Vincent Montana Jr.
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
Revision as of 16:58, 12 November 2008
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Vincent Montana Jr. (born February 12, 1928) is an American composer, arranger, and percussionist, most known as a member of MFSB and as the founder of the Salsoul Orchestra.
He is the spiritual father of the Salsoul Orchestra, the backing band for the many acts on Salsoul Records. The personnel of MFSB and the Salsoul orchestra overlapped substantially, and both groups were recorded at Philadelphia's famous Sigma Sound Studios.
In recent years Mr. Montana has worked with famed house music duo Masters at Work, which has rekindled interest in his work. Ken Cayre, founder of Salsoul Records, has praised Mr. Montana's skill at scoring strings, brass, and diverse percussion in such way that it all worked within a dance recording. As Mr. Montana was among the first with his considerable training and skill to apply such scoring technique to disco-oriented recordings, it is safe to say he is a true pioneer in the field.
Montana and famed mixer Tom Moulton had a rocky professional relationship at Salsoul, most likely because Moulton was in the constant position of retouching Montana's work (this was Moulton's appointed profession). In reality, both men would seem to have little reason to be adversarial: They share a legendary status in dance music culture (Evidenced by Montana's invitation to work with MAW two decades after his peak period, the sleeve notes of Nuyorican Soul and the numerous web pages about Moulton).
