Rubén Blades & The Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis

Salsa stars to gather in New York to honor Cheo Feliciano

Source by Ruth E. Hernandez Beltran.

Latin music stars will gather at New York's Madison Square Garden on Friday to honor Puerto Rican salsa and bolero singer Cheo Feliciano, who died in a car accident in April.

"Cheo was one of the 'last of the Mohicans' and a very talented one," Willie Colon, who shared the stage many times with Feliciano as members of the legendary Estrellas de Fania band, told Efe.

"His death hurt me a lot, it was a shock," the trombone player, singer and composer, one of the stars who will participate in the Oc. 24 homage, said.

The 79-year-old Feliciano, known for his rendering of standards such as "Triste problema," "Amada mia," "Pa'que afinquen" and "Anacahona," among other hits, was killed on April 17 when the car he was driving swerved and crashed into a concrete pole.

The Madison Square Garden stage where Feliciano himself performed will be taken by Colon, Gilberto Santa Rosa, la India, Oscar D'Leon, Tito Nieves, Jose Alberto "El Canario", Raulin Rosendo and Sergio George with the Los Salsa Giants band for a show titled "La Salsa Vive" (Salsa Lives On) to highlight Feliciano's five-decade music career.

Colon, who will travel from Los Angeles where he is to perform on Oct. 23, recalled Feliciano, whose career began in New York with the Joe Cuba orchestra, as a man "of good humor and an incredible personality."

"When I was with Estrellas de Fania, the thing I liked most was to perform along with Cheo, to see him, to be able to work with him," Colon said. "He was a fast thinker, both in English and Spanish, and had a wonderful philosophy of life. People enjoyed being around him and wherever he went things would lighten up."

"All the songs he sang would come out in a unique expression. He had a peculiar syncopation, a way to shape phrases, he was a brilliant character," Colon said.

Gilberto Santa Rosa, known as "El Caballero de la Salsa," remembers of Feliciano mostly for "his humility and comradeship."

"He never made a distinction between the star level he was in, and us, the generation coming up behind him," Santa Rosa said.

"From the first time I met him, he always treated me as an equal and I never saw him keeping his distance," Santa Rosa said. EFE

Panamanian singer Ruben Blades to run for second run presidency

Source by Elida Moreno and Eric Walsh

Panamanian salsa star Ruben Blades said on Sunday he could be a candidate in Panama's 2019 presidential election, which would mark his second attempt at the presidency.

The singer, 66, ran in the 1994 presidential election, backed by the movement 'Papa Egoro,' which means Mother Earth in an indigenous language. Blades lost that election to Ernesto Perez Valladares.
"If I'm healthy and I have a plan put together, I will run as an independent," Blades said in an interview on a local television channel. "I'm not running with a party because their structures tie you down."

Blades, who is also a lawyer with a masters degree from Harvard University, defines himself as "left-leaning" and identifies with the current president of Chile, Michelle Bachelet, and the form of government that Luiz Inacio Lula de Silva developed in Brazil.
Between 2004 and 2009 Blades was tourism minister in the government of former president Martin Torrijos.

[VIDEO + AUDIO] On Fania Records And The Music That Made It Matter

Source by NPR Staff

Fifty years ago, New York City musician Johnny Pacheco and his lawyer friend Jerry Masucci started a small Latin music record label and delivered their first albums to record stores across the city — from the trunk of the musician's car.

From these humble beginnings, Fania Records eventually became a global brand, spreading the sound of salsa from the dance clubs of New York to the rest of the world. Felix Contreras, co-host of NPR Music's Alt.Latino podcast, says the impact of the label and the musicians it brought together — Celia Cruz, Willie Colón, Rubén Blades and the rest of what would come to be known as the Fania All-Stars — was social and political as well as musical

"The early 1970s was a political coming-of-age of Latinos across the country," Contreras says. "Fania was the soundtrack for the empowerment for many of these communities, because it was brash, it was vibrant, it was new. It embraced the Afro identity of Latin America. And it made me — a young Chicano teenager in California, just discovering music — want to be part of this exciting new sound and movement."
Hear more of Contreras' conversation with NPR's Rachel Martin, as well as some of the music that made Fania matter, at the audio link. Listent to the audio.

Watch the video.

Fania 50th Anniversary Concert Series Partners with SummerStage

By Justino Aguila 

The 50th anniversary of the iconic Latin label Fania Records will be celebrated this summer in partnership with Central Park's SummerStage program.

Starting June 14, the City Parks Foundation will feature a concert series, dance and theater performances, film screenings and other events that highlight the label's history in New York. The series will conclude with a Fania All Stars concert in Central Park on Aug. 24.

Fania Records was home to major recording artists who performed in genres such as Latin big band, Afro-Cuban jazz, boogaloo, salsa and Latin R&B. The label also introduced the musical group Fania All Stars and included entertainers such as Hector Lavoe, Willie Colon, Celia Cruz and Ruben Blades.

“The SummerStage series is one of best Summer concert series in the world,” said Michael Rucker, chief marketing officer at Codigo Group.  “We are thrilled to be a part of this series and couldn’t think of a better way to celebrate this iconic label’s 50th anniversary.”

The series is also scheduled to showcase new acts and DJs that embrace the Fania sound. Also, Fania is releasing eight digital albums from May through September to coincide with the SummerStage events. Each album will feature tracks from both well-known entertainers and new artists, all of whom will also be performing through the summer.

The June 14 kick off has scheduled performances by Roberto Roena y Su Apollo Sound, La Mecanica Popular and DJ Louie Vega.

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Louie Vega - Elements of Life - Eclipse

On Elements Of Life Eclipse, which was 4 ½ years in the making, Vega kept the style of the earlier albums (African, Jazz, Latin, World) but has added Soul, R&B, Gospel and Blues. The lyrics are deeper now and are bringing more conscious messages to the world. Joining Elements Of Life on this album are singers Lisa Fischer and Cindy Mizelle, and poets: Ursula Rucker and Oveous Maximus as well as percussionist Luisito Quintero (Vega produced his last two albums). Singer/songwriter, and global DJ Anané has blossomed since her full length release of Ananésworld and brought in more of her Cape Verdean influences and has also experimented more with the R&B/Soul sounds which she’s made her own on songs like the Roy Ayers penned “You Came Into My Life” and the Cesaria Evora classic “Sodade.” Lisa and Cindy have brought in their Gospel and R&B influences, and have even experimented with Jazz, Funk, and House. They performed backgrounds on live shows for many years for artists like Luther Vandross, the Rolling Stones, Steely Dan, Bruce Springsteen, Whitney Houston, and Mary J. Blige to name a few. For years Vega wanted to do a project and take Lisa and Cindy from the background to the forefront as leads. Rounding out the stellar talent are poets Ursula Rucker and Oveous Maximus who bring their storytelling and poetry in the form of spoken word to E.O.L. As Vega states, “It was all perfect for the new album.” Ongoing themes for the new album are about reaching out to our young generation, and paying homage to women. Vega adds, “I feel in these times we need songs like this to help inspire moves.”

Vega concludes, “It’s a true honor for me to be the first new artist album signed to Fania Records in years. It really comes full circle now, being able to be on the label my uncle Hector Lavoe was on and the Fania All Stars who are also great inspirations for me. Fania Records is to Latin music what Motown is to R&B and Soul, so to be even a small page in this encyclopedia of music is a dream come true for me.”

Elements of Life - Eclipse

Ruben Blades sings "Juan Pachanga" 1978: VIDEO

This video take us back to 1978. Ruben Blades and the Fania All-Stars are in full swing with the salsa explosion. Juan Pachanga is a song with similar narrative ideas to Pedro Navaja however the storyline doesn't compare or is similar. Its a song based on a totally different person. 

Appearance by Papo Lucca, Willie Colon and Pupi Legarreta.

Juan Pachanga (Ruben Blades)

Juanito Alimaña vs. Pedro Navaja

                          
                Can you imagine this? It’s a match between two criminals, two tales written by two iconic salsa giants Hector Lavoe and Rubén Blades. Each song portrays the lifestyle of the urban Latino American experience and who would have thought that these songs were going to be part of the salsa explosion of Fania records. Well, the songs Juanito Alimaña and Pedro Navaja are classics now and the lyrics to both songs are well worthy enough of be craved in stone.


Coming straight from a New York City street corner, we have Juanito Alimaña that tells the story of a street thug that is irreconcilable with society. He is vicious and dangerous; his cousin is a police officer, which makes it seem that he can get away with any crime. Hector Lavoe depicts Juanito’s world as sordid and exquisite but the song keep us engage as if you was watching Carlito’s Way.

Juanito Alimaña (Hector Lavoe)

From the street corner of lower Manhattan, it’s known that the track Pedro Navaja was dislike by Fania bosses Johnny Pacheco and Jerry Mascucci. However, when Willie Colón and Rubén Blades’ second collaboration album, Siembra hit the record stores in 1978. The song Pedro Navaja became famous and a hit classic. Blades wrote and narrated Pedro Navaja with a tale illustrating life, death and with an unexpected dark ending. We have to ask ourselves, was there anything between Pedro Navaja and the prostitute. Did he already have a grudge? And where did the drunk come from?

Pedro Navaja (Rubén Blades)

What’s your opinion? Which one is the best song of all-time? 

Leave a comment.

Fania music continues to live strong in PERU: Video en ESPANOL

Certain genre of music die out and disappear but the music of Fania Records maintain it's legacy in Peru.

Mack the Knife vs. Pedro Navaja

Mack the Knife vs. Pedro Navaja

Two Salsa Icons and Fania All-Stars

Two Salsa Icons and Fania All-Stars - Ruben Blades & Hector Lavoe (1981)

(1980) Fania All Stars con Rubén Blades - Pedro Navaja (Colombia)

Pedro Navaja in Colombia with Fania All-Star
(1980) Fania All Stars con Rubén Blades - Pedro Navaja (Colombia) from Fernando Catano on Vimeo.