by Various
Strut is pleased to present the first ever definitive 2CD retrospective of Fania Records, the seminal New York latin label, spanning its influential heyday between its formation in 1964 through to 1980.
Fania was originally the brainchild of musician and bandleader Johnny Pacheco who, when disillusioned with the label releasing his music, teamed up with lawyer Jerry Masucci to form a new imprint, named after a Reinaldo Bolanos composition. At the time, the era of the ‘mambo kings’ that reigned supreme in New York from the late 1940s through the 1950s had begun to lose momentum. New York’s new generation of young Latinos were more interested in doo-wop during the late 1950s, then the ‘twist’ and the R&B of Motown. Younger Nu Yorican musicians began experimenting with new, energetic fusions of Latin music like boogaloo and what ultimately became known as salsa and Fania arrived at the perfect time to bring the new sounds to the huge Latin communities in Spanish Harlem and across New York.
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