Studios. I'm Rosie Perenz and this is our thing, The Birth of Salsa Nuevao a podcast about the legends behind the music and the label who defined it, Bania Records. My work has always lived at the intersection of movement, film, and cultural storytelling. From my choreography days that earned me Emmy nominations to my life on screen with Golden Globe and Asconauts, it has all been about expression for me. But before the recognitions or other titles, I was just a girl in Brooklyn listening to salsa music. As a Eurekan, I sometimes questioned if I was Puerto Rican enough for the motherland. Salsa reminded me that identity is not just inherited. It is created, lived, celebrated, and it was born and raised right here on the streets of New York City. So that's where we're gonna start. Episode one, Faniac takes whoever your from Brookland to the Bronx. Music has always been a part of New York City's heartbeat, coming from windows, people's cars, family parties, check check and check. The high files up and bumping the latest tune. People would bring over their favorite records and share their latest fines for our family. That usually included artists from Fania Records, the Motel of Latin music. You know them, Willie Colon, the Level, Celia.
00:09:04
Speaker 7: Couls, Raby.
00:09:07
Speaker 3: Baby Red Old Reuben Blade.
00:09:08
Speaker 1: Tell you these artists were the soundtrack to our lives. And they were here in New York City because if you wanted to make music, New York was where you came to make.
00:09:30
Speaker 2: It in the world.
00:09:33
Speaker 1: And the sixties was a time of change, changing music, change in politics, change in culture.
00:09:41
Speaker 7: We're taking over schools to ask for black and Puerto Rican studies. The civil rights is going on. We're watching people a crossing the bridge in the South.
00:09:51
Speaker 8: And equal freedom for all about citizens regardless of race or regardless of color.
00:09:56
Speaker 7: And getting shot with poses from fire and being sick down with German shepherds.
00:10:03
Speaker 1: As is a Puerto Rican journalist and writer who once worked for Fanio Records and grew up in New York City. She remembers Puerto Rican activists mobilizing in the sixties.
00:10:14
Speaker 7: They were advocating for the liberation of Puerto Ricos and we're marching you know, against the Vietnam War.
00:10:22
Speaker 6: The war in Vietnam is the world and perilous depression against the colored people.
00:10:28
Speaker 7: In East Harlem. When more into civil rights, when more integrated with the black community, we went into a bottom genius, you know, and torn off T shirts and no.
00:10:41
Speaker 1: Bra The Sneaker generation, as they were nicknamed, were going against the grain, changing things up from what the parents used to do. Their parents who used to hit the big ballrooms and big mambo numbers, you know, the big bands and the boleros and marengez.
00:11:01
Speaker 7: The sixties was a big shift from big band, from mambo, from rumba and medinge chaanga to bachanga. In nineteen sixty, when the whole world was doing twists, New York Latinos were doing bachanga.
00:11:20
Speaker 1: And don't forget rock and roll was also taking over. In the sixties, young people in the US used rock and roll to rebel.
00:11:28
Speaker 7: American kids rejected the big band music of their parents. They out and out rejected it and embraced rock and roll. Then by the time sixty four came in, the Beatles that took over.
00:11:44
Speaker 1: We were listening to rock and roll and soul too. But many Latino teenagers didn't see the need to completely reject their parents' music.
00:11:53
Speaker 7: We didn't do that. We respected our parents' Puerto Rican music. We respected the Cuban music. But then we mixed it up with our music, our influences, with jazz, with rock, with what was going on with English, and we called it Sansa.
00:12:15
Speaker 1: Latinos were adapting the music of the past to vibe what they were feeling at the time, and at that time, it was all about a new kind of dance, the bachanga. It's kind of like salasta to the naked eye, but more funky, more street. Often involves a banuelo and some jumping whipper. This is musician Johnny Pacheco speaking to author Mary Kent for her book Salsa Talks.
00:12:47
Speaker 9: I started the dance of the jananger.
00:12:49
Speaker 1: Praise Tcharanga was a late feeling Cuban music, the music dance the bachanga to get it. The name Pachanga is actually a fusion of his name bah for bajaco and Changa for tcharanga, because Johnny is the one who started the dance craze and he was literally bringing down the house as shows. As he told Ura Flores in an interview.
00:13:17
Speaker 9: When I opened up palladium that seeing fell down and there was a car dealer and a drugstore. All the medication went on the floor and they had to put still being in order for me to come in with a pachanda.
00:13:32
Speaker 4: Johnny was like my big brother, you know, just a very lovable guy.
00:13:36
Speaker 3: Is really not a bad bone in his body.
00:13:39
Speaker 1: This is Alex Basucci, who worked alongside Johnny Alfanio Records.
00:13:44
Speaker 4: Always had a smile on his face, cigar in his hand, you know, and a joke on his tongue.
00:13:48
Speaker 3: He was always telling jokes.
00:13:50
Speaker 1: Let me tell you more about Johnny because he's one of the main characters in this whole story. Juan Asarias Pacheco Nipping aka Johnny Pacheco was born in the Dominican Republic and was exposed to music young.
00:14:08
Speaker 9: Thank father was the bandleader used to have Oeta Tantacilia, which was the number one orchestra in that era.
00:14:15
Speaker 1: His father, renowned band leader and clarinetis, gifted him a harmonica one year and that was that.
00:14:22
Speaker 9: The first systeman that I got was a harmonica that was given to her. By the time I was about seven, I was playing marangas a writer.
00:14:32
Speaker 1: Johnny's family fled the Dominic Kim Republic because of the infamous dictator, Fafio Throuillo. The Pacheco family did not sympathize with the dictator, and if you weren't down with Ruio, it was very easy to turn up missing. So Johnny's father worked tirelessly to get his family out of the country, finally able to bring Johnny over to New York City when he was eleven. After going through the public school system, he eventually studied percussion at Juilliard, the world renowned music school. By the late fifties, Johnny was gaining traction with his orchestra Bajako Isu Taranga.
00:15:09
Speaker 9: I was trying to get the group recorded. I never gave up, so I went in the studio and I did a demo nobody wanted. They said that's the crap. He's gonna die Forget about that.
00:15:21
Speaker 7: Then comes Allegi Records al Santiago.
00:15:25
Speaker 9: Al Santiago came man and he says, you want to record kid, I'll give you a contract.
00:15:30
Speaker 1: Al Santiago was a record producer who started Allegra Records aka Out of the Bronx.
00:15:37
Speaker 7: Al Santiago was the first one to record these guys when nobody else would record them.
00:15:44
Speaker 1: Johnny also trusted Al Santiago. Al had grown up enthralled with loud music, even as a kid hanging out at the Palladium, the legendary New York City Council Hall. Here is El speaking with journalist David Karp in the nineties before he passed.
00:16:02
Speaker 10: I used to be the band boy to my uncle's band who played the Palladium, and at least I was on the penstine giving out the music. I remember going up those long flight of stairs, those many many steps, and hearing the brass section.
00:16:17
Speaker 8: Da da dada. That is my favorite Mumbo phrase, and I'll never forget it.
00:16:32
Speaker 1: The Palladium Bolvroom was one of the most famous establishments of the time, a legend in the heart of Midtown. The club was home to the biggest acts and best dancers.
00:16:43
Speaker 10: They wanted you to be dressed appropriately.
00:16:46
Speaker 3: You had to have a jacket.
00:16:47
Speaker 10: You couldn't get in unless you were a tie, and if you didn't have one, you were forced to runt a real.
00:16:53
Speaker 3: Ugly, wrinkled, horrible tie.
00:16:58
Speaker 10: And of course in those days, we didn't have jeez and we didn't have sneakers and all would there.
00:17:02
Speaker 3: Go like that.
00:17:03
Speaker 1: The big bands played at the clubs all over town, but they all wanted top billing at a lady. The players were dressed to the knives, the best dancers all up front, absorbing the sounds of the percussion, fill in the glave, ba ba ba ba.
00:17:20
Speaker 7: So all this has happened, and then clubs are happening, not only its.
00:17:24
Speaker 3: Harmm all over the Bronx.
00:17:26
Speaker 7: One of the reasons clubs came out was because the factory is you know this the whole you know, industrial revolution and the way it happened on the islands and all of that. People needed a place on the weekends to just relax. This was not farm work anymore.
00:17:44
Speaker 1: The people needed this music. They craved it, and that created competition all over the city because you had to get out and dance at the best spots with the best orchestras. You needed an outlet. And let me tell you something, dancing does something to your brain. It changes you. It makes you more confident. Let me be blood. You may not be very good looking, but boy, if you could dance, people waited in line for you. And the dancing at these clubs it was hot, it was sensual and man didn't make you sweat with your clothes on, so without even meaning to it was a big outlet, and packed clubs meant packed wallets for the owners, so the music had to be top notch. So back to our hero story. A young Johnny Pacheco had just signed with Alegre Records and Al Santiago. His first album with the label, Pacheco is Sucharanga was a hit. In one of his early songs, he repeats a an African term meaning joy or happiness. The percussion is the backbone, still marking that glave ba ba ba ba ba with a cowbll walking the mambo section. The whole song is a party and mark my word, it made you want to dance mucho swing. Johnny was a genius. He could play everything well. He had refined playing percussion at Juilliard, but thanks to that he also played clarinet, violin and one of the signatures the flute.
00:20:00
Speaker 2: Her Checko was incredibly knowledgeable about music.
00:20:04
Speaker 1: That's Bernie Fox, one of Fania's original sound engineers. You heard him.
00:20:09
Speaker 2: If Pacheco had to overdub a Morocca part or a Guido part on a live recording. He didn't have to look at music if once he heard the music, once he knew all the breaks, he knew all the everything, and he would just go and play it.
00:20:25
Speaker 1: There was nothing Johnny couldn't do. Johnny even worked on The Tonight Show on NBC. So anyway back to Allegra. After that initial honeymoon phase ended, Johnny realized something was a miss at the label.
00:20:42
Speaker 11: We were selling records and the money wasn't coming in.
00:20:45
Speaker 9: They were spending money like it was going out of style, and that really take me off.
00:20:50
Speaker 1: So Johnny Butcheco decided he would leave Allegre for bigger dreams. As he told Ura Flores in an interview.
00:20:57
Speaker 9: That I was to have the best orchestra ever, getting all the best musicians, putting them together.
00:21:04
Speaker 1: And by this time Johnny he was a star. His record had been a hit.
00:21:11
Speaker 7: This record at that time sold over one hundred thousand copies.
00:21:16
Speaker 1: Making sure you heard that right, one hundred thousand copies in nineteen sixty one. This is not streaming sales or digital downloads. This was pushing music on the radio and physical album sold without any of the modern tools to get your name out there. Think about that Johnny was huge, but his personal life was suffering.
00:21:40
Speaker 7: He was getting divorced.
00:21:41
Speaker 1: At the time, Johnny needed a divorce lawyer.
00:21:44
Speaker 7: His divorce lawyer was Jerry Masucci.
00:21:49
Speaker 3: It's starting at a party.
00:21:51
Speaker 1: That's Jerry Masucci, the other central character of our story. He speaks here to author Mary Kent for her book Salsa Talks.
00:22:00
Speaker 9: He was worth a leg record.
00:22:03
Speaker 3: He was unhappy.
00:22:04
Speaker 1: Johnny met Jerry about the divorce, but soon the two hit it off when they talked about their mutual love for Latin music.
00:22:12
Speaker 3: He's very charming guy, Jerry, you know, very charming.
00:22:15
Speaker 1: This is Alex Masucci, who you heard from earlier, who is also Jerry's younger brother.
00:22:21
Speaker 4: And he was really a jock, you know, he was always playing ball.
00:22:25
Speaker 1: Jerry and Alex grew up in Brooklyn, New York. Their parents were immigrants from Italy, and Alex remembers that even as a kid, Jerry loved Latin music.
00:22:36
Speaker 3: When I was a.
00:22:37
Speaker 4: Kid, we shared a bed, so he would come home and he put on Latin music and I'd say to myself, you know, what the come I don't.
00:22:45
Speaker 3: Understand how does he understand this?
00:22:47
Speaker 4: What is the is this guy?
00:22:53
Speaker 1: Before he was a divorce lawyer or a cop. Jerry was in the Navy, and the Navy sent him to Cuba.
00:23:01
Speaker 12: I worked in Havana, so I went to school in Mexico. I was always sort of had a feeling for lat things.
00:23:09
Speaker 1: Jerry's time in Cuba really left a mark on him. Before the revolution, Havana was ultimately a US playground, filled with casinos and clubs and everything that was prohibited or taboo in the US at the time.
00:23:24
Speaker 4: Imagine leaving you lived behind the candy store in Brooklyn, and you know you're a jock, and you know the biggest experience has gone on a corner bar, you know, and all of a sudden, he's in Havana. Would sell your cruz singing on the corner and a cafe and all these girls dancing to Latin music and all these clubs, and then they would race, you know, cooker roches between the track. You know, it's just action town. You know. The richest people say that, and a cab driver who went there with no money would say the same thing.
00:23:58
Speaker 3: And it was a wild town, Havanah.
00:24:01
Speaker 1: Jerry got back to New York and tried to find his way.
00:24:05
Speaker 4: He was the youngest cop on the force. He became a cop on his twenty first birthday. Jerry was always trying to start businesses. You know. One time he started to see you know, the electric carts that they use now. He had it years ago, and I believe he was traveling around the country with Mario and Dretti trying to sell these carts. You know, he was always trying something. And then Jerry met Johnny.
00:24:28
Speaker 1: Johnny Pacheco, who happened to need a divorce and who also happened to be one of the hardest Latin musicians of the time. Soon Jerry invited Johnny to dinner at the Masucci's one weekend.
00:24:41
Speaker 4: My mother she worked eight hours a day in a factory selling pockets.
00:24:45
Speaker 3: You know what that is, just go.
00:24:47
Speaker 4: Boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom, boom boom boom.
00:24:51
Speaker 3: And then she would cook.
00:24:53
Speaker 4: She'd make antipasta that was like it was like a piece of art.
00:24:58
Speaker 3: You know.
00:24:59
Speaker 4: She'd row all the salami up, put it in certain spots and it was amazing. And then she'd make pasta, sausages meet for bra Joel, and then she made chicken cutlets. So one day Johnny comes over. I was sitting outside my mother was coming for a Sunday dinner, and all of a sudden, this Mercedes pulls up, you know, and they were no Mercedes in my neighborhood. I didn't know if I knew what a Mercedes was. And Johnny gets out and Mona gets out, his second wife.
00:25:33
Speaker 3: And she was gorgeous.
00:25:35
Speaker 4: I mean really, I'll never forget when she got out of that car.
00:25:41
Speaker 1: And then it became official. Here's Jerry again.
00:25:46
Speaker 12: John I said, start a rek, so we came far.
00:25:53
Speaker 1: Jerry had teamed up with Johnny to create Bania Records, a new label that they said would be favorable to musicians, one that would be like a family.
00:26:03
Speaker 4: My mother and father gave him the money to do the album, which was a lot of money for them to give. You know, they were making twenty eight dollars a week.
00:26:10
Speaker 1: The Masucci's mom gave them twenty five hundred dollars and they were off. Johnny would serve as musical director and Jerry would handle the business side, even if at first that was a work in progress.
00:26:26
Speaker 3: He didn't know anything about the music business.
00:26:29
Speaker 4: You know.
00:26:29
Speaker 3: They opened up a phone book and I got.
00:26:31
Speaker 12: The yellow pages out and called up a recording studio, Jacket Place, Label Place, and we made a record together.
00:26:40
Speaker 1: Johnny and Jerry. Jerry and Johnny a real dynamic tool.
00:26:45
Speaker 4: Johnny is probably one of the most talented showmen in the history of the business. An incredible songwriter, fabulous food player and a wonderful guy. You know. I mean, I don't think either one of that could have done it without each other period.
00:27:02
Speaker 11: Jerry was a true fan of the music. He really got into the music big time.
00:27:07
Speaker 1: Javi at Byrne popular music producer, a musician.
00:27:11
Speaker 11: Fania the name Fania is a coffee shop in Cuba where a lot of guys want to hang out.
00:27:17
Speaker 1: There's some debate about that name. Johnny is stuck by his version in many interviews that the name came from a Cuban song called Aania Boonche, originally written by Rinaldo Bolanos. He also said that there was a Cuban group called Fania.
00:27:36
Speaker 9: It was a group of individuals in Cuba that they had this club and was from good players only, and the name attracted me so much. I put Fania instead of Pania Fania and I said, this will sounding not only good to the Spanish, but to Americans they would say Funnie Records.
00:27:54
Speaker 1: Whatever the reason the name Fania stuck, I'll take it. Harvey got involved right from the onset through a mutual bandmate, one of Fania's first artists, Larry Harlow.
00:28:07
Speaker 11: Mike bookkeeper was Larry hollow mother. Okay, Larry see his mother during the day and tell her about that he just signed a contract with his new record company, owned by an Italian lawyer and Pacheco. He said, Oh, you wouldn't meet this guy, Jerry Masucci. I think you too would get along. As Jerry said, I want to continue my law practice and put all the money I make into Fania. I believe in Faia.
00:28:36
Speaker 1: So the two co founders now have a name, some producers and a couple of artists. Fania Records was up and running sort of.
00:28:47
Speaker 4: There were so many record labels on Tenth Avenue, you know, just in storefronts, and we were in a basically in a broom closet in Jerry's law office.
00:28:58
Speaker 3: You know, you know, we didn't sell a lot of records.
00:29:01
Speaker 1: Daniel Nassel was the first of Pacheco's album's release on the new Fania label, with eleven dance tunes. This marked the beginning of an era. They didn't even have space to store the LPs. Remember we're talking about physical products, giant heavy boxes. A team of two. They would deliver the records, sometimes out of the back of Johnny's own car. One person to watch the car and want to deliver the merchandise. If you know New York City, you know parking was a bitch even back then. Here's Johnny Pacheco again.
00:29:37
Speaker 9: I used to do Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and Jerry used to do Tuesday Furdiesday. On Saturday, we used to get in my car and put all the records. We used to go to every store delivered on own records.
00:29:51
Speaker 1: Despite Johnny already being a pretty big deal. Here he was in the middle of winter distributing records himself, and people got a kick out of me.
00:30:01
Speaker 3: It was scroll like hell, my nose was running.
00:30:05
Speaker 9: And one guy then look up a check a lane that bay making delivery and he took out a dollar billion into.
00:30:13
Speaker 3: And every then that came in, we put it back into the business.
00:30:17
Speaker 1: All of that paid off because the public took notice. Here's Jerry and.
00:30:22
Speaker 12: Just came together. Second recond Now he found no guide, and all of a sudden thing of.
00:30:33
Speaker 1: Jerry and Johnny were able to get it played on the radio because Jerry was well connected through his day job as a lawyer and a cop, and Johnny knew all the DJs. Between the two of them, they knew everyone. The public was into what they were selling because it was different, because, like we said earlier, the demographics were changing. Auror remembers the first time she noticed the change.
00:30:59
Speaker 7: So I'm listening to Symphony sid one night and I hear a gonga. I hear a lot of music, but I'm hearing this guy. But I'm saying, wait a minute. He's not singing about the farm. He's not singing about.
00:31:12
Speaker 3: The chicken and the rooster.
00:31:14
Speaker 7: He's singing about the projects. He's singing about riots. He's singing about us.
00:31:19
Speaker 1: This new generation of kids, the sneaker generation, was ready for change in society and in music, but with the flavor they grew up listening to at home. By nineteen sixty six, the Palladium shuttered its doors and Fanio Recas was poised to take the city by storm. But as the saying goes, the road to Hell is paved with good intentions coming up this season.
00:31:47
Speaker 4: That night Da Cheetah, they just played un fucking believable or slabe.
00:31:53
Speaker 12: It's somebody you didn't mess with, you know, one of things his way, if they were legal or not.
00:31:58
Speaker 4: Our rhythm is directly African.
00:32:00
Speaker 3: We cannot continue to act as if this is just Latin music. This is African music now.
00:32:05
Speaker 7: Lupe was the queen of Latin soul, different from Celia.
00:32:09
Speaker 3: Why is it, Jerry that you promote the commercial bands. Why aren't you promoting the black bands?
00:32:14
Speaker 1: Banya is making money in every direction.
00:32:17
Speaker 7: Johnny was sorry hard because Johnny trusted him.
00:32:21
Speaker 3: If you sold one hundred, that was unheard of. We sold millions.
00:32:25
Speaker 11: Didn't make a nickel, a fucking penny.
00:32:28
Speaker 3: I never made nothing of that. I said, Holy shit, I'm Joe Batan.
00:32:32
Speaker 11: I ain't got the money to pay for the flat tire.
00:32:38
Speaker 1: I can't wait for the next episode. Joined puturo Plus for early access to the whole season at free listening and exclusive bonus content. For our Thing, The Birth of Salasa in UEV, York. Go to Puturomediagroup dot org slash joint plus to get access today our thing, The Birth of Salsa in Uever York is an original podcast from Puturo Studios. It was made possible by the Mellon Foundation. Our senior producer is Genie Muntalvo. Our episodes were written, reported, and produced by her and Mark Pagan. The episodes were edited by Maria Garcia, additional editing by Marlon Bishop. Our post producer is Joaquing Cutler. He and Genie Montalvo sound designed our episodes. Our associated producer is Juliana Luis. Our production managers are Francis Poon, Jessica Ellis and Victoria Estrada. Mixing by Stephanie LAbau, Julia Caruso and jj Corubin, back checking by Tatiana Diaz and additional booking by jabiir Rejas. Editorial consultation by Ernesto Lechner. Special thanks to Aroa Flores, Martin Cohen, Alex Masucci, Mariso Negron, Mary Kent and Annsto Nukar. Special thanks to Craft Recordings, a con Company theme Swung and original music by Ella Brick. Additional music courtesy of David Frankel and Avanida bay Yours Truly recorded at Bridge Studios in Brooklyn by you Ros Giovanovitch and at full English post by Charles at Tangana and Ben Steiner. Special thanks to my manager Tarkanafari a Strand Entertainment and my glam Squad here Johnny Levoy and make up Karen Dupiche. Executive produced for Uturo Studios by Marlon Bishop and Maria Garcia from Concord Records. Executive producers are Bruce McIntosh and Wesley Adams. Show art by jose ostol OSTOLASA original show concept by Marlon Bishop and Genie Montalvo. Legal review by Neil Rossini, Michael Martin, Linn Hoist and Jonathan Bishop of Legal Arts. A marketing team includes Annello Reyes and Luis Luna. Futuro Media was founded by Maria Inajosa. I'm your host and resident Luregan Rosie Perez. You can hear all the music featured in this episode and this season on our Spotify music playlist. We've got links in our show notes, and don't forget to tap the heart to save it to your library because we'll be adding to it each week. And make sure you follow our thing, The Birth of Salta in Nueva York on your favorite podcast app. Thanks for listening.
