Sensual sauce. Souvenir classics.

I remember that from a very young age for various personal reasons, I lived from city to city, from house to house, from place to place for a certain season, only compared to the same gypsies. Likewise, this brought advantages and disadvantages, among the main advantages was meeting new people, new ways of thinking, new ideals, new tastes that in some way influenced me.

Peru, which although it is an Andean country is characterized by its miscegenation, not only racial but also cultural, and of course the music does not escape this. It is so, that within these new tastes, music was a field that surprised me because as a child I will have heard all genres (own and foreign), without prejudice, that I unknowingly became a music lover.

If we review my previous post, you will appreciate some dedicated to music, each one of a different genre. This time I want to make a small compilation of music and singers that made great a genre that has accompanied us during good and bad times, the "sensual Salsa"; that until today this sauce camouflages our romanticism with those danceable and seductive rhythms.

When I started this post I shared a fragment of the lyrics of the song, Gitana, by Willie Colon to see if you, like me, noticed when you heard it so many times, the similarity (practically the same) that it has to some verses by Gustavo Adolfo Becquer , Rhyme XXXVIII to be exact, observe and draw your conclusions:

Now, I make this simile appear not with the intention of criticizing, but, quite the contrary; I wish today's music and songs, those massive genres especially, would copy existing cool lyrics and complement what they call music. Although I am also of this generation, although in my house I do not hear the massive genres, I have to admit that I do enjoy that music in society, but you always want more. However, that did give us the sauce of yesteryear, with sensual lyrics, dances close to romance and melodies that inspired us in the art of seducing and loving.

How can we not remember that great boom from the 70s to the 90s, such a heyday that left us a range of salseros that emerged throughout Latin America.

How to forget great Venezuelan exponents such as Don Óscar de León, Erick Franchesky, Hildemaro, even the youth movement like Los Adolescentes, although not at the level of those already mentioned, delighted us with their good sensual sauce. Orchestras that emerged in Colombia such as Niche, Los Titanes, Colombian groups that made us feel (sentimental) even to men. And a point apart are Alberto Barros, composer and singer; Galy Galiano's tremendous romantic; and it was necessary to mention the great Joe Arroyo.

Although it is true, these few lines will not be enough to name the whole maelstrom of salsa exponents that Puerto Rico has given birth to, but I have to mention a few. Monsters of the genre that are no longer today, such as "The Dad of salsa" Frankie Ruiz and "the singer of singers" Hector Lavoe, even from above continue to make us feel and dance.

So many great Puerto Rican exponents such as Gilberto Santa Rosa, Willie Colón, Paquito Guzmán, Eddie Santiago, Willie González, Maelo Ruiz, Tony Vega, La India, Jerry Rivera among other great exponents of classic sensual salsa. I do not forget to mention, to the best of the Panamanian salseros, Rubén Blades.

An honorable mention is for Peruvian salsa, which although it has had a very precarious music industry for a long time, knew how to have its own representatives of the genre, which were even heard in its neighbors in the region, such as Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela, etc. Among the exponents of Peruvian sensual salsa we have Johnny Rojas, known for his song "adicto a ti", the Lima-based orchestra La Sociedad de Barranco; and its main representatives Antonio Cartagena and Willy Rivera.

Today, the technology has been developed, and if there is no support from the industry, there are other options such as virtual music platforms. That is why currently salsa in Peru has developed and has penetrated even more in the population, becoming the second musical genre that is heard and danced the most in the Inca country, after the Peruvian cumbia.

Finally, this post has not tried to talk about the history of salsa, the types or anything like that. I wanted to remember this genre out of nostalgia that it brings to many and remember so many great exponents of the genre; and now that we are in quarantine and there is time to spare, the new generations, if this comes to them, they can also appreciate it, I leave a great list. Without more I say goodbye.