Tango 1928

1:00That was the Hungarian 1928 hit, TV van Egepo, which according to Google Translate means something like camels are unicorn. What? Camels are unicorn. So I think they had unicorns back in 1928. Obviously. Yeah, obviously. Yeah. How are you, Michael?

1:24I'm very well. Very glad to be here. Very, very glad indeed to be here. How are you, Dag?

1:30I'm good. It's nice to be back. Just a week since last time we saw each other, so that's good.

1:37We'll get through the winter together. We will.

1:41And these pre-cortinas from about 10 different nations were inspired by you, Michael, when you did this love special after party from all over the world, but I also wanted to make a kind of celebration of the global participation of the Tango by Year program, because as some of you saw from the group post, we have listeners from all over the world, which is really nice, some really special for us to know that people are listening to us from all over the world.

2:09Yeah, I really appreciate that. I remember one program at the end, somebody was going to bed and someone else had got up just to listen to the program, so that's how far around we stretch both ways. Yeah.

2:23So, 1928, Michael, it's the earliest year we've done, and in Tango 1929 you said that now we think about this as the old music, but then it wasn't the old music, of course. No, it certainly wasn't. I let my t-shirt do, I've got my special t-shirt on once again. Here we are, 1927, 1931, Epoca de oro.

2:48Sure. A golden age for tango music. A golden age, but a different kind of golden age to the 40s. It's maybe more for the lovers of more intimate music, or it leans more in that direction. And we've got a different set of artists at the top. There are still four big artists, but none of the names are the big four from the 1940s. In fact, one of them is Gardel, so that just leaves three typicals, three bands. There's a big three, not a big four.

3:19And it's Canaro, Firpo and Fresedo. So a very, very different musical scene. But the new guys are kind of bubbling along and they're beginning to have an impact on the scene. Julio De Caro, Pedro Maffia, Luis Petrucelli. They're beginning to make some records. They're influencing the scene, they're not selling many records as yet, it's going to take a while before they are really recognized for the importance of what they're doing, but you can hear the impact that they're having in the music that's made by others.

3:52And another big change is that Canaro and Lomuto both start using Charlo as an estribilista, and they hadn't really used estribilistas very much before, so that's a very big change in the music, and Charlo's voice really brings up the quality of what we're going to hear from those bands. We're definitely going to listen to some Charlo.

4:19And preparing for this, I mean, 1928 is such a rich year. A lot of different music, more than a thousand recordings I've been pre-listening to. And because this was so much and most of this is not known for dancing, and I think I only had about 100 of these recordings on my computer before I started preparing.

4:37That's quite a difficult task for you then. A lot of new music for you to listen to.

4:41It was a very nice task, but I asked, I put a post in the group and asked participants to suggest songs. So I had about 10 or 12 people sending me suggestions. So I'll use some of those, but I can't play all of them because some of you sent me like 10 songs. So, and it's the, yeah, I have to balance the orchestras and the singers and everything, but we'll hear some of those, but I won't comment who suggested them, just play them. And in terms, sorry, no, finish.

5:09I just wanted to thank everyone for the contribution. It was very nice to have these suggestions. Yeah.

5:14And with 1,100 songs or more being written in the year, not just performed, written, there's going to be a lot of really good songs, some of which we'll recognize from later on and some of which we won't. So in terms of good new compositions, it's very difficult to get them into one program. Impossible, basically.

5:36But let's listen to some music, and I want to start not with one of the big four you mentioned, but maybe number five, I think, Juan Maglio, because he's also had really good recordings from this year and he's one of the old guys, Paco. We talked about him before. This is maybe his best year. The music is a little bit more complex than Maglio's music was before because he's getting young musicians into his band and they are evolving the style for him.

6:07Troilo talks about this. Troilo was in Maglio's band just for a few months. We don't know exactly when, because Troilo was a boy of 15 or 16, and he couldn't remember. But maybe, you know, like 29 or 30. So not long after this time. And he said that Maglio barely understood the music before. He didn't conduct the band. And the night they opened in a new cafe, he didn't even turn up. He went to another cafe.

6:31And then he came in, sat down at a table, listened to the band that was performing in his name, and just kind of shook his head. I don't understand this music anymore. So Maglio's a brand. Of course, they're trying to maintain the Maglio brand. What is the Maglio band? So if you listen to the beats, you'll hear that you get four strong beats, not strong beat, weak beat. Strong beat, weak beat. That should remind you of somebody. Should remind you of D'Arienzo. And I find the Maglio compas in this time irresistible. It's slow, but still pushing. Lovely music. Lots of good Maglio.

7:10Yeah, and remember you said in Tango 1929, I think it was, that, yeah, the beat is one thing, but another thing that reminds of D'Arienzo is the stop time. Sometimes it just stops, like D'Arienzo also does. Let's hear two tangos, Viejo ciego with José Galarza singing and El nocturno with Carlos Viván singing. I think they're both really nice tangos, so. I know they are. Yeah, you know that. Viejo ciego and El nocturno, Juan Maglio.

13:04Oh, lovely violins. What a sense of melancholy. Yeah, very, very. It's much more expressive than we give Maglio credit for. So, to those listeners who are not really that familiar with Maglio, the tracks Dag's played are typical for this year, but they're not really typical for his output as a whole. He does lots of jolly waltzes like Oriches del Plata, stuff like that. This has got an intensity that's telling us something about the year. But yeah, the sense of melancholy in that last one and the sense of melody. It's not just about beats and simplicity with this Guadalupe Vieja stuff.

14:09Let's hear one of the waltzes, as you mentioned it. Recordando tus promesas. Remembering your promises. Yeah, and it's a quite fast one. I was thinking maybe it could have been speeded up, but I don't think so. I think it's actually in the right speed, but it's unusually fast for this period. There are a few waltzes from 1928, but most of them are much slower than this one. Let's hear it, see if you like it. Recordando tus promesas is also with Carlos Viván singing.

16:53Good swing on that waltz. Almost hypnotic. One thing I did notice is that what the violin was playing was just doubling what the singer was doing, which is something that's beginning to change at this time. We're beginning to get more than one line to listen to, so that's a sign that this music's positioning itself at the simpler end. Yeah, so the alternative would be a counter melody. Yes, a simple counter melody, an obligato part for example, or something more complex even. That's what you might hear, we say, Petrucelli in the car at this time.

17:38All right, let's move on to one of the big four you mentioned in the beginning introduction, Carlos Gardel, and he is tank the mega star worldwide style. As the year opens he's in Paris, and he's moving between Paris and Barcelona and recording and being extremely successful and fated, partying with all the most interesting and select and sophisticated people. So the recordings from this year will be from Europe, all of them? Until about September. All right. I didn't check the dates from the ones I'm going to play, but maybe you can during your play.

18:17First I want to play what must have been the most popular tango this year, Esta noche me emborracho. Definitely that's the most important tango. Yeah, so many recordings of it. The first tango we're meeting tonight from Discépolo. So Discépolo is arriving on the scene with his Di Shepolin sense of tragedy and melancholy and existential failure. Yeah, that's something new that tango hasn't had until 1928. And that's what this is about, a guy getting wasted because he has some great sorrow in his life, I suppose.

18:57Yeah, this is a, well, it tells us, doesn't it, in the lyric, this is a tango that most of us listening here will have encountered for the first time from the Tanturi Castigio recording from 42, if memory serves, around that time. Anyway, and the story of the lyric is this guy's going home really late at night when he sees this woman come out of a nightclub and she looks terrible. She looks an absolute mess. And he goes, oh, what a mess. And he walks on and then he goes, wait a minute. I know her. And he remembers 10 years ago, this was his ex. Oh, my God. That's the story. That's heavy stuff.

19:41So at the end, that's why he's getting drunk. He has all these memories and he looks at it and he says, I'm going to go home and I'm going to get really drunk so I will stop thinking about this. That's why he wants to get drunk. But in addition to this tango, I want to play a waltz by Gardel, Rosas de otoño, autumn roses. And this is also a thing we know from later recordings. Di Sarli's waltz from the early 40s with Rufino singing, I think. Or is it for the star? I can't remember. But early 40s, Di Sarli. And then later on, of course, Nelly Omar with Francisco Canaro. Yeah, it's beautiful waltz. And both these are with guitar backings. So a different feeling than with the orchestras. So Carlos Gardel, Esta noche me emborracho, and then the waltz, Rosas de otoño.

20:35 · They playEsta noche me emborrachoCarlos Gardel · 1928

Discépolo's first tango, perhaps the most popular of the year, with guitar backing; a man sees his ex coming out of a nightclub, ruined, and decides to get drunk.

♪ Music · 2:25 · What the transcriber heard

25:18How wonderful the way he stops and holds the tone there. Yeah, it's something that we associate, for example, with Alberto Podestá, with Album de Bohemia in 1943, but this is 15 years earlier. Beautiful voice. Great stuff.

25:37Next band, one of the big four in the later years, Carlos Di Sarli. He wasn't bigger this time because he just started. This is his first recording. Yeah, he just sneaks in at the end of the year, doesn't he? December, I think. So let's give a bit of background to that.

25:51Fresedo has seen his compatriots Carlos Gardel and Francisco Canaro voyage to Europe and have a very successful time. He's already been to the States and he thinks, I want to do that. So he decides to go. He gives up his record contract and departs in October. Doesn't come back for about a year and a half. Very successful trip.

26:19And at the time, Fresedo has got four bands going simultaneously. The fourth one of which, at the Phoenix Cinema Theatre, is led by Carlos Di Sarli on piano. So when Fresedo goes, Di Sarli's got this ready-formed band and a songbook. So they just carry on and they're very quickly signed up by Victor. So Victor, Odeon, there are more than two companies, but basically it's a duopoly, the two companies controlling the scene. Odeon has got all the big established stars and Victor, the American newcomer, is playing catch up. So they're signing up new bands, but they try and sign up bands that are a bit more interesting and innovative. So Victor signed up the young Di Sarli and it's very popular to say that Di Sarli sounds here like Fresedo and you can follow Fresedo's influence, but I think you can already hear the differences. It's more dedication to a strong walking beat. And something that really surprises me and may surprise some of you is how clearly you can hear the double bass in these recordings. Because at the same time, Julio De Caro is recording on the same record label and you can't hear the double bass at all. They've both got one and there's only six people in the room. So, Di Sarli wants you to hear the double bass. You can, so the walking beat...

27:46He puts it closer to the microphone. That's what happens. He puts it closer to the microphone. Yes, he does. And in the piano part as well, there's more happening already in the left hand, which reinforces the double bass. They're working together. So that's already present in these recordings. And sometimes there's the arastre as well, the zoom sound, which is so nice for walking. So much as we hear Fresedo's influence, Di Sarli's character is fully present.

28:15And if I recall, there's just one disc, so just two tracks to choose from. It's true. And on one side it's Te he besado, which I'm gonna play, and the other side is Guitarita, the little guitar or the girl playing the guitar. I'm not sure what it means, but anyway, let's indulge in the kiss. Te he besado, Carlos Di Sarli, his first recordings ever, in 1928, instrumental.

31:26You can already hear the walking beat in Di Sarli's left hand. You can. You can hear the double bass going. I just want to pick up on something. Somebody was commenting in the chat window, comparing the arastre, the zoom sound, between Di Sarli and Fresedo. And let's just remember that here, mostly the arastre is part of the beat, it's part of the marcato, whereas with Fresedo it's not always part of the marcato. That would be a difference. Fresedo does it some of the time, but Di Sarli does it all the time. But it's all there, the little bells in the right hand, that's already there.

32:27You can hear the band and yons a bit more, can't you? Because there's only six people in the room, so the texture's thinner, there's more space in the music. That's something I enjoy about this early tango. Good choice by Victor to allow Di Sarli into the studio. And imagine if they knew that 30 years later, he'll be one of the major orchestras in tango and hundreds of recordings. And that 100 years later or 90 years later, we'd still be listening to this music.

32:54Yeah, there is, however, a lost recording. When I say lost, it's not like a recording that exists that was lost. It was a recording that was never made because of an accident of timing. And that is the Carlos Di Sarli sextet recording of Milonguero viejo. So Milonguero viejo is Di Sarli's tribute to Fresedo to say thank you for giving me my opportunity. And this song, it's not a huge hit, but it's a minor hit, but a few months earlier. So Di Sarli never records it. And then Fresedo goes off to Paris. And by the time Di Sarli comes into the studio in November, it's fallen out of favour. It's not a fashionable song any longer. So it's not recorded. So that's something we just have to know how that would have sounded. Yeah.

33:51Okay, instead of imagining, let's move on to another orchestra, Francisco Lomuto. But it's not one of the big ones, but they're really nice tangos and some waltzes, but mostly tangos. And I want to play one called Siempre Vida with Charlo singing. And Charlo, you said in the introduction, he's a big name this year, isn't he, as a singer?

34:16Yes, Charlo's, he wasn't discovered so much, but he hits the big time. He's been performing for about three years. And Goddard, who's not the boss of the Glücksmann Empire, because Max Glücksmann is the boss of the Glücksmann Empire. What do I mean by the Empire? I mean Discos Nacional Odeon, so the main record company, plus a radio station, Radio Splendid, plus a theatre attached to the radio station, plus a publishing house, everything. Anyway, his artistic director, Goddard, hears Charlo singing and signs him to the label. So he first records with Canaro in February and with Lomuto in March. Sometimes both Canaro and Lomuto record the same song.

35:07Now, some of you may realise, Lomuto sort of starts out a bit like Canaro's musical cousin. You know, at the beginning, Lomuto apprenticed himself to Canaro to find out, literally, he literally apprenticed himself to Canaro to find out how to run an orchestra típica. So there's quite a lot of similarity between the two orchestras, and more so in 1928 than in 1938. So one of the things they do sometimes in this year, they record the same tango and both with Charlo singing, so they have to get Charlo to sing a different bit of the lyric. But yeah, already you can hear the difference. Lomuto has a bit more weight, it's a bit less sweet.

35:53Yeah, well, let's listen to this one. It's a sweet melody and a very nice piano and violin. Special track, I think. The sound quality is so-so, but acceptable, I think. So let's hear it. Lomuto with Siempre Viva and Charlo singing.

39:02So sweet. It's sweet, but it also has that heavy Lomuto beat already. Yeah. Yeah. It's good. And we have to listen. I mean, we'll get back to Charlo. You mentioned he sang for Canaro also. So we'll hear some more Charlo. Charlo was magnificent in 1928. This year would not be the same without him.

39:33But we've got to hear some instrumentals by Lomuto also and I want to play two songs. The first one you've heard many times, it's Te aconsejo que me olvides. So this is an instrumental version, but the one you know as dancers is with Troilo, Fiorentino, from 1941, I think. Yeah, one of the big hits, first burst of Troilo, but it was a hit this year as well. There were versions by Charlo also and Canaro and Gardel from this year.

40:00Yeah, let me explain a bit about that. So the Odeon company, Glücksmann, had an idea that he could organize a big tango competition, first of all, to generate a lot of publicity for his enterprise, but also to get all the best composers and authors to bring their new tangos to him. So he would use his theatre and use one of his orchestras, like one year it would be Canaro, the next year it would be Lomuto, and they would, there'd be a pre-selection and they would perform all the songs and then the winners would all get recorded by Canaro and Gardel. So it was a real in-house operation. And in the 1928 competition, which was around the beginning of October, Te aconsejo que me olvides was one of the winners, but a relatively minor hit for the time. Would have to wait for Troilo for it to get really, in Argentina they say, consagrado, to receive its consecration, to have its definitive transformation into a dance epic. So it's a minor hit, but very, very beautiful.

41:14In this version, it's very different, of course, from the Fiorentino or a sung version, but it has a very nice violin counter melody. And it also has a bandeonon variacion at the end. It's got everything. Yeah. And it's a traditional orchestra. Lomuto is not one of the so-called Guardia Nueva, New Guard. He's more a guardia vieja orchestra, more old style. But of course, they've all been affected by the new musical ideas.

41:43And the second instrumental I want to play is one I think many of you haven't heard before. It's called Guapito. That's a real gem. Let's listen to this to Lomuto, Te aconsejo que me olvides, and Guapito.

42:00 · They playTe aconsejo que me olvidesFrancisco Lomuto · 1928

An instrumental with a nice violin counter-melody and a bandoneón variación at the end; a Pedro Maffia composition.

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♪ Music · 2:10 · The lyrics, on the song's page

44:10 · They playGuapitoFrancisco Lomuto · 1928

A second instrumental that many listeners will not have heard.

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47:09Two beautiful songs, very danceable, both of them, I think. Very beautiful. Guapito especially has this hypnotic timeless quality. We're transported to another place where the music just goes on forever. I could imagine dancing until I dropped.

47:50And the music's more complex than it first appears, doesn't it? As you said, we had a little violin counter melody, a simple counter melody, more an obligato part. But yes, the music is not just banging out a simple tune.

48:07Yeah, let's move on to one of the woman singers this year, and this is a woman singer we never played before in Tango By Year, Rosita Quiroga. She was, I think, recording until about 1930 and then she dropped out of business and she did a few recordings then in the 50s. But can you say something about her as a singer? And I think also she worked as an actress, didn't she, or maybe not, I don't know whether she worked as an actress.

48:30Well, what I can say is that she and Azucena Maizani, they are clearly voices from a different era. Now, a voice like Libertad la Marca, whether it's to your taste or not, it's not the point, has a quality that doesn't sound out of place in the 40s. But these voices, the voices of these women, is clearly from a much earlier time.

48:58I mean, it doesn't matter what she was singing. I would imagine there'd be a great sense of melancholy imbued with it, a sort of wistful, slightly distant quality. So it's no surprise to me at all that as the D'Arienzo explosion takes place, this kind of really restrained music just doesn't find a place any longer. And she has a sort of darker, for a woman, quite dark voice, which appeals to me. So let's hear two of her songs, since we've never listened to her before. First, a tango called Hacelo por la vieja. Do it for your old woman.

49:36It's a beautiful song and it has also a violin counter melody, and I was chatting about Rosita Quiroga with our engaged guest Gerardo, and he asked if the band on the own we hear on this song could be Sirac Ortiz. So I wanted to ask you about this, Michael. We can talk about it after maybe, but there's something about this conversando style of the bandoneón in the beginning that really reminds Gerardo. And also I think... Come on.

50:09She's recording on Victor. Sirico Ortiz is on Victor. We know that Victor shared musicians around the different bands. They had house musicians like Elvino Vadaro and they would just instruct them to go and play on recordings. It's definitely him. Definitely. Definitely. Yes. Our ears do not deceive us.

50:28Okay. All right. And the second song is called Bandoneón. This is a composition by Sebastian Piana and Pedro Maffia, actually. So, yeah, listen to these two wonderful Rosita Quiroga sung tangos. Hacelo por la vieja and Bandoneón.

53:20 · They playBandoneónRosita Quiroga · 1928

A composition by Sebastián Piana and Pedro Maffia; the accompaniment is weaker than in the first song.

56:36It's a special feeling, this voice, I think. The voice of the arabal. I was just looking at the lyric, which I wasn't familiar with. Bandoneón, throw your hundred wounds and your eternal regret to the wind, so that in each breath you can renew a hundred lives. Oh, that's so poetic. Amazing. Yeah. Amazing.

57:04There was a question in the chat window about the backing by violin or bandoneón. Yeah, it's like the third instrument doesn't really have anything to do. So in that aspect, that second one, I found a bit weak from the accompanying point of view. When we were listening to the earlier one and the bandoneón was so much more expressive, because the first one was Surya Kurtis playing and the second one, clearly it wasn't. Probably he wasn't available for the session. So they do something simpler.

57:34But the first one reminded me of what's going on in European Cabaret at that time, in the Weimar scene, the piano accompaniment style of people like Wartinsky, for example. So there's a real echo there. Of course, that's something that's going to disappear in tango. It's something of the spirit of the 1920s that we're hearing there. It's a nice spirit. That's something special about it.

58:04Let's go on to the most recording Tango Orchestra director ever, Francisco Canaro. This year he has about 250 recordings, I think. It's about a quarter of everything from this year. Well, I had a look and I think it's 280 or something like that. But I mean, relatively low for Canaro for this time. If you don't mind my saying. A bad year for Canaro. It's a bad year.

58:29Yeah, he only records more than 250 pieces because in 29, 30 and 31, he's going to record 300 songs a year. Yes, Canaro has moved in terms of quantity. He's won the commercial more. He's eliminated his great rival, Roberto Firpo, displaced him from the biggest venues. And he's making some very interesting music. Sometimes it's very square, sometimes not. He's got wonderful musicians in his band. Minotto is playing bandoneón in the orchestra at this time, so yes, there's a lot of good stuff to find in there. And what have you found for us?

59:11I found two, first two wonderful Charlo tangos, Entre sueños and Viejo ciego. Oh God, Entre sueños. I can remember this for a long time ago. Yeah, so a lot of these Canaro, well, I say a lot, a number of these old Canaro songs were released in Europe at the time. And this was because Canaro had been in Europe for almost a year in 1926. So he'd set his stamp on the idea of European tango. This is something we can take away, folks. The takeaway, European tango is kind of based on the style of Canaro in 1926.

59:50So a lot of Canaro records, there were about 50, were released by Parlophone in a series called OT, which stands for Typica. Well, we think it stands for Orchester Typica, but actually I think it stands for Tango. But anyway, OT series, easy to remember. And because of this, in the very early days, there were one or two collectors that had really good Canaro collections here in Europe, and a Parisian-based record label called EPM released a fantastic Canaro CD in the 1990s, full of top tracks in very, very good fidelity. Some of the stuff we're listening to tonight, the sound quality is better than some of the songs from the late 40s. The record technology was really good. The quality of Shellac, the actual physical quality of the records was excellent.

1:00:43And Entre sueños was on this. Entre sueños is a song that kills me every time. Entre sueños. There's a much later recording by Tantori, but it's not as good as this one. Entre sueños, Between Dreams, it's about a man waiting for his lover to arrive in a room, and you're waiting for your lover. So it starts off with this distant sounding piano with an echo between the left and the right hands. Then it gets going, then Charlo comes in and suddenly he jumps up an octave when he says, how long I have waited and struggled waiting for you and struggled against death. And then he uses this very Argentine verb, I've overcome through my brilliance, through my daring, through my sort of Argentine character. I've overcome death in order to be with you. Fantastic.

1:01:40It's an exception. It's one of Canaro's best numbers. Definitely. Good. Top 20 Canaro. So we'll hear Entre sueños first, and then Viejo ciego, Old Blind Man. Is that the right correction? Oh, this is a really tragically sad lyric about a guy who, he's blind and he plays the violin on the streets to beg for a few coins. And then, of course, one day he's not there anymore. Yeah.

1:02:08And this one has, well, two things, wonderful violin solo, of canto melody, but the most interesting thing about this one, I think, is the ending, because there's a long bandoneón variation and to me it sounds like it's without a break. So it's something we associate with Lauren's later, that he plays in and out on the bandoneón, a very, very special skill on the bandoneón playing. Yeah, I would imagine this is Minotto playing, and I would also imagine that it's only Minotto playing. So normally in a typical orchestra you have a fuelle cadenero, cadena means chain, a fuelle cadenero is a bandoneón player who's got the ability to drag the rest of the section along with him and up to his level. So when you get the fast solo, it's not just one person playing, one person is leading the group, the section, but the others are playing as well. But in Canaro's orchestra, when the playing gets really tough, all the others just stop and listen, and listen to Minotto. So I think that's what we'll hear, that it's only one person.

1:03:10Minotto was famous as a great technician and he carried on studying through his whole life, even ordering bandoneóns with extra buttons to be specially made for him in Germany so that he could increase the range of the instrument. And he's capable of playing just without break, in and out, without any break. Yeah, so he's playing in both directions, he's taught himself to do that. Let's listen out for that in the second tango. But first, Entre sueños. Entre sueños.

1:04:40 · They playEntre sueñosFrancisco Canaro · Charlo · 1928

A man waiting for his lover in a room; Charlo jumps up an octave, 'how long I have waited', and has beaten death to be with her. Stenvoll says it 'kills me every time'.

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1:07:40 · They playViejo ciegoFrancisco Canaro · Charlo · 1928

A lyric about a blind street violinist who one day isn't there; the bandoneón variación without a break is probably Minotto.

Danced to it

• Gaston Torelli & Mariana DragoneSeoul International Tango Festival · 2019

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1:09:48Isn't that great? Absolutely fabulous. Minotto. That's Minotto, yeah. Yeah, early on, he was already doing these little things, but they were so short you couldn't even hear them. When Canaro let his musicians do great stuff, they were fantastic, but he was always keeping them on the lead, whipping them into shape. No, stop doing that. It's too interesting. But sometimes he couldn't help himself.

1:10:32And in 28, he didn't start this Series Sinfonica yet, did he? Arranged music. Or was this an example of this? No, that's not Series Sinfonica. It's 29. It comes later. Okay.

1:10:45Let's see one more Charlo number, but this is one where he sings as a soloist and with Canaro as backing, it's the waltz called Nelly. Oh, now there are two recordings of Nelly. One is Canaro typical with Charlo as estribillista, and then the other, which is only recorded like a week later, is the other way around. And when you listen to the arrangements, they're almost identical. Now, normally you don't expect that, do you? You expect that for the soloist version, you will get a very different accompaniment full of stops and pauses. And then when the non-solo version, where it's a typical playing for dancers with the singer just coming in and doing one chorus, the thing will be much more continuous and there's less of a role. But here it's a waltz, so maybe that's the reason why they're almost the same. Or maybe it's something about Charlo's style, because I'm sure Adefel Kohn would have put a big pause in, but here there's no big pause, he keeps going. You get more of the lyric and it's really delightful.

1:11:51I prefer the solo version by Charlo, maybe because you hear all the lyric and his wonderful voice. Yes, his voice just raises the quality. So let's have it. Nelly with Charlo backing by Canaro.

1:15:17Although there's some stiff competition which we haven't yet heard. That's true. Some famous names coming up if I'm not mistaken. Could be, could be.

1:15:26Let's hear one of the woman soloists from this year, Mercedes Simone. She's a top singer also, I think. And she doesn't have a lot of recordings at these times, but there are some. And she's backed by guitars at this time, which is really nice. And I want to play one of her own compositions, Oiga, agente.

1:15:46Rente, listen agent or listen? A police officer. Police officer. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Listen officer. So it's a kind of confession, as I can say, maybe. Possibly, possibly. Yeah. She's been arrested in the street. I don't know. I don't know this lyric. Could be. Let's have a look at it while we listen to it.

1:16:06But yeah, she's, we listened to her before and she has also this darker tone in her voice that makes it pleasant to listen to. Yes, a very, very rich voice. Let's hear it. Oiga, agente, with Mercedes Simone.

1:18:57Wow, that's a really strong lyrics. It's a social tango, isn't it? Very. Not many of them. There it is, hiding in plain sight. You could say, oh, it's another tango about the mother. But no, it's a social commentary. Yeah. Powerful.

1:19:14She wrote it herself. This is her own composition, and she wrote the lyrics. I've never heard it before. Her self-composition that she's most famous for is Cantando, singing, which is considered her signature song. So it's interesting that this song wasn't particularly famous. Maybe it made people feel a bit uncomfortable. The lyric was just too bleak or too honest. I don't know.

1:19:42And beautiful guitar accompaniment as well. Simple but delicate. Let's go on to Victor's house orchestra, Orquesta Típica Victor, and they had some nice tango recordings this year. I remember you said in tango 1929 that OTV is simple but with good musicians. Yes. I mean, every musician playing in the OTV is playing a little below their peak. I mean, they're restraining themselves at the technical level, I always feel, but that doesn't stop them producing very good stuff.

1:20:14I mean, the OTV was created, so we mentioned Fresedo a bit earlier and I'm sure you're going to mention him again a bit later. So I was mentioning how Fresedo was one of the big stars of the Odeon company, and it's his departure in 28 that gives Di Sarli his break. But back in 1925, Fresedo had been one of the big stars of the Victor company, and then he'd gone off on one of his trips or something and left them, and that's why Victor started the OTV, because they needed to replace his sales with something. Wow. So, and Fresedo is always a good musician. So that's a good way to think of the OTV, not a band that's trying to compete with Canaro, a band that's trying to compete with something a little bit more sophisticated, like Fresedo, but not the most sophisticated, like De Caro. So if we've got like a sophistication-o-meter, somewhere in the, just above the middle, that's where it's aiming. And I think it does that very, very well.

1:21:16And they've got great musicians at their disposal, because you've got bandoneón players like Petrucelli, you've got violin players like Vadaro. Not on every recording because, you know, he might be busy doing something else, but on most of the recordings. So some very good stuff. And of course, I had a look through the OTV recordings for this year and there are some magical recordings.

1:21:39Yeah, let's hope you like this one. I want to play Muñeca de percal. I wasn't expecting this one. No. There are other more famous ones. Yeah, I know. But let's hear it. It has a really good rhythm, I think, and a nice bandoneón variacion, also. Okay, I've just looked at my notes. Have you looked at the lyric? No, because this is instrumental, so I didn't look at the lyrics, but there is a lyric to it. There is a lyric.

1:22:04So percal is a code word. There's a famous tango, isn't there? Percal. Yeah. Every, well, not every English speaker, every English person shouldn't immediately understand the word percal because we buy pillowcases made from a kind of cotton called percale, which is a very fine cotton made in Egypt. So percal is cotton and it means a cotton dress. So if you're a girl wearing a cotton dress, that means you're a poor girl. Muñeca de percal is always a reference to poverty. And the lyric of Muñeca de percal talks about a young girl who's worked to death as a seamstress and dies of TB, which was a very common fate in those days. But it is a beautiful recording. Now that I remember it, hypnotic. Let's hear it. Muñeca de percal with Orquesta Típica Victor.

1:25:35Good stuff. Wow. Someone was teasing me on the Facebook group the other day because sometimes after a really good song I say, wow. But, wow. So, I think the bandoneón is Petrucelli there because it doesn't sound like Siria Cortis. And who's Petrucelli?

1:26:05Petrucelli is the first bandoneón in the first line-up of the De Caro brothers. That's how good he is. And he only splits with De Caro because he's really pissed off that the band is called De Caro when they had agreed that the band would not bear any of their names. So he is Julio and Francisco De Caro's first choice as first bandoneón. And you could hear in that tango in 1928, absolute mastery of the left hand, because a long variation was played, not in the twiddly high notes in the right hand, but in the left hand, which takes a lot more practice. So he was better than Maffia and Laurenz at this point. Well, I can't say he's better than Maffia and Laurenz, because those guys are very strong, you know.

1:26:54Well, let's move on to Julio De Caro, since you mentioned him, and he has a lot of nice stuff this year, I think. And he's one of the more experimental bands this time, as you said in the introduction. Yeah, I mean, this is what De Caro is about, isn't it? The whole De Caro project. And when I say De Caro, if I don't mention a first name, I want to make this really clear to everybody. This is important. Please remember this. It's not just Julio. When we say De Caro, you should hear two first names. You should hear Julio, the violin player, but also Francisco, the pianist.

1:27:28Now, as you know, the piano is often the axis of an orchestra, the instrument without which it can't function. There's only ever one, and it has notes from the very lowest to the very highest that are played in the orchestra. So it organises all the other instruments. Francisco De Caro is a better musician than Julio in several respects. He's a better player, he's a better instrumentalist. Julio is a very good violinist and a creative guy, but he's also a really good organizer. Now you need to be a good organizer to run a band, and they have a project which is to incorporate all the new ideas in tango music into a working orchestra. But they're not necessarily his ideas or his brother's ideas, their ideas being generated by a whole group of people. Julio De Caro becomes the figurehead, but Francisco's the more important musician really. He's the motor in the orchestra and a clear influence on Pugliese's playing, for example, Francisco De Caro.

1:28:34So yeah, where were we? So 1928 is a year when they perform for the first time many works that you think of as famous pieces by, well, let's give the names. If I say El Monito, who do you think, or Mala Pinta? If I say Mala Pinta you think, oh, Pugliese in 1944, but it's De Caro 1928 first, and there's a whole bunch of stuff like that. Even Maipo. If I say Maipo you think, oh, D'Arienzo 1939, but actually it's Arolas's composition and Arolas is in Paris at this time. So the only person who records it is De Caro. So he really selects the most interesting material there is to play. Yeah.

1:29:24Well, I selected a tango that might surprise some of those who sent in suggestions, because there were many suggestions about De Caro. But I chose a different one called La otra noche. It's an instrumental. You've surprised me as well. Yes. And I really like the melody of this one. It has a really nice violin. And what's special about it is it has a bandoneón variacion, since I think that both Laurenz and Maffia are in the band at this time. Now, can I correct you there? Yeah, of course. Maffia has already gone solo. So Laurenz is now first bandoneón. And Alfredo De Franco, the guy with the super strong prescription, we call them bottle glasses, because the glass is so thick it looks like the bottom of a bottle.

1:30:06You posted this photo in the event. Oh, for another reason. Yes, that's right. Yeah, so it's now Maffia has gone, but desperately, sadly, he doesn't have a record contract. So the variacion would be played by Laurenz. Laurenz is first bandoneón and De Franco as second bandoneón, more in the Laurenz style. Yeah, so it's a Laurenz flavor bandoneón section in the 1928 De Caro orchestra. And you can hear that in the recordings, the sense of dynamic that they have. So let's hear it, I'm interested what you think. La otra noche, Julio De Caro and Francisco De Caro, according to your comments.

1:33:38Laurenz, 1928, folks. Wow. You can hear it's Laurenz, can't you? That sense of excitement. Hall was here this time, like early 20s or something. Yeah, I can't remember exactly when he's born. I think it's 1904. Well, I'd have to check. He's a young guy. Nice.

1:34:16And the music is complex, isn't it? Could you notice, folks, right from the beginning how much the piano was doing? It wasn't just going chunk chunk chunk chunk, and it wasn't just going chunk chunk, it was going very rich. So this is Francisco De Caro. That's Francisco. He's the backbone of this orchestra. And then all the other guys are able to do their thing because of him. He's like the midfield player who lets the strikers score the goals in football.

1:34:50And at the very end, when there was that fabulous variation going, the violin came in and played a very simple obligato counter melody. That's Julio De Caro playing the violin here. Yeah, I think it was. There you have to be careful, because often he's playing one of these cornet violins, the straw violin, which is a very strange tone, and the second violin player is playing a normal violin always, but generally that's how they set it out. So it's not necessarily him playing the violin solos, but it doesn't matter, it's great anyway. Beautiful music and really nice to listen to tonight, because there's a lot to listen to and because we're not dancing we can really focus in on what we can hear.

1:35:33Yeah, I remember I said you earlier, during one of the earlier programs, that with De Caro, you prefer his recordings from around 1950 for dancing, because they have a really good walking beat, but for listening, you prefer these early recordings. And I think I agree about this, it's beautiful. I wouldn't say I prefer them, but they are wonderful to listen to. There's a great deal to listen to. And they're more for listening than dancing, I think, especially. For me, they are, because the impulse is not for walking. And that's certainly how it was received at the time. People did dance to this, but De Caro was playing for a select audience. For example, when the Prince of Wales and his brother visited Buenos Aires in 1925, the tango band that was hired to play at the ball was De Caro's. You wouldn't get Canaro to play for the Prince of England, would you? Get this band.

1:36:30Yeah, yeah, let's move on to another experimental band, Juan Carlos Cobián, and we never played him before in Tango By Year because I think because he probably, this is his last year of recording, isn't it? Well, he comes back in 1942. Juan Carlos Cobián, a tango pianist first of all. Yeah, very good musician both as a player and as a composer too. He's the composer of the music of Nostalgias, but also in terms of musical ideas, so not just tunes, but good new musical ideas. He's very important to this Guardia Nueva project in 22 and 23, playing with Fresedo before De Caro's even got his band together.

1:37:21The problem that he has is that he's got this completely disorganized love life, and every time things are going well for him he has a disaster on the personal front and he has to up stakes. I can't remember if it's at this particular time, but it could be. He has this whirlwind affair with this rich American woman who we know only by her initials, NMG. So I mean he's handsome, he's a great musician, he's a snappy dresser, he has Argentine manners, irresistible. So she marries him. And then she realizes, oh, my God, what have I done? So she asks for a quickie divorce. And the way she arranges it is she puts $50,000 in a bank account in New York. And he has to go to New York to get it.

1:38:13As a result of which, he then disappears from the tango scene for several years. But he enjoys New York for a few years, probably. Yes, I think he does. Good story. A true story. I just want to know who NMG was.

1:38:27So he does great work. And if I recall correctly, his singer in this year is a still relatively not famous vocalist called Francisco Fiorentino. That's true. I'm going to play a tango with Fiorentino singing. So quiz question. Well, it's a two-part question. Part one, does Fiorentino sound like Fiorentino? That's the whole question in two parts.

1:38:53Do you recognize the voice, the tone, the timbre of the voice? And secondly, is he as good here as he is with Troilo? That's an easy question to answer. I mean, we can answer before listening to this. In addition to Fiorentino, he has also Vardaro playing the violin. So this is a strong combination, I think, that makes it worth listening to.

1:39:15Yeah, Cobián is not going to play simple music. Yeah. Somebody who's capable of writing something like Nostalcias, which is, what is it? It's lyricism, it's intense lyricism. He's going to be writing more interesting music and performing more interesting music. And I want to play the tango, Charlatán, which is not his own composition, but composed by Sirac Ortiz actually. Yeah, Vardaro on violin, Fiorentino singing. Can't be better. What's not to like? Charlatán, Juan Carlos Cobián.

1:39:45 · They playCharlatánJuan Carlos Cobián · Francisco Fiorentino · 1928

Cobián's last year of recording before he leaves; Fiorentino is not yet at his Troilo best, and Vardaro plays violin.

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♪ Music · 2:26 · What the transcriber heard

1:42:11So was Fiorentino better with Troilo or with Cobián? Well, we know he was better with Troilo, but the voice doesn't sound the same either. No, it's true. Not only does it not phrase as well. Is it the recording quality only, or is it also that he actually sung differently? He sings differently. Yeah.

1:42:32Because I remember we listened to a Fiorentino recording in 29. I can't remember which orchestra. Was it Canaro? And you could actually, you could hear it was Fiorentino differently than this, I think. This is unrecognisable, I think. Yeah, well, that particular recording, there were no crackles at all on the recording. So that tells us that it's been cleaned. And that sounded to me like whoever had done the cleaning had cleaned it maybe a bit too much. Yeah.

1:42:59So that would have affected our perception of the voice a little bit. But you can hear, it's partly a thing about the decades, different styles of singing, what people are aiming for. But it's also partly to do with Troilo knowing how to get the best out of a singer. He trained all his singers. Yeah. Think of that. Troilo with his sandpapery voice. Troilo said, if I had a better voice, I would have been a singer. And the moral of that is don't clean things too much, people. Some things are better dirty. Some things are better dirty, yes.

1:43:35Yeah, uh, let's go on to, this is not very dirty actually, but uh, let's listen to Osvaldo Fresedo. One of the big orchestras finally. Yeah, finally. Yeah, one of your favorites, is he? I think Fresedo in 28 is outstanding. He's so interesting and he's got a, um, heavier quality to his beat. It's not a walking beat but it's great for dancing, some intense feelings that you don't get, you don't get an intensity with Fresedo in the 40s. But here you do, it's almost unrecognizable compared to the sound he makes in the 40s. Yeah, interesting to see what people think. And his main singer this year is the next of our, um, we're going to listen to two of his tangos. But first I want to play a tango with the singer, a less known singer called Antonio Buglione, singing Tarasca solo, which means Tarasca only, whatever Tarasco means in Argentina. It's possible it's the name of the horse. So okay, for instance the famous tango Leguisamo solo means Leguisamo the jockey is out in front by himself. Okay, clear of the pack. It's a racehorse, uh, kind of, thumb, quite, quite, I'm not 100 sure about that but probably. And Antonio Buglione, he sang only Fresedo, you know, or other orchestras as well. Now he crops up a bit with other orchestras at the time. Let's hear him and uh, Fresedo, Tarasca solo.

1:45:05 · They playTarasca soloOsvaldo Fresedo · Antonio Buglione · 1928

A tango with a lesser-known singer, perhaps named after a racehorse or football player; Lavocah notes there is a whole genre of football tango.

Danced to it

• Hernan Ohaco & Yamina Leiva Improvisan2017

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♪ Music · 1:45 · What the transcriber heard

1:47:20So Tarasca solo, we discovered during the song that it was a football player. Yeah, footballer. It's a whole genre, there's lots of football tango. But I just love the intensity of that, the creaminess of that violin sound, full of emotion. Yeah, it is.

1:48:05I see two more Fresedo songs, this time with Famá singing. Piedad, which is one of the hits. This series has a lot of recordings of it. Yep, Piedad is another one of the competition tangos, the Gran Concurso of Max Glücksmann. So a medium hit, not one of the top, top hits, but a hit with many versions. But I like the Fresedo version the best, I think. And the second one is called De puro guapo. Oh, no! A fabulous one. Yeah, please.

1:48:40Like I said, there are two tangos called De puro guapo, at least. So if we say De puro guapo, a lot of our guests, especially the more educated guests, are thinking, ah, De puro guapo, Pedro Laurenz. It's not that tango. This is another one and I don't even need to look at my notes to tell you what I've got written in the comment field for this tango. It says, six star masterpiece. It's an absolutely stunning recording. De puro guapo, Fresedo 28, you're going to die. Good. Get a glass of something good ready for the second song that he's going to play now. The first one is just to warm up. Yeah. Warm up to dying with Piedad. This is Fresedo with Ernesto Famá singing both.

1:49:40 · They playPiedadOsvaldo Fresedo · Ernesto Famá · 1928

One of the Gran Concurso tangos of Max Glücksmann's competition, a medium hit; Stenvoll prefers the Fresedo version. The orchestra stops and Famá sings with guitar.

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♪ Music · 3:10 · What the transcriber heard

1:52:50 · They playDe puro guapoOsvaldo Fresedo · Ernesto Famá · 1928

Not the Pedro Laurenz tango of the same name; Stenvoll's note says 'six-star masterpiece'. A heavy lyric looking back to knife fights.

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1:55:19Yeah, so heavy stuff lyrics in that last one. Revenge tango, one of the men in. Yeah, I mean, what can we say? This is already referring back to a time that's 20 or 30 years in the past, when knife fights in early dances were commonplace. But the intensity of the music is extraordinary.

1:56:09Did you notice that Famá sang a verse and a chorus in that tango? No, that's unusual, isn't it? Normally the estribillista sings an estribillo, one chorus, one section of music. Here he sings two. So that was unusual. And we had something unusual in Piedad as well, when the orchestra suddenly stops playing when Famá's singing, and he's just got a guitar backing him. And then it breaks back into the orchestra again. I've never come across another tango like it. I like that detail.

1:56:40I mean, it's not so common with guitars in orchestras like this, but there are some, I mean, it's more usual with guitars in this early period than later. So what happens with the guitar in tango? Because initially it was an important instrument, wasn't it, in tango? Well, it got replaced by the piano, didn't it? Tango moved indoors. When was that? 1913 is the year that Firpo wins the competition to be the new house band at the Armenonville and is immediately stabbed by a guitarist. Because he was a, he's a pianist. He's a pianist, if you've got a piano you don't need a guitar, because the piano can do the accompanying function. Now if you're walking around in the streets you can't do that with a piano, but as soon as tango moves indoors and you don't need to transport the instruments any longer, yeah. So that was bad news for guitarists everywhere, but the best ones carried on as guitarists and many of the others retrained as double bass players. Yeah. Which was a new position opening up at that time.

1:57:47And one of the good discoveries for me from Tango by Year is the guitar backing of solo artists also way into the dance era. I don't hear these songs at milongas, but they're really nice for listening, I think, because they bring out the voices much more than a fuller orchestra backing. Yes, it's sort of like tango unplugged, isn't it? Yeah, you get the feeling of sitting in a smoky joint in Buenos Aires and drinking wine and listening to the music live.

1:58:18Okay, let's move on to a different section, which I call the Vardaro section, an orchestra we haven't heard before, Juan Guido. Oh, so this is one of the real old timers. Yes, we haven't. He's recording on the Victor label, unusual for an old-timer orchestra, and yes, he's got Vardaro as a session musician. So Vardaro would not have played with the band except on the records. Yeah, but what strikes me is, I mean, even if Vardaro is a boy, you don't really hear the good violin solos that you hear from later. According, it's a simpler conception of music. This is really interesting for us to listen to, just to get an idea of what the baseline had been a few years back, because Guido's starting to sound quite old-fashioned now. There's still some great numbers, particularly some of the waltzes.

1:59:07Yeah, I was considering the waltzes, but then I decided instead to play a tango called El pañuelito, which is an instrumental that we know from, although the composer is Juan de Dios Filiberto. So it's, um, we listened to some of his recordings before. It's, uh, I guess we could say that the beat is a bit square, but I like the melody of this song. It's very, yeah, it's kind of sad. I think it's a really charming orchestra and it's really useful, and more than useful, it's nice for us to hear one track by him tonight. Yeah, let's hear it, El pañuelito, with Orquesta Típica Juan Guido.

2:02:57Yeah, it's Vardaro, but he always plays together with other violins here. Yeah, there were three there, weren't there? Because for quite an extended period, you could hear two violins playing in harmony. And at the beginning of that section, another person was playing pizzicato. So I guess Vardaro walked into the session, said to the normal violin player, look, you and I are playing thirds. You do pizzicato, let's go.

2:03:29And the backing, the accompaniment, is a bit, I think I would say, European, because it's very like, yes. So this is a band that's playing without a rastre, so it just goes chunk chunk, chunk chunk, chunk, and that's what the piano is doing. But there were moments where he broke away from that, weren't there? So at the end of every phrase it would go boom boom boom, dum dum dum dum dum dum, bum. Every eight beats you would get this, dum dum dum dum dum. So that lifted it a little bit. Yeah.

2:04:00All right, let's listen to some more Vardaro, but in a different setting with a trio called Victor. So I guess that's with the record company, right? Trio Victor. So the Trío Victor, let's just wind back one year to 1927, when a guitar duo formed between somebody you know and somebody you don't.

2:04:24The person you know is Oscar Alemán, this Argentine, black, really dark jazz guitarist who went to Paris and played alongside Django Reinhardt and was as good, but a different style of guitar. But that was later. Right now, he forms a duo with a Brazilian called Gastão Bueno Lobo, whose name is normally Hispanicized to Gastão Bueno Lobo. So with his name being Lobo, they called their duo the Wolves. Los Lobos. Los Lobos. But they gave it a French tinge to make it more sophisticated. They called it Le Loop. So that was moderately successful.

2:05:12So Victor said, come on, let's do a trio. So it was the record company's idea, I should think, to put Vardaro together with these two guys. Just, I think, two recordings. Yeah, I saw three recordings. Very few from 28, 29 and 30. So let's hear the one from 28. It's called El presumido. It's a tango with two guitars and a violin. Yeah, Trío Victor.

2:08:20That's so joyful. If this doesn't make you feel happy, please get some medication, people. And you can really hear about Aro playing here, the violin. I mean, clearly. And a great guitar playing also, as you said. Yeah, those two guys play really well. I've just posted a link to a little article that I wrote on my blog about those, and there's some photographs there. So when they played just the two of them, Buenolobor would play like a steel guitar. So it's a normal steel string guitar, but he would place it flat on his lap and play it with the slide steel. But I don't think he was doing it in that particular recording. It was a popular thing at the time.

2:09:01Okay, let's go to Luis Petrucelli. He also had Vardaro on board this year. Yeah, and this is one of the really advanced orchestras of the year. Complex, dense music making. So Petrucelli, we mentioned him before, he's a bandone player. He was the guy who quit De Caro out of disgust, led the OTV for many years. This is some of the best music of 1928. And this song I'm going to play was recommended to me by several, and we know it from a much later version by Pugliese, Gervato lo Todo. Oh, this is wonderful. Yeah, it's a beautiful song. It's very different from the later version by Pugliese, but it's so, yeah, very special song. The composer is Schiamarella. I think it would be Schiamarella. Schiamarella. Okay, that's the right pronunciation. Let's hear it. Luis Petrucelli, Gervato L'Otodo, an instrumental, 1928.

2:12:13Wow, I say. Now you're doing it. So I'm sorry I forgot to tell everyone beforehand, but I did type it in the chat window at the beginning. As soon as it started, I remember, oh, yes, there's two violins playing and they're playing different things. Right from the beginning, Vodaro plays and our ear is attracted to him. But underneath, Mandolin Francia is the second violinist. He's not just playing a simple harmony. He's playing another line, advanced music. And wasn't it wonderful when Petrocelli came in and played his little bandagnon solo? Really great phrasing that he had, but quite a short solo. So this is really in the new wave of music, advanced music making. Yeah.

2:13:25Okay, next one. I'm curious what you'll think about because this is something I heard last week and I really like it. It's a special recording. This is your joker for the night. Well, yeah, I guess it's a joker. It's true. Yeah, this is what I feel. It's a very known song. It's Mala junta, a lot of the Lawrence composition, but this is by an orchestra called OT, as you said, the European signal of the recording, Brodmann-Alfaro. It's an instrumental and, yeah, for me this was a very interesting recording. Now Brodmann-Alfaro is based in Paris, Parisian based band. Yeah, Brodman is an Argentine, he's the band union player, and someone will correct me if I got this wrong, but I wasn't expecting to hear Brodmann-Alfaro tonight, so I'm just talking unprepared. And he's a very good musician, and generally the weakness with the European bands is that the band union players were not as good as the Argentine ones because there just wasn't the competition, the need to raise your level. And Alfaro is a Frenchman but he's changed his name to sound more Argentine, and they are the band that sound most like an advanced Argentine band that plays in Europe that I'm aware of. So that they are making more advanced music, which is not typical of the music that's being made in Paris by tango bands. Very, very interesting to listen to.

2:14:50Yeah, and listen to this one. I found it very surprising, some of the parts of it, especially when you get to the middle, you'll understand what I'm talking about when you hear it. All their music is very, very good. It's been very hard to find good quality transfers. So Sirian, if you're with us, I don't know if you've got any Brodmann-Alfaro. I hope you do. That's what I want for Christmas. I know we've just missed Christmas, so I'll have to wait another 12 months now. But that's what I'd like for Christmas. You have a birthday in April, don't you? That's true, yeah, middle of April. Yeah, okay. Mala junta, okay, or OT Brodmann-Alfaro, instrumental.

2:18:32Isn't that extraordinary for a tango recorded in Europe? It's fantastic, isn't it? So advanced. Listening to it again with all of you, the special character was that it joined two things that aren't normally going together. So it joined this light sort of champagne bubble Parisian thing with really high quality playing and complex arrangements with two or even three musical lines going at once. So it didn't become weighed down in serious musicianship, it maintained this light and joyful feeling all the time, which was helped by these breaks where, you know, suddenly we had whistling and we had the musical saw. So these guys made good music but didn't take themselves too seriously. That's special. Yeah, it was great, and the variation on bandone with the violin going and the counter melody above is really complex things, beautiful. So that was a surprise for me, the surprise of the year maybe for me, preparing for this program. Hope you liked it.

2:19:38We're approaching the end, but before we finish with one of the big orchestras I want to play another song by a woman singer, Azucena Maizani, that you mentioned also in the earlier. You can't go through 1928 without listening to Azucena Maizani. I'm going to play Pero yo sé, which is one of the important tangos of the year. But do you want to say something about her as a tango singer and an artist at this point? The voice will remind people a little bit of the voice of Rosita Quiroga, whom we heard earlier. So a voice that's from an older era, a rabelera, a voice from the outskirts of the city, with this kind of wistful sound, wistful quality, slightly distant and melancholic.

2:20:29As a personality, she was quite intriguing. She would often dress in men's clothing, like in a dinner jacket for her performances, which is partly to do with being a woman in a man's world. She wasn't the only woman to do that. There's a photograph of Mercedes Simone also dressed like that. But for her, it was quite rare. For Azucena Maizani, she did a great many of her performances like that. She wasn't very good at being an independent person and she had a pretty disastrous love life as well and was very unlucky in love, so her personal story ends up in the end being a sad one. And by the end one starts to look at the lyrics and think, well, maybe they're about you. And this is her own song, she wrote this song, she wrote a number of important songs, not just Pero yo sé.

2:21:22Pero yo sé, how does it go? It's night falls, but you've only just got up. You get dressed in your smart clothes, you get into your fancy car, and you go off driving down Corrientes and Florida. And it goes on. And then you get to the chorus, Pero yo sé, but I know what's going on that the others don't see. How you're stuck remembering this lost love. So it's a really tragic song with a strong message, and there's a lovely backing by a piano and guitar, so it really suits it perfectly. And if I'm not mistaken in 1928 her backing group, the piano is Enrique Delfino, who's a really important musician as well. A French touch. Let's hear it with Azucena Maizani.

2:24:31Such a beautiful singing and the wonderful delicate backing also. I think I suddenly remembered the Beatles song, While My Guitar Gently Weeps. Yeah. Because it's a heartbreak, but she doesn't scream or shout about her heartbreak. She just relates it in a very quiet, matter-of-fact fashion. So let's get on to the last orchestra of this part of the night, anyway. And in my view, this is the best band of the year. You're going with Firpo, are you? Yes. Killer beat. And I just love Firpo at this point in time.

2:25:26Beautiful, so good, good, beautiful walking, and there's a sadness and nostalgia to it, or melancholy maybe. Yeah, there's different things about the Firpo band. One of them is something to do with the way the violins are making their vibrato, and I'm not sufficiently technical to understand it, but you can hear that the violin have a different quality, a wailing quality at times. Firpo is a composer of beautiful romantic melodies. Tango Romanza, he's one of the people involved in that moment. El amanecer, which I don't know if that's going to be one of the tracks you're going to play, but that's a beautiful Firpo tango, and typifies his ideas as a composer, I should say. Firpo recorded about 100 tangos this year. A lot of good stuff. I think I ended up with about 10 tangos I wanted to play, and then I had to get it down too. I have the same problem. Fantastic. Yeah.

2:26:32But I want to play first two tangos with the singer Teófilo Ibáñez. The first one is called, it has a great title, Entre tangos y champagne, between tangos and champagne. Isn't that something? I mean, I just, I miss the Milongo when I hear that title. Just want to sit there and drink champagne and look at people dancing. Yeah. And the second one is called Chamuyando en recuerdo. So these are, in my view, two wonderful songs. Shall we listen to them and then we can talk about them after? Yes, please.

2:27:30 · They playEntre tangos y champagneRoberto Firpo · Teófilo Ibáñez · 1928

Firpo, 'in my view the best band of the year' for Stenvoll; a cabaret lyric.

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♪ Music · 3:00 · What the transcriber heard

2:32:24So, so groovy. Oh, it's got an irresistible groove. Yeah, lovely. Way, if you can hear how it's one of the influences on Di Sarli, the waves in the music and the power of the piano driving everything. That's Firpo himself playing this time? By 1928, no, it's not Firpo any longer. But he's a superb pianist. He's not one of the people who stopped playing because he wasn't good enough anymore. He's still playing and he taught his son to play. But they're playing what he wants. So if you listen to the piano as well there, as one does with Di Sarli, the music becomes more interesting. And just to give an idea about how good the music is, I just went and looked at my list, because I listened to all the Firpo from writing to an act. This didn't make my top 10 for the year. It's an outstanding track.

2:33:40So much good. That's how good the quality is. Yeah. Let's see two more Firpo before we end with La cumparsita. Two instrumentals.

2:33:48First, an instrumental called Sin madre, without mother, very sad number. Um, I'm just imagining someone who just lost their mother when I'm listening to this. And the composer of this is Alfredo Eusebio Gobbi. So it's the father of the Gobbi we know from later recordings. Yes. He went to Paris. Oh gosh, in the 1900s, I can't remember exactly the year, but something like 1908, 1909. He went there with his wife, uh, to make records because you couldn't make records in Argentina at that time. So a very important figure in the early days, but not just for tango. He was working also in theatre, musical comedy, recording many genres.

2:34:32Well, this is a fantastic tango in my view. And the last one, the second one, will be the waltz, Recordándote. We listened to Firpo waltzes before in tango by ear, and there's something with the Firpo waltzes. They're special.

2:34:46They're very special. So let's hear these two.

2:37:45 · They playRecordándoteRoberto Firpo · 1928

A hypnotic Firpo waltz that reminds of Maglio's waltzes of the year.

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2:40:20There's quite a few songs and bands that have this hypnotic quality. It seems to be something about the music of this era. And these are very beautiful waltzes. They remind me of other Firpo waltzes that we know. But tonight that we're listening to the 28 ones, it reminds me more also of Juan Maglio's waltzes in 1928. So we're getting a feeling for the mood of the year, aren't we? Yeah, it's true.

2:40:51And it's been a good year and we're getting close to three hours now. I'm sorry, I couldn't narrow my list down. I even cut out three orchestras during the program because I saw that we were getting out of time, but it's so much nice stuff from this year. So that's it before I play La cumparsita. Thank you for everyone for attending.

2:41:14And yes, thank you for being with us. Yes, so nice, and thanks to you, Nico, for again for sharing all your knowledge about the music, the orchestras, the songs. This was a slightly different voyage for us, wasn't it, going back to 1928? I hope those of you who aren't familiar with this era have enjoyed the songs that we've been listening to. I think it's lovely music. Hope so too, because it's most of it you don't usually hear at milongas, at least not, unless you're really into the old music kind of dancing.

2:41:47So, yeah, next week we'll have one of the Lost Afterparties, right? Another Lost Afterparty. I mean, we have the fix planned, so it's going to be 1944, another incredible year for tango music. So, as normal, I won't play anything that Dag played or anything that we played in the Troilo show or the Love Special. Those are the rules and I'll stick to them. Still a lot of nice stuff from 44. It'll still be incredibly difficult to restrict my selections to one evening's music. And Dag, don't feel obliged, but if you suddenly have the passion for an after party, we'll see. The door is open.

2:42:29And the week after that, we're going to go... I was looking through the years we've done in Tango By Year, and, uh, our plan is to do from this year is the earliest one, 1928, and the last year, uh, is 58, but that was an exception, so we ended at 55 actually. That was the, so 58 was just an excursion, and that leaves us another five years in chronological order. That's 31, 38, 43, 49 and 53. So I think in two weeks we'll go to the last year, 53.

2:43:08Excellent choice. Contrast from this year. Yes, that'll make a very good contrast. Yeah. So next week, 44, and then two weeks, 53. Ordinary program. So looking forward to that. Thanks to everyone for listening. Thanks to our sponsors, Tango Norfolk and Tango Abrazo, and also the Marabu Club in Buenos Aires, right? Yes. And thanks to all of you for your donations. If you can afford it, make a donation. Yeah. I appreciate it. Very much.

2:43:38And La cumparsita, our tradition to play La cumparsita. This year, there is eight versions. Now, Firpo has a good La cumparsita. Yeah, but we already heard four. We already heard him. There's the Bianco Baciccia Orchestra in Paris. They have a La cumparsita. Not going to play that one either. I'll shut up now because there's eight to get through. I'm into the guitar moods. And there are three guitar backing tangos or cumparsitas from this year. One is by Oscar Alemán, which we've listened to already. And one is with Gardel. But I want to play the third one with Iriarte y Pessoa. It's a really groove one, I think.

2:44:24Nice. So I hope you like this. I don't think I know this one. No, it's very rare, I think. I've never heard it before. It's a duo of guitars. So let's see what you think about this. And after that, if you hang around, there might be some more music, right, Michael? There is a lot of good music in 1928. We've only scratched the surface. So keep going until tomorrow morning. Yeah. But this is the last one from me. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for hosting the evening and for giving us a tour of this year of music. Thank you. It's a pretty good night. And thanks to everyone again for your contributions, for your suggestions for music. All right, La cumparsita with Iriarte y Pessoa.

2:48:01Now how about that? Hot damn, those guys are good. So groovy. Yeah, I think normally they're back in Corsini. So it's really interesting to hear them on their own and really adventurous. Loved it. Okay, it's your turn, Michael.

2:48:43My turn. More music. So I dashed out during the Firpo to recharge my water glass. But in case you didn't, I will now play something that isn't a tango so you have less guilt. And I'm going to start with something by Louis Armstrong. Now, I don't know, Dag, if you listened to any jazz for 1928 when you were planning your pre-party, but I did, and most of the jazz in 1928 wasn't very good. The only good band is Louis Armstrong's band, and the reason Louis Armstrong talks about this, he says we were being forced to play white jazz, white people's music, and whenever we made records, they would make us play in a white way. And he's like the only guy who's playing his music in more of an afro, black way, and it rocks. I mean, the level is just so far above all the other jazz coming out of North America at that time. So let's lift the energy just a tiny bit with some fireworks from Louis Armstrong and his Hot Five.

2:52:49Right, on with the tangos. I have to be honest, I really don't know what order to play things in. I'm completely at a loss. Let's start by listening to somebody that we didn't hear so far tonight. Ignacio Corsini. Now, one of the songs that was entered into the Gran Concurso del Discos Nacional Odeon, the Great Competition, was a song that we know from Carlos Di Sarli in the 40s and 50s, Duelo criollo. Here a completely different interpretation.

2:55:51Beautiful interpretation. Corsini is always so beautiful. Now, we're beginning to get the impression that 1928 is quite a violent year in tango lyrics. Duelo criollo is about two guys having a knife fight over the woman. And they stab each other in the moonlight. And we had De puro guapo, which was a bit... Oh, that was really tough. And now one more. It's a tango that was quite a hit in 1928. There's lots of versions and it's called Pin pan pun, which means bang bang. It's set in a conventillo. So this is one of the old houses that was broken up into slum tenements where families lived in a single room. And it starts off Pin pan pun. Superintendent, please go and find out what's happened in room 32.

2:58:49Nice up. Many nice versions of that tango. Now who's the orchestra with the strongest beat in 1928? It's a toss-up, I guess, between Juan Maglio, who's pretty much forgotten nowadays by the modern tango social dancer. And Firpo's beats were quite strong. Fresedo has strong beats, but they're not all strong, not part of the marcato. So I'd like to play a bit more Juan Maglio, because I think most of us are just never listening to Juan Maglio. So let's have a go with Carlos Viván singing, who sings also with which orchestra? With Firpo's orchestra. That's right.

2:59:44Now if I can get away with it, I'll play two. Yes, let's start with Qué vachaché. Qué vachaché is a piece by Discépolo and it means something like get away with you. There's lots of versions and after that we'll hear a really untypical number. I've never heard any other versions and it's not really typical of Maglio, called La cuyanita, the girl from Cuyo, the little girl from Cuyo, which is the region around Mendoza. So first Qué vachaché and then La cuyanita.

3:03:10Killer lyric actually. True love has drowned in the soup. The stomach is king and money is God. Oh goodness.

3:03:32Now, earlier on people were asking, what's the line-up? There was a lot of discussion in the chat window. What's the lineup of the Mally Orchestra? How many violins are there? How many bandoneons are there? And people were making suggestions. But we don't really know. Not really, because the lineup was changing on a monthly basis. Musicians just came and went. They were expendable. One person went, you just got another person in to do the job. So the lineup was changing very, very fast. And we've got no idea really who was the lineup on any particular recording. None at all.

3:04:08Mario's not playing. He's a famous bandoneon player from the 1910s, 1912, 1913, but he's not nearly good enough to play in this band now, so it's not him. He's just a brand, just a brand. You know, it's a different sound, it's his sound. So I want to play one more, which is a really special track called La cuyanita, which has got a fantastic bandoneon variación and we've got no idea who's playing. And the very special thing about this variación is that it starts not at, it's not at the end of the piece, it's not in the middle, it begins after 19 seconds. I think this is a record. If anyone knows a tango where the variación starts earlier than 19 seconds, please would you post it in the chat window.

3:07:18Is there anybody not smiling after that? Isn't that just so joyful and so innocent and lovely? That's really made me feel better. So there's more Juan Maglio from that year, but we're not going to play any more because it's already getting quite late in the evening and we've got more great bands to listen to.

3:07:59Now, there's a lot of good Canaro from 1928. And I'm looking at the list of things that I've got here and I'm not really going to be able to play most of it. Goodness. How many can I get away with? Let's just have one to start off with. I'm going to play something really unusual.

3:08:28Now, the name Pedro Maffia cropped up a few times this evening. It cropped up as one of the composers of Te aconsejo que me olvides. And Maffia left Julio De Caro in 1926, formed his own orchestra, but he doesn't get a record contract. Odeon record a couple of bandoneon duos of himself and De Caro, just the bandoneons in his orchestra, but he doesn't get a contract until Brunswick enters the market in 1929. So this is a really important composer, a unique voice, one of the best composers and musicians, one of the most important instrumentalists of this time, and we can't really hear what he's doing, but you can hear what he's doing through other people recording his songs.

3:09:26So I'm going to play you something now that is very unusual in many, many ways. It's one of the tangos that was entered into the Gran Concurso of 1928 and won a top prize. It's called Arco iris, which means rainbow. And it's a Pedro Maffia composition, but you will hear that the melody is pretty complex. There is a lyric, but the lyric is extremely difficult to sing. And who records it? Well, it's the band that performed all the songs for the competition, which for the 28 competition is Canaro. So now this doesn't, this sounds like it's not going to work, does it?

3:10:08A very beautiful and challenging melody, advanced music, being played by somebody whose brand is about playing the simplest possible music. Well, it does work because Canaro's band is full of top musicians who can play not square, but with exquisite phrasing, when they're allowed to. So because of the particular melody in question they are allowed to, and we get this really quite strange recording which doesn't fit in any of the boxes. How it would have sounded with Pedro Maffia we would just have to imagine, but instead have this really rather strange tango romance cabaret style from the unexpected hand of Francisco Canaro.

3:10:55 · They playArco irisFrancisco Canaro · 1928

After-party: a Pedro Maffia composition entered in the 1928 Gran Concurso and a top-prize winner; complex advanced music played by Canaro with exquisite phrasing.

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♪ Music · 2:33 · What the transcriber heard

3:13:28How about that for an exquisite tango romance? Now, normally Canaro would never play like that unless he was backing Adafalcon. It's a one-off. Now I'll play a bit more. Can I play more Canaro? There's a lot of good Canaro in 28. Now I'll play something that's kind of in the middle. Something that's still romantic, still with phrasing, but more like the Canaro that we know. This is called Berretines milongueros.

3:14:20So a berretín is a fantasy. Crazy thing. And the special thing is what happens almost right at the very beginning, which is this hesitation in the melody. It goes ba-ba-da-da, and then the melody goes. You'll get used to the trick very quickly.

3:14:50 · They playBerretines milonguerosFrancisco Canaro · 1928

After-party: a more typical romantic Canaro with phrasing and a hesitation in the melody at the start.

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♪ Music · 6:22 · What the transcriber heard

3:21:12That's some of the range of Francisco Canaro in 1928. There's a lot more good tracks. Atorrante I was very tempted to play but time is moving on. No time. Now Julio De Caro made a lot of very important music in 1928 but I'm not going to play the super important stuff because the problem is you'll all be thinking, oh, that's a good tune, I like it in the Pugliese version from the 40s, and I don't want you to be thinking that, but I do want us to get an idea of how inventive the band was.

3:21:48It's quite easy. For a long time, my thoughts about the De Caro project in the late 20s was that it was a bit intellectual. Maybe a bit like some advanced jazz music. But sometimes you can hear how much fun the guys are having. They're really having a great deal of fun. You can hear that, for example, in El monito, which is very, very creative. Mala pinta is also really worth a listen. But I want to show them really going mad because every now and then they let themselves go. So the track we're going to listen to, it's called Vayan saliendo, and it's full of crazy sounds and people shouting and really interesting rubatos. So I'll be really interested to get your feedback in the chat window. Here we go, the De Caro brothers, Vayan saliendo.

3:25:36It's mad, isn't it? But also really high-level music. Lots of solos, the melody passing around the band members very quickly and phrasing. Lots of phrasing, especially from Laurenz's bandoneon. That's crazy, and it's 1928, you know, that's 16 years before we get really famous Pugliese performances of all these De Caro numbers. It's really early.

3:26:25Now, how about a bit of Típica Victor? It's not something you hear me say every day, so make the most of it. And I went to a lot of trouble to get you a really good version of El porteñito, because first of all it's a beautiful melody. The Típica Victor version is exquisite, Vardaro is wonderful, but a lot of these early records, they were sped up terribly when they were transferred, so I had to do a little bit of work to get a version that I was really, really happy with. And here it is. This is so infectious, enjoy.

3:29:29Joyful, isn't it? Just joyful. Let's have one more. There's quite a lot of good Típica Victor tracks in 1928. We want to set a really high standard. Here's something a little bit unusual. This is one of those songs that was first of all a hit with western orchestras and was translated to Argentina. This is the Song of the Swamp, Spanish title Canción del pantano, or Chloe.

3:33:23Oh, it's so joyful! Really, really joyful! Okay, so two cracking tracks from the OTV. I'm gonna keep playing. I mean, no one's in a hurry, are they? You don't want to go and catch the news, it's full of awful stuff, at least where I am. So you know, what's the point? Forget the news, just makes you miserable. Do something positive, listen to music.

3:33:54Now, the orchestra for which I had the most tracks in my pre-selection for tonight was Fresedo. Fresedo, in the years, this section of time, I'm trying to work out how to explain it to you all, because in October he goes to Europe and then there's this huge gap. And then when he comes back, the style has changed and he's on another label. So this really marks the end of a period for Fresedo. And if I have to choose, it's my favourite period of Fresedo. Fresedo in 1928 is absolutely intense. He has a strength that he doesn't really have, although actually in 1931, there's some very special recordings, but they are very few. For his mass production, 1928 one could easily argue is his best year.

3:34:52So let's move on to Fresedo and play a few of those. This is not going to be as happy as the OTV, sorry about that, but I will find some happy ones to include. But if you'll forgive me, I'll start with a slightly sadder one. I don't know if you're going to know this or not. This is a tango called Burn Those Letters. Quema esas cartas.

3:35:40 · They playQuema esas cartasOsvaldo Fresedo · 1928

After-party: a sad Fresedo, one of his intense 1928 recordings.

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♪ Music · 2:43 · What the transcriber heard

3:38:23Beautiful. Now let's try and play a slightly lighter one. Che papusa, oí. It was a very popular tango from Matos Rodríguez, who wrote La cumparsita in 1927-28. So here's a slightly unexpected version from the Fresedo orchestra.

3:41:18I love it. And I've got another dozen tracks here of the same quality. So seek out Fresedo from 1928 and 27, it really is exceptionally high in quality. Don't forget that Fresedo was perfectly capable of playing music of the complexity of Julio De Caro and that movement. He was a member of that movement in 1922-23. De Caro played in Fresedo's band making advanced music in 1922. Not the other way around. It wasn't that Fresedo was a bandoneon player. And he had De Caro as a violin player in his band playing advanced music in 1922.

3:42:30And then around the end of 1923, Fresedo thought, no, I don't want to do that. He just made a choice. He said, my musical path, I want to emphasise melody and romance, and I will sacrifice a little bit of complexity to do that. So when you listen to Fresedo's orchestra, it's not an orchestra that cannot play more complex music. It's an orchestra that's choosing not to.

3:42:53Now, next on our list, we have to listen to a bit more of Roberto Firpo. We have to listen to El amanecer. You know that I was going to play this because I even mentioned it earlier on while Dag was DJing. El amanecer is one of the most important tangos ever written, one of the most romantic tango melodies ever written. And in an interview, Firpo spoke about how he wrote it. So he was coming home from work. Now, for you and I, coming home from work means getting on the bus at five o'clock in the afternoon. But for Roberto Firpo, coming home from work meant getting on the tram at four o'clock in the morning in order to go back to a part of town where he could afford to live.

3:43:48So if you've ever been out somewhere busy at four o'clock in the morning, you know that all of human life is there. So there's a mixture of people on the tram, first of all. There are people going to work, going to work, and people coming home from work and people coming home from the nightclubs. So there's lots of people who are drunk, happy drunks, not problem drunks, there's lots of happy drunks. And one day he's on the tram, he's going home and there's all these drunk people going, and as he's going home, at the same time, the factories have started work, four o'clock in the morning. It's not like today where in a city centre, there's no factories. Everything is the same place. So it's easy to find factories in the city centre.

3:44:37And he hears the sound of metal workers banging their hammers. And that's what you hear in the percussion at the outset of this. El amanecer means the dawn. It's Firpo's depiction of a summertime tram ride after a night out working at the milongas, 4am and all the different people that he hears and all the different aspects of human life that he hears, all summarised into this one exceptional melody.

3:45:10 · They playEl amanecerRoberto Firpo · 1928

After-party: Lavocah calls it one of the most romantic tango melodies; Firpo wrote it after a 4am tram ride home, with hammering factory workers heard in the percussion.

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♪ Music · 1:52 · What the transcriber heard

3:47:02I'm really pleased that we listened to that together. That's really calmed me. Really one of the most beautiful tangos ever recorded. We cannot leave 1928 without listening to one version of Cuando llora la milonga. When the Milonga Weeps.

3:50:29So it's getting late, so I'm going to give you an excuse to leave. What I'm going to do is I'm going to play a cumparsita, and then I'm going to do my own after-after party. So the cumparsita is going to be the 1928 Firpo cumparsita, which is a really special cumparsita. Dag's shaking his head like, yeah, I would have played that, but I chose another one. Because there's so many good cumparsitas in 28. Let me just look at my notes to see what we should be listening to as we listen to this cumparsita.

3:51:14First of all, you'll hear, if you listen closely, that there's 3-3-2 syncopation, and that's the da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. And at the same time as that's going, there's pizzicato going on top. It's really crazy. And the way it's done is crazy as well. It's done with brushwork. And you'll also hear the double bass player slapping. No, it's not the slap bass. It's when they take the bow and they use it to hit the stock, the place where the strings bind to the body of the double bass. Many, many rich musical effects.

3:51:49So I'm going to play a cumparsita. And then those of you getting tired can feel, oh, it's OK. I can go to bed and then I'll play just a few more songs after that because I have some really special things that I still haven't played.

3:51:55 · They playLa cumparsitaRoberto Firpo · 1928

After-party: Lavocah's 'compasita of the night' with 3-3-2 syncopation, pizzicato on top and the double bass slapping the bow on the strings.

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The lyrics, on the song's page

3:54:23It's awesome, isn't it? Isn't that amazing? Oh, if it was New Year I would now play the 1928 Roberto Firpo Fuegos artificiales, but it's too late so we're not hearing that. But, um, if you can, that's something you can listen to in the week if you need some cheering up. It really is really very, very nice.

3:55:03Right, how about a little bit more Petrucelli and a link to the last program, because if I'm not mistaken last week we listened to Agua florida in the D'Agostino Vargas version, so that was 41, now we're 28, so this is 13 years earlier. Let's listen to how Luis Petrucelli, now Petrucelli, don't forget, this is the Bandoneón guy who was with De Caro at the beginning of the De Caro project and makes really advanced music, and he's got the De Caro on violin, so this is not going to be simple.

3:55:55 · They playAgua floridaLuis Petrucelli · 1928

After-party: a link to last week's D'Agostino-Vargas version from 1941, here 13 years earlier with Vardaro on violin.

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♪ Music · 2:41 · What the transcriber heard

3:58:36So it's after 11 o'clock. We've been together for four hours. I do thank you for this time we've spent together, and I want to play you my last Argentine song. This is an Argentine version of an American song, meaning from the United States.

3:59:20So in 1928, United Artists made a silent movie called Ramona, starring the Mexican actress Dolores Del Rio. So Mabel Wayne wrote the music and Wolf Gilbert wrote the lyrics. And Enrique Caricomo, who was an expert at adding lyrics to songs which didn't have them, wrote a Spanish lyric to Ramona. And this was recorded by Carlos Gardel. Now, the song you're going to hear, I don't mean this version, I mean the theme, Ramona, this was one of the worldwide hits of 1928. So the version used in the film by Gene Austin sold a million copies. Now, these days a million isn't that much, but in 1928, to sell a million copies, records are expensive. Selling a million records in 1928 is an extraordinary achievement.

4:00:22And that wasn't even the only hit version in English. So the Paul Whiteman Orchestra, they had three weeks at number one with their version of Ramona. And there were other versions that reached number one as well. That's just the English versions. Then Gardel recorded Ramona using Caricomo's Spanish lyric. And I think it's better than any of those versions. It really is an extraordinary piece.

4:00:51It fascinated me this week. It captured my attention, and I was also captured by the beauty of Dolores del Rio, the actress who performs in this film, and I researched a little bit about her, and the thing that stayed with me was a quote, something she said about beauty. She said, "Focus on your own internal spiritual beauty. It will show on your face." Let's listen to Carlos Gardel.