“Celia & Johnny” by Celia Cruz and Johnny Pacheco (1974)
Release Date: March 26, 1975Produced by Jerry Masucci
Genre: Salsa, Guaracha, Bolero
Label: Vaya Records, Fania
Chart Positions: N/A
Certifications: N/A
Singles and Chart Positions: “Quimbara,” “Toro Mata,” El Pasa Del Mullo”
Singles Certifications: N/A
Other Charting Tracks: N/A/
Best Tracks: “Quimbara,” “Toro Mata,” “El Paso,” “Lo Tuyo Es Mental,” “No Mercedes”
“Celia y Johnny,” undoubtedly the most important album in Celia Cruz’s career, opened the doors of success for the famous Cuban singer with the force of a raging bull.
The singer had been fighting to break out onto the salsa scene since her arrival to the United States in 1962. Her career had been lethargic during the era of the boogaloo. In the early 1970s, a series of commercial flights were hijacked to Cuba, becoming a weekly event. Fearing she might board a flight that was hijacked to Cuba, Cruz decided to stop flying altogether. This, combined with disagreements with the Tico label over the direction of her career, kept her isolated from the beginnings of the salsa movement that took shape under the Fania label.
After Celia’s participation in the Carnegie Hall stage concert of “Hommy”, with the Fania All Stars, it was time for Cruz to record a full-length album that would showcase her interpretive skills. “Celia y Johnny” proved just the trick. Pacheco wasn’t the first to use the term salsa to describe music, but Fania Records made it nationally popular, and Celia & Johnny was its first breakout hit.
Johnny Pacheco had been enjoying a long and successful music career. Since his early days as a percussionist in the Xavier Cougat Orchestra, the Dominican had learned a lot about style and rhythm. His unique sound known as the “Pacheco Groove” had turned him into a favorite, particularly among New York dancers, and among lovers of Afro-Caribbean music in general.
Pacheco, a founding member of the Fania label, had noticed that Cruz’s early recordings on the Tico label with the Tito Puente Orchestra tended to limit her impressive voice, which he felt was not reaching its potential against the enormous sound of Puentes big band. Pacheco sad, “Let me put it to you this way: Celia sounds good with a stick banging against a can, she didn’t need all those instruments.”
Singers such as Melón, Pete El Conde Rodríguez, and later, Héctor Casanova, achieved great success and acceptance in combination with the Pachecho sound. Pacheco understood that his resounding style would help to highlight Cruz’s incomparable voice.
Paired with the Pacheco groove, the Queen of Rumba evolved, unleashing two of her greatest hits: “Toro Mata” and “Quimbara.” Both received wild acclaim among dancers, who immediately accepted her as the favorite on the growing salsa market, which was about to take the world by storm.
The first single to make a splash was “Quimbara”, a high energy rumba song which immediately showcased Celia’s vocal talent and stage energy immediately became an enormous and explosive hit.
“Quimbara,” written by Junior Cepeda (a talented young Boricua was killed by his live-in girlfriend at the age of 22), became Celia’s new signature song, and “Celia & Johnny” still had a lot more to offer. The “guaracha” “Lo Tuyo es Mental” became another hit, along with a Salsa version of the Peruvian folk song “Toro Mata”.
The Johnny Pacheco groove and the charming essence of Celia Cruz forged a bond that took control of the most important period in the history of salsa. This period has now gone down in history as The Golden Age of Salsa. This album is an intensely important one within the historical, political, and social context that marked the time.
"Quimbara" (1974)
Celia Cruz and Johnny Pacheco (1974)
Celia and Johnny
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