Salsa trombonist Willie Colón (b. 1950) seems to be better known and respected in Latin America than in most of the US, although he is an American citizen by birth. His neighborhood in the South Bronx included immigrants from many different Spanish-speaking countries. That neighborhood, and many other like it, saw a blending of the musical traditions of all those different places. Latin music is often called salsa (sauce in Spanish), but the term most properly applies to that sort of blend.

He started to play trumpet at age 10, but eventually switched to trombone--at least partly because it was bigger and so harder for neighborhood bullies to grab and steal. He developed an excellent musical reputation in his neighborhood, both for playing trombone and writing songs. He dedicated himself to music as social commentary, which he called "conscious salsa."

As long as no one but people in barrios cared about salsa, Colón and others could write whatever they wanted. After salsa's popularity grew among non-Hispanics, he had difficulty achieving commercial success. For one thing, commercial recordings required shorter songs than most of his best work. For another, record company executives often found the political viewpoints in his texts troubling. Rather than adjust his texts to attain a wider public, he became content with his great reputation among Hispanics in this country and throughout Latin America.

There has long been a pattern in this country of younger generations, say, the grandchildren of immigrants, becoming ashamed of their heritage and attempting to blend into the dominant culture. In turn, their own grandchildren have struggled to reconnect with it. Colón spends considerable energy visiting school children , giving speeches and making commercials to keep that pattern from occurring among Latinos. Meanwhile, he has kept up a busy musical schedule, too. From the time he was 17, he has had his hand in more than 40 albums of salsa as both performer and producer.