Manny King John
Today Pandora launches the second of a planned series of four new stations that celebrates the contributions of the African diaspora on the music of the Americas. Today’s station launch, Afro Boricua highlights the contributions of Afro Puerto Rican musicians. This follows the launch last month of Afro Colombia. Two other stations are planned next month – Afro Cuba and Afro Quisqueya which celebrates music from the Dominican Republic.
These new stations represent our effort to highlight and celebrate in a direct and overt way the infinite contributions made to contemporary Latin music by the African diaspora in the Americas, says Pandora’s Head of Latin Music, Marcos Juarez. Not just a side note, Afro influence is the foundation, inspiration and innovation behind almost every popular Latin music genre. From Salsa and Cumbia, to Merengue and Reggaeton, Africa is fundamental to the melodic and rhythmic DNA of these iconic genres enjoyed the world over.
Latin music is a hugely popular genre at Pandora. In fact, over the last year monthly listeners to the platform’s flagship Latin station El Pulso have grown almost 250%.
