The Death of Salsa
in
New York City
by: Néstor Louis
Salsa is dead... At least as the way I knew it to be back in the seventies, eighties, and nineties. Long gone are the days of waiting in line to get into The Copacabana, Latin Quarters on 96th street (formerly known as Club Broadway), or The Palladium on 14th street. The days of large crowds packing the city's Latin nightclubs from Monday to Sunday are almost non-existent. Eventhough throughout New York City there are parties that cater exclusively to salsa dancers, from beginners to advanced; none of these can be compared to what used to take place in the city not long ago. Labeled as "Salsa Socials", many of these parties are not known to draw the huge crowds that made New York City's Latin nightlife a thing of legend.
This is just the aftermath... The end result of some sort of generational tsunami that may have, or not, needed to happen. "I remember when I started in this business, I played percussion for Santiago Ceron, Charlie Rodriguez, Hector Casanova. Then I formed my band just because I wanted to. I always wanted my own band and do my own record. Back then it was different. Many folks can tell you similar stories! I was gigging with my band six to seven nights a week." So said Ernie Acevedo, the leader of Conjunto Imagen, in a very familiar retrospective tone of nostalgia used by many other bandleaders. "Things are just not the same, not even remotely close to what it used to be like before 9/11... Very few things are." That is true for almost everything, but nothing has changed so drastically and precipitously as the salsa scene in this city. The question is why?
One of the most obvious and honest reasons is - New York City just got old. Life caught up with the crowds that used to frequent the nightclubs. Myself included! With a mortgage, a wife, and a family, I no longer go to clubs or buy music as I used to. Ten years ago I chatted with the then owner of Les Poulet's Cafe about this same exact topic. "Every now and then I flip through the newspapers... I'd stumble on an advertizing promoting the fact that Johnny Mathis, Tony Bennett, or Barry Manilow were playing some hall or doing some concert. I'd call my parents to tell them about it and they'd say ‘wow he's still out there eh? That's nice.' Lets face it, older folks, folks with families are less likely to go out. This business is a business that thrives on youth. And youth is a fleeing capricious commodity that is here today and gone tomorrow. And so goes this business" Life, as it goes on, has caused many in my family and circle of friends to move out of New York. I'm sure they are not the only ones that left. But that's just one reason.
Not long ago, depending on your age and recollection, guys like Moncho Santana, Galy Galiano, Ray Sepulveda and other even more obscure artists were prominent fixtures in New York City's AM and FM radio stations. Some, including myself, would quickly point to payola as to the reason for their success back then. But no one can deny the subsequent profitability of both parties as a result of that subjective radio exposure. "Radio, for better or for worst, created artists. It created hit songs that people wanted to hear over and over. It created artists that booking agents wanted to sell. It created artists that nightclubs wanted to book. Radio created the artists that people wanted to see. Radio, public or commercial, was the go to point for the artist. Not anymore. Nowadays, radio is just a chatter box of thoughts coming from not the most enlightened individuals. Music is just not their thing. Music is something you hear at best in a radio spot. And that's a shame because when radio killed the music, it also killed the artist. It killed the nightlife and the overall scene. What's the point of hearing say... a Copacabana ad on La Mega promoting a performance by Hector Tricoche, when no one knows who is he or what songs he sings? Why should you care who plays at a nightclub?" So said an executive for an independent record label. But the blame doesn't stop there, for there is plenty to go around.
"Homogenous". That was a word that was used and thrown around, often as an insult, during a decade that covered the mid-eighties and mid-nineties. It described the fact that most salsa artists of that period started to sound alike. In particular those that were signed to the same labels, or worked with the same group of musicians, arrangers, and producers. You had the cookie-cutter-effect, the why-re-invent-the wheel syndrome. Both pretty much worked on the premise that said if Paquito Guzman, and Eddie Santiago were successful doing what they were doing, then Lalo Rodriguez, and Andy Montañez should be successful if they use a very similar formula. For all the hoopla that was made against all the salsa-romantica / salsa-monga artists of that era, one thing remained true and positive, big money was being made all around the industry hand over fist. There was so much money being made that the big boys in the American market took notice and got involved.
The involvement of CBS/Sony, BMG, EMI/Capitol in salsa brought a lot of prosperity to the scene. They created many of our current and most successful salsa icons. They also raised cost and expectations. Not necessarily a good thing if you consider the following; before the Multi-Nationals got involved, a successful tropical Latin music record sold between 40,000 to 60,000 copies with little or no promotions, and it cost between $20,000 to $40,000 to make. It's been rumored that Marc Anthony's first salsa record, produced by Sergio George cost about $30,000 to make. After the American Multinationals entered the game, a tropical record had to sell no less than 250,000 in order to even consider making another one. "That's a feasible goal don't you think?" I was asked by a Sony Discos Executive years ago. "If Latinos are expected to be the dominant ‘minority' within the next 10 years, why should it be taboo to expect at least 500,000 copies sold?" That philosophy, I believe, was the turning point for the tropical Latin music industry. Suddenly a record that cost $40,000 to produce, costs $80,000 to $120,000. Musician's, rightfully so, raised their fees. Even promoting artists got more expensive, since a lot of the tactics used to promote artists in the Anglo market were employed to promote tropical Latin artists. Lets not forget, radio had to get their cut too. And for a considerable period of time the game paid off. There was a Latin Explosion unlike anything I've seen before. Marc Anthony's Contra La Corriente, under RMM, was estimated to have sold over 4 million copies, thus accelerating his departure to Sony for a reported 30 million dollar deal. Paul Simon plunked down 11 million dollars on a short run Broadway play The Capeman featuring Marc Anthony, Ruben Blades, and almost every working New York Latin Musician. Buena Vista Social Club and Ricky Martin became the universal synonym for everything Latin... Everything salsa. Let's not forget Sergio George and his DLG. Crossover was also the word of that era... Those were some great times! That is until the industry got greedy.
By the late nineties... 1998, 1999 the industry started to blame the effects of CD burners and other methods of digital duplication for their short comings. They blamed CD piracy for their reported sales slump, eventhough CD prices rose for those years. The way I see it, the reason sales were down was simply put, no one heard - much less bought the music they had to offer. There was just too much product available, too many choices, too many records, too much music to be heard... Too much bad music available, not worthy of public consumption. The market was saturated with music, bad music at high prices. The situation was exponentially worst for tropical Latin music because, salsa, merengue, and cumbia, are not genres capable of sustaining sales beyond 80,000 - 100,000 copies. Latin music is a huge umbrella that covers about 10 or more genres, each with its own batch of artists and superstars. And the way I see it, the demographical pie is not big enough to sustain all genres equitably with limited sources of income. Radio, in the midst of yet another payola scandals, started to pull back and changing formats that went from music to a mostly talk format. Add to that, the RMM debacle. Ralph Mercado's RMM files for bankruptcy in November of 2000 after losing a legal battle worth millions filed by Glenn Monroig over unpaid royalties. That event subsequently caused the collapse of many careers. Many of which have yet to recover. As RMM went under, so did the infrastructure of the nightlife in New York City. Oh but it gets worse.
The tragic events 9/11 and its aftermath pretty much broke the camel's back. Many nightclubs were on their last legs way before 9/11. due to rising rents and low profits from the salsaholics and dancemaniac not consuming alcohol. Only less obnoxious than a below average chick who thinks she's a ten, are trained/schooled salsa dancers. Not just because they think they are god's gift to the nightclub but because along with prima donna concept of dancing in clave, they have kept the profit margins of club owners low by not contributing to the bottom line. A world renowned DJ here in The States sponsors one of the most popular "salsa socials", and even he at one point had to address this issue in one of his weekly newsletters. Dancers, in particular the ones that go out to strut their newly learned routine, do not consume alcohol. Sadly it is no secret that alcohol accounts for a serious chunk of a nightclubs earnings. "These guys come in here with their bottled water, backpacks with their dancing shoes, some even have full dress costumes in there. Sometimes I wonder if there's a fruit basket hat in there! But seriously, they don't care if my overhead is in excess of $25,000 a month. All they care about is getting their dance on and get out. Is like, I'm running a playground here and the dance floor is their monkey bars." Even bands suffer because of these dancers. Club owners, trying to remain open, have reduced and virtually eliminated live performances because many of them have realized that they'd get the same crowd if they had a DJ instead. There's very little incentive for a nightclub to bring in live band, and the few remaining clubs that bring in bands are not paying them much either. Make no mistake, salsa in New York is suffering a slow and painful death, and the bands themselves are not clear of any fault either.
There are many keepers of the gate out there, salsa musicians, band leaders, and connoisseurs that through the years have blamed everything for salsa's unavoidable demise. I'm guilty of that too, for I've blamed Sergio George, DLG, and their ilk for being the catalyst for the genre's downward spiral. Thank goodness DLG went the way of the Lambada and La Macarena, and Sergio is back to recording salsa. But the damage has been done, and that's a good thing, for this is hopefully the wake up call the genre desperately needs. Reggaetton, and to some degree bachata, has blown the doors wide open to a youth movement that has been arrogantly denied access to participate in salsa music and its creation. Some of these guys come off the street, and they are not the most polished guys, but they are given a shot to perform music... Their music. Yet to play salsa, or so it seems, one needs to be some sort of musical prodigy. Something that most of the musical giants of the genre, ironically, never were. ProTools, Fruity Loops, and other "computerized beat makers" have given the youth the opportunity many of today's band leaders, producers, and other musicians, never gave them. It is quite nauseating for me to hear band leaders preach that today's youth is "lost" and that "they have no knowledge or interest in their roots", or that they are trying to "recapture" the youth. When the reality is none of those band leaders care enough to give a young person the opportunity to join a band. Salsa is the only musical genre where every youngster needs to learn "la mano secreta" and the chromatic scale before auditioning for coro. Salsa musicians seem to belong to a certain club... a secret society of sorts, that creates a click. Similar to high school clicks in which the kids with the coolest cloths hang together. We all know how the rest of the school felt about those clicks. To use sports as an analogy; if in basketball and football you can go from high school to college on to the pros, why would anybody want to play baseball? Similarly, if doing beats or strumming three chords on a guitar can get you paid, why would you want to play salsa? The road to teaming up or joining a salsa band is a difficult one, hardly worth the effort for a generation lives in the now and expects instant gratification. If the genre really wants young people to be into the music, the culture of the genre has to change. If it doesn't, young people will end up being indifferent to the music and its history. To say it plainly, it is easier to record anything but salsa. I wonder why Jazz is a thing that mature folks enjoy the most?
Speaking of recording anything but salsa, can salsa acts record something other than covers? I'm starting to take the assault on Fania's catalog personally. There's an unwritten rule about re-doing covers. It says, if you're not going to make the song better leave it alone. I agree with that. Though I have enjoyed a few remakes, some as much as the original versions; generally speaking remakes are rarely better. "I love the music. I grew up with it. It was all around me in the house, so I have very fond memories attached to each of those songs. I feel that young people are missing that. I want to bring them in... reel them in." Now here's the question, why would young people gravitate to old songs? Songs that deal with nothing they can relate to? La Malanga, Bilongo, Bruca Manigua, are all great songs of an era that closely resembles that of their parents... My parents. By today's standards, many of those songs could easily be labeled corny. They are not even close to the life experiences young people are living today. "But many of us are not just re-recording salsa covers. We are polishing them off, and giving them a fresh coat of paint, with fresh arrangements." But why would I prefer your version over the original? Because you threw in a baritone and a different guajeo? "I understand what your saying but remember, the song might be old to you because you know it from before, but it is still new to a younger person that maybe never heard it before" That might be the case, but dated topics are dated topics and I doubt those would ever it stick. But that's just me.
Though the picture looks grim... very grim, there are several things the genre can do to change it's current path. I'll leave that for the next time.
© 2007 Nestor A. Louis
nestor@palosalsero.com or visit Lo Que Dice La Gente... Digalo Usted
Home Page | CD Reviews | Artist Interviews | Opinions & Editorials | Events | Favorite Sites