Craft Latino continues the year-long centennial celebration of Celia Cruz with a reissue for Celia y Willie, her timeless collaboration with legendary bandleader Willie Colón. Featuring such favorites as “Dos jueyes,” “Latinos en Estados Unidos,” and “Cucurucucú paloma,” the 1981 release marked the second of three albums from the superstar pair. Arriving on June 6th, and available for pre-order today, Celia y Willie has been remastered from its original master tapes by Clint Holley andDave Polster at Well Made Music and pressed on 180-gram vinyl. A limited-edition“Oro Suave” (soft gold) color vinyl variant (limited to 300 copies), with an exclusive bundle option that includes a collectible Vaya Records logo T-shirt, is available at CraftRecordings.com.
Throughout 2025, Craft Latino is honoring Celia Cruz and her incredible contributions to the musical landscape with a series of vinyl and digital reissues, playlists, video content, and more. Visit the Celia Cruz Centennial page for more details about the celebration. As one of the most influential Latin artists of all time, Cruz was an internationally beloved star who sold over 10 million records during her five-decade-long career. A ten-time GRAMMY® nominee, Cruz was honored throughout her life and beyond with numerous awards, exhibits, commemorative stamps, samples by major artists, and tributes, including a National Medal of the Arts, a Smithsonian Lifetime Achievement Award, a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and a posthumous GRAMMY® Lifetime Achievement Award. Cruzwas also inducted into the Billboard Latin Music Hall of Fame and the International Latin Music Hall of Fame, among others, while in 2024, she became the first Afro-Latina to appear on U.S. currency through the American Women’s Quarter Program.
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Known around the world as “The Queen of Salsa,” legendary Cuban singer Celia Cruz (1925 – 2003) rose to fame in the early ’50s as a member of the celebrated vocal group, La Sonora Matancera. After a decade of hit records, film roles, and international tours, however, the singer was forced to flee her country, following the Cuban Revolution. Settling in New York City, Cruz launched a solo career, collaborating with the era’s biggest Latin stars—most famously Tito Puente—before signing to Fania Records imprint, Vaya Records, in the mid-’70s. There, Cruz embarked on her most successful era yet, beginning with the bestselling 1974 salsa classic, Celia & Johnny (with Fania co-founder Johnny Pacheco). Over the next few years, her star continued to rise, as she joined the legendary supergroup Fania All Stars and released a string of acclaimed albums, including the GRAMMY-nominated Eternos (with Pacheco) in 1978. This era also found Cruz branching out to collaborate with other Fania stars, including Pete Rodriguez (for 1980’s Celia, Johnny and Pete) and legendary bandleader, composer, and producer, Willie Colón.
A multiple GRAMMY and Latin GRAMMY nominee, Willie Colón (b. 1950) shaped the sound of salsa through his prolific work on and off the stage. A native of The Bronx, Colón launched his storied career at just 15 years-old when he signed to Fania Records. Partnering with another rising star, singer Héctor “El Cantante” Lavoe, Colón became a sensation in the Latin music scene—thanks in large part to the duo’s 11 genre-defining albums, including 1967’s El malo, 1970’s Cosa nuestra, and the 1971 Christmas classic, Asalto Navideño.
By the mid-’70s, however, Colón had shifted his focus to projects behind the scenes as a composer, producer, arranger, and musical director. This era also found him exploring a variety of solo projects and broadening his network of collaborators, working with the likes of Rubén Blades and Celia Cruz. The latter partnership—between the “Queen of Salsa” and “El Malo del Bronx”—began with 1977’s Only They Could Have Made This Album. The dynamic pairing, which featured Cruz on vocals and Colón as producer and bass trumpeter, would prove to be highly successful.
Among the highlights are the electric hit “Dos jueyes,” the vivacious “Kirimbambara,”and “Mi caso,” an empowering tune that declares multiple reasons why a woman would not want to get married. Other standout tracks include the socially conscious “Latinos en Estados Unidos” and a salsa-fied cover of the iconic Mexican song “Cucurucucú paloma,” as well as the irresistible “Come Down to Miami.” Despite the English title, the latter tune is primarily in Spanish and encourages New York-based Latinos to escape the cold and relocate to sunny Miami.
Celia y Willie proved the pair’s magic, once again, while the album’s popularity found Cruzand Colón reuniting one more time for 1987’s Winners. Today, more than four decades after its release, the 1981 LP remains a salsa classic. AllMusic writes that a Cruz/Colón collaboration “is to salseros what a Marvin Gaye/Tammi Terrell duet is to soul lovers or an Ella Fitzgerald/Louis Armstrong project is to jazz enthusiasts; in other words, you’re bringing together two of the best artists that the genre has to offer. When Cruz and Colon get together, the sparks usually fly—and Celia y Willie is no exception.”
Click here to pre-order Celia y Willie.
Click here to find the exclusive bundle including the “Oro Suave” color vinyl with a collectible Vaya Records T-shirt.
Vinyl Tracklist:
Side A
- Mi caso
- Cucurucucú paloma
- Ya lo puedes decir
- Latinos en Estados Unidos
- Berimbau
Side B
- Dos jueyes
- Kirimbambara
- Come Down to Miami
- Apaga la luz
- Hay que recordar
*Digital tracklist mirrors Vinyl
