Anthology: Johnny Pacheco

A towering figure in the history of Latin music, multi-instrumentalist, producer, and bandleader Johnny Pacheco is—more than any other single figure—responsible for the colossal artistic and commercial successes of the Fania label during the ‘60s and ‘70s. Even before he and Jerry Masucci formed Fania in 1963, he'd distinguished himself as a sideman for the great Charlie Palmieri and as a hard-driving bandleader whose records for the Alegre imprint were among the label’s bestsellers. This 28-track collection gathers material spanning from Pacheco’s early years (when he recorded hard-driving pachanga for Alegre) to his groundbreaking years as Fania’s resident arranger and bandleader. Though Pacheco’s catalog is vast, Anthology does a serviceable job in presenting tracks representative of Pacheco's general career arc, and it manages to include a decent amount of the finest Latin popular music of the ‘60s and ‘70s.