Return of a Salsa Hero

When Johnny Pacheco walks on the tiny stage of the Imperial Ballroom Friday night at the Sportsmen’s Lodge, it will be the latest step in a remarkable chapter in the history of salsa.

Even if you are unfamiliar with the many currents within the field of Afro-Cuban music, you would surely notice that Pacheco’s music is warmer and friendlier to the feet than most of the salsa that is heard today in clubs and on the radio.

The genre’s aficionados will receive Pacheco as a hero, one of the instrumental figures in the creation of Fania, the New York record label that in the ‘70s and ‘80s took tropical music to new heights.

At 63, Pacheco is not the household name he was 25 years ago, when his “El Can~onazo” was the first album released by Fania. But salseros haven’t forgotten his stature. On a trip to Colombia last year, Pacheco and the re-formed Fania All Stars played to 80,000 people in Bogota and 65,000 in Cali--fans who consider the musicians legends.

“Back then, there was no musical style with which Latinos could identify,” Pacheco said. “When we started the label with [businessman] Jerry Masucci, we caused an explosion of sorts. We had a very talented roster and paid a lot of attention to the choice of material.”

The key to the Fania aesthetic was mixing venerable Cuban dances such as the guaracha, the guaguanco or the son montuno with the textures of American jazz and even some R&B.; This was Afro-Cuban music as experienced by mostly Puerto Rican immigrants in the heart of New York (Pacheco himself is from the Dominican Republic). It was a sassy, street-smart sound, as daring as it was seductive, representing the essence of salsa, which, ironically, would return to Cuba and end up influencing a new generation of local musicians.

Pacheco was not only partially responsible for the sound of this movement, but also for some of its catchiest compositions. He wrote the anthemic “Mi Gente” for singer Hector Lavoe, the autobiographical “La Dicha Mia” for Celia Cruz and “Quitate Tu,” a 15-minute jam in which all the label’s singers playfully attempted to vocally outdo one another.

“I used to feel really upset about the fact that people didn’t know me as a composer,” he recalls. “But when we first formed the Fania All Stars, we had a show to do but no music to play. [Bassist] Bobby Valentin and I wrote ‘Quitate Tu’ and all that material in only two days.”

But Fania’s reign in the salsa business began to fade in the mid-’80s. The productions sounded a bit tired, and many of its finest artists migrated to other labels.

“I formed the label with the ideal that it should be run like a family,” Pacheco says, a trace of nostalgia in his voice. “But when I sold my share of it in 1980, things changed. Like everything else, the music also became more complicated. In the beginning, we played simpler beats. Our only goal was to make people dance.”

It was the end of an era, and the beginning of a creative nadir for salsa. A new, bland style called salsa romantica became successful, forsaking the rootsy sound for a glossy, state-of-the-art approach. Soon, the focus of Afro-Caribbean music switched from New York to Colombia.

The Fania All Stars were eventually re-formed in the mid-’90s. But their release, “Bravo 1997,” failed in its attempt to imitate the more aggressive sound of modern Cuban bands like Los Van Van.

These days, Pacheco is trying to continue the Fania legacy by reuniting its surviving members for a back-to-the-roots record and subsequent touring. Judging by the players’ individual achievements, such a group could do much more than bask in past glories.

“Our hair has turned white, and some of us gained a couple of extra pounds,” he says with a laugh. “But it’s funny; we sound exactly the same as when we recorded that first album.”

Interestingly enough, the man who elevated salsa to almost unreachable heights is confident about the genre’s future.

“We don’t have a Hector Lavoe today, but we have a Marc Anthony, a Gilberto Santa Rosa, a lot of great singers,” he comments with hope. “It makes me really happy to see that the new musicians are listening to our old stuff and making music that is more danceable and traditional.”

BE THERE

Johnny Pacheco plays Friday at the Sportsmen’s Lodge, 4234 Coldwater Canyon Blvd., Studio City. 8 p.m. $20. (310) 450-8770.