A pioneer of the reggaeton genre that emerged in the late 1990s, Francisco Saldana – half of the duo LunyTunes – owns the prolific Más Flow Studios in Puerto Rico where he recently installed a pair of Symphonic Acoustics 2X15V studio monitors and matching subwoofers, providing him with monitoring capabilities in line with those of Paul Epworth’s Church Studios, Ann Mincieli’s Jungle City Studios and J.Cole’s Dreamville.
Completed in December of last year, the new monitors’ impact was immediately apparent to both Saldana and his clients: ‘My first project in the new studio was with Daddy Yankee. The studio was 60 per cent completed, and I hadn’t set up the Symphonic monitors yet,’ he recalls. ‘I did a mix and sent it to Daddy Yankee, and he told me it needed work and that I needed to take it to the next level.’
He installed the Symphonic 2X15Vs and 18SWs. ‘Once I mixed on the Symphonics, I could hear everything. I sent the remixed track to Daddy Yankee and he said that I killed it.’
In addition to Daddy Yankee, LunyTunes routinely works with top artists making music in the reggaeton field, including Enrique Iglesias, Wisin & Yandel, Ricky Martin, Bad Bunny and Nicky Jam. One recent success was the co-production and mixing of ‘Muévelo’, a song that appeared on the Bad Boys for Life film soundtrack. ‘Daddy Yankee was so happy with how that came out that I got a credit as co-writer,’ Saldana says.
There is no mystery behind his love for reggaeton: ‘It is popular world-wide because it has a beat that makes you want to dance to right away,’ he explains. ‘Its Latin and tropical roots make it a very international musical genre that everyone can appreciate.’
He first encounted reggaeton as a child in Puerto Rico, where several music styles were fused into one: ‘They took the dancehall beat from Jamaica and started rapping in Spanish – this is how Daddy Yankee got his start.’
While he was Raise in Puerto Rico, he would soon relocate to Boston, where through a series of serendipitous equipment purchases, would become acquainted with PK Pandey, now founder and managing partner of Symphonic Acoustics – who then worked at Guitar Center and was the founder of GC Pro. At the time, roughly 15 years ago, Saldana was a food service worker at Harvard University. ‘I was saving money for my studio, and PK would help me with my gear decisions. I was just a beginner and didn’t know anything.’
Since those humble beginnings and that chance encounter, LunyTunes has worked alongside Pandey on several studio installations including Master House Studios in Miami, where two Symphonic 2X15Vs and matching 1X18 Subs were commissioned, LunyTunes in Puerto Rico, a nine-room recording and mastering complex designed by WSDG; Puerto Rico’s Más Flow, and a host of others along the way. At each of his studios, Saldana has relied on Pandey’s expertise for monitor choice, room tuning and other critical equipment considerations.
‘I have known Francisco (Luny) for the better part of 15 years, and it has been a very inspiring ride,’ Pandey says. ‘The first pair of George Augspurger monitors I sold him came right out of the Hit Factory, and once we started Symphonic Acoustics, he was one of our first customers. I am thrilled that Francisco is still on the cutting edge of the reggaeton genre, and that he considers our monitors as a “mission critical” part of his studio.’
‘I’ve had like seven studios, and PK helped me set them all up. He helped me set up the first studio for Daddy Yankee in Puerto Rico, where we had the same large format Symphonics, and it was amazing,’ Saldana says. ‘Now, I always work on my Symphonic Acoustics monitors – including my new project with Enrique Iglesias, Daddy Yankee and Nicky Jam.’
‘It’s so hard to find the perfect monitors,’ Saldana concedes. ‘When I was commissioning my new studio, I told PK that I wanted the Symphonics because they work perfectly wherever I work; every big studio should have a pair. One of my associates is dying to get a pair because he says that with these, you can hear the music in 3D.’
Saldana says that his Symphonic monitors play a vital role in how his mixes translate into various environments – whether a car, a home, or most importantly, a club. ‘To have that next level, punchy sound that you want in the club you need these monitors,’ he effuses.
‘If you want to take your music to the next level, you have to finish your mixes on the Symphonics,’ he concludes. ‘It is really simple – they give you more headroom on everything, and you can get the sound you’re looking for and you can hear all the frequencies from top to bottom. You get incredible accuracy, but in a really large form factor that you can play loud. They sound like a studio monitor, but they sound like you are in a club.’
