Tango 1929

1:00Sorry guys, that was just too tempting to play that song. I mean, it's 1929, it's at the summit of the roaring 20s. But despite this very energetic intro song and the reputation of the 20s, for tango dancers, 1929 doesn't really come across as the wild party year, does it, Michael?

1:26Well, for us, it's the old music. So once we've become accustomed to the D'Arienzo explosion and how that all sounds, then yes, it's, um, it's very different, so we think of it as the old music, although we shouldn't really think of it as the old music, because at the time a lot of them were making what they thought was very new music. So maybe that's something we can hopefully clear up through the course of the evening, but you hear these phrases, Guardia Vieja, the old guard. So for us as modern dancers, this is the old guard, but it isn't. The old guard was quite a bit earlier, and Julio De Caro has happened now, so he's given a lot of new ideas to music, and for many musicians, this is already the new guard, and it's the era of the sextets. Although again, they didn't call themselves the sextets, they called all their sextets orchestras, but we call them the sextets to make a difference, so we have it different in our minds, and there's a profusion of new bands springing up and a lot of them making really quite playful and advanced music. So it's a very interesting time musically, perhaps Canaro's best year. It's certainly a wonderful year for Canaro.

2:41And the year when he records a lot of music too, isn't it? I mean, it's just amazing amounts.

2:46Well, it's not just this year. I mean, in 1929 he records, I think, about 300 tracks, but it's the same between, say, 28 and 31. Yeah, it's amazing. I mean, 300 tracks, that's more than was recorded in total in 1935, for instance. He goes into the studio and he will record six tracks in one go like that, six, eight, no problem, and, um, if one of the takes doesn't work out, he just comes back and records it another time.

3:17Yeah, and for those, let's say one more thing as well as an introduction, for those who like this era, this is a really, really special time, and I'm just going to stand up so that everyone can see my t-shirt here. You see that, 1927-1931, a poco de oro, a different kind of golden age, a more tender and more intimate age. Where did you get that t-shirt?

3:45This was actually made for us by Akira Natchi. He's this wild Japanese DJ in Paris, and he organized a tango DJ event some years ago, and all of us who came to present were given these wonderful t-shirts, so I wear this about once a year.

4:03Okay, so, um, as every week I will play some music and we'll talk about it, mostly Michael, but and the twist is that Michael doesn't know what I'll be playing. And when we're talking about a thousand recordings from 1929, that's quite a challenge, and I must admit, also as a DJ, I had a lot of work preparing for this program. And I asked some DJ colleagues of mine in Bergen, I mean, we have a very good DJ community in Bergen, so I asked them for some advice and some of their suggestions for good songs to play, and also a couple of international DJs I asked. So, um, a team effort tonight.

4:37Yeah, it's a team effort, yeah.

4:42So, uh, yeah, let's start with Canaro, because he was super productive, and I posted one in the Facebook group yesterday, Mimosa, and I will not play that tonight, but I'll play four other songs, and since this is a romantic night more than a party night, Michael, maybe we should start with a love story, and Francisco Canaro and Ada Falcón and her singing La Morocha. Yeah, a hugely important song, of course. Yeah, and the second song I'll play is the instrumental Shique, which is also a very known song, and this is one of the first recordings. So let's listen to these two, La Morocha and Shique by Canaro.

11:23Oh, that's, uh, Canaro at his most sensitive, isn't it? What we're listening to there is arranged music. This is the difference. So despite churning out 300 tracks a year, which keeps you fairly busy, he's starting to find time to make arranged music, and this was, um, published under the label, the name, Series Symphonica Canaro. He wanted to be taken seriously, so he started to make arranged music, and this happens in 1929. Eventually there's 27 songs that are published under this title over a period of about three years, most of them are 29 to 31, that's the peak, but the first four, initially when they're printed, they're not part of the Series Symphonica, he's kind of thinking about it. But it's used for the first time, the first time this label was used is with Ada Falcón's La Morocha.

12:47Yeah, she's just come into his life, I think. It could be, if not the very first, it's one of the first recordings that she makes, out of about 200 recordings that she makes with him, only five are done for dancing, and that's one of them. So yes, a song like Shique, and Canaro didn't often tackle the really complex material, so there's no Canaro recording of La Cachilla, but he does do Shique, and it's magnificent what he does. There's so many different phases to the story. Like, you know, a tango from these times could easily be two and a half minutes in, it's done, but that's three and a half. Just when you think it's over, it changes and a new mood comes in. There's this bit, it's about, yeah, about three minutes in where you think, oh, that's going to be it. But the piano makes a little break and then this violin comes in, it gives you another thing. So this is Canaro, his very, very best.

13:37Yeah, and his mood change, it's not what we associate with Canaro. And someone asked if it's the influence of Dakaro we hear here.

13:45Well, yes and no. I mean, we can't say no, because Dakaro has had a huge impact in this time on what everybody is doing. But I don't really feel it's Dakaro's influence. It's Canaro at his very best. And these are the years where we hear him at his very best. 29 to 31 are Canaro's best years. He's super productive. He's creative and playful, and also tender, and he's tender because of the people that he's working with, because Ada Falcón has come into his life, and initially it's just his voice, but after a while a love affair starts. So he's got this fantastic voice in the orchestra, and he's also got Charlo in the orchestra, and we're going to listen to a song by Charlo.

14:27Yeah, another one of the, you know, the three or four top voices that ever sang with Canaro. I mean, for some people, one of the best voices ever. So everything's coming together, this is Canaro, his most genuine. You know, later in the 40s it's a little bit just doing the same thing, but here it's not, I feel the sincerity of his music.

14:44Yeah, and 300 songs to pick, to pick four of them has been kind of hard. But of course, yeah, we could just listen to Canaro for an hour from this year and we wouldn't get bored, because the quality is so good. But we'll listen to Azulidad with Charlo singing, and the last one is called Vuelve Amorcito. And the vocalist here, I will not tell you, because it's kind of interesting to see if you can guess who it is. So don't cheat, folks. Don't look it up. Don't look it up. But when the singer comes in...

15:19I think they won't be able to guess.

15:22Okay, so Azulidad with Charlo and Vuelve Amorcito with unknown singer that you'll have to guess.

15:36 · They playAzulidadFrancisco Canaro · Charlo · 1929

From Canaro's most genuine, sincere period with Charlo, one of the era's three or four top tango voices.

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♪ Music · 5:15 · What the transcriber heard

19:35 · They playVuelve AmorcitoFrancisco Canaro · Fiorentino · 1929

Played as a guess-the-singer game; revealed to be a young Fiorentino, at this point still primarily a bandoneón player who only doubled on vocals.

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20:51Actually, you one is in with a chance of guessing it. There is some of the same quality that we're going to hear later on. It's a really mournful vocal performance as soon as he comes in and sings that line, come back to me, my little love, you really hear the sorrow in his voice.

21:10Yeah, it's interesting, I didn't know before this week started that Fiorentino was singing, actually. So this is something I learned from preparing.

21:16Well, he's just singing a couple of numbers, isn't he? Fiorentino is still really a bandoneón player who's doubling on vocals. He's going to experience Pedro Maffio, and after he listens to Pedro Maffio playing up close, he thinks, God, I'm never going to be as good as him. So that's the point where he tries to become a full-time singer and puts the bandone down. That's good for us.

21:40Maybe we're going to hear Pedro Maffio tonight, I don't know. Maybe we are, maybe, maybe so. Yeah, people are getting to appreciate this Canaro, and I'm really pleased about that. Yeah, it's beautiful. Let's go on to another, Francisco Lomuto. This is a song with also Charlo singing, Soy un Arlequín, and Lomuto recorded only 60 songs in 1929, so it's much less than Canaro, but still quite a lot. So he's doing well, isn't he?

22:11He's doing very, very well. Soy un Arlequín is one of the big hits around this time, and there's more than half a dozen good versions. Francisco Lomuto with Soy un Arlequín, singer Charlo.

22:46 · They playSoy un ArlequínFrancisco Lomuto · Charlo · 1929

One of 1929's biggest hits, with more than half a dozen good versions; chat listeners rated this Lomuto/Charlo version above D'Arienzo's.

♪ Music · 2:55 · What the transcriber heard

25:41It's a different sound than Lomuto we listen to later, in later years. But it's very typical at this time, and there's lots of great tracks from this period. The speed, the pace of that tango is just right. And then, of course, when Charlo's voice comes in, it just elevates the quality. And plenty of people were typing in the chat window, that's the best version of Soy un Arlequín.

26:11So without any doubts or hesitations, everybody rated Lomuto, of all people, as of higher quality at this moment, in this song at least, than D'Arienzo. It's amazing, not to think about it, is an extraordinary thing that we all did, but it's a very well realized interpretation. Yes, a kind of lazy beat.

26:30And just to pick up on some of the things in the chat window, there's not much dancing at this time. Dancing is not the mass phenomenon. The vocal interpretations are dominating, so it's difficult to speak about what the hits are with the dancers, but they're more likely to be the instrumental numbers. And the reason is, so we just heard Charlo singing that beautifully with Lomuto, but if Lomuto played for a dance, Charlo wouldn't have been there, because he wasn't a member of the orchestra, he just sang on the records, and it's the same with Canaro. So when in 1929, when Canaro and Lomuto played a dance, they probably turned up without a singer, because LFL Con sure as hell wasn't going out to dance in some dodgy club. And I don't think Charlo would have been either, because he's not a member of the bands. So the danced tango is still largely an instrumental affair.

27:24What about the biggest question, that why didn't other orchestras record this song later? Because it was a huge hit. So why wouldn't any 1940s orchestra record it in a different interpretation?

27:37This particular song, I mean, I have no idea, but my first reaction is that it didn't suit the more accelerated pace of the 40s. That would be my intuition. Or it could be that they were performing this song, but it was kind of like a second tier song. So part of the repertoire, but not interesting enough to be recorded. But my gut feeling is probably that it just didn't work when it was played really fast.

28:02Yeah, maybe let's go on to some vocal tangos, and when we listen to Carlos Gardel in 1935, he was backed by an orchestra, but back in 1929 he's backed by guitars, and I would say I prefer those recordings. I think there's very few Gardel recordings backed by an orchestra.

28:16He liked playing with his guitars, his brew, as he called, yeah, escobas, that's what he liked, as so many singers did. There's something very pure and authentic and original and manly and masculine about standing with your voice exposed, not hiding amongst the orchestra, with just the guitars behind you.

28:40Yeah, and I'm going to play one of the songs that was re-recorded, and we listened to it last week in our 1940 program, Rie Payaso, a very energetic D'Arienzo song with Caceres singing, and this is Carlos Gardel version, which is a totally different feeling. And after that I'm going to play a waltz by another soloist we also listened to in 1935, Ignacio Corsini, and the song is Por una mujer, and it's also backed by guitars.

29:20 · They playRie PayasoCarlos Gardel · 1929

Gardel's guitar-backed version, very different in feeling from the energetic D'Arienzo/Caceres version played in the 1941 episode.

♪ Music · 3:44 · The lyrics, on the song's page

34:25Let's see the results of this poll. Who's the best singer? Corsini wins. I'm a Corsini man. I really like Corsini a lot. Gerardo says it's not fair.

34:35I think if you're not Argentine, your perception of Gardel is very different to if you are Argentine, because Gardel, he has this valence, he has such a meaning to the Argentine soul. He was the perfect man in many, many ways. Corsini goes more to my heart than Gardel. I like Gardel, of course. It's taken a long time for me to really appreciate it. But Corsini, I like more.

35:04He's wonderful natural voice. I think I said this on another evening, I don't remember. Corsini said that he was taught to sing by the birds. Yeah, he said that, and I really, every time I hear his voice, I have that feeling there's something very natural about his voice which I find very appealing, and it's very sensitive. It has this really like sensitive tone to it. Gardel is more like a little bit introverted. Gardel's not an introverted voice, is it? It's more drama, more delivery, more storytelling. So Christine is more like us, Michael, that's why we like him more. Maybe that's it. Yes, yeah.

35:38Um, so from God, I would never have worn a floral shirt. Okay, from the guitar we'll move out to a more common dance tango instrument, to the violin, and both the directors of this Donato-Zerrillo orchestra were violin players. How come two violin players got together and form an orchestra? I mean, usually it's pianists or bandoneon players who make orchestras.

36:04Yes, that's true, it's not so easy to lead an orchestra from the violin perhaps, but there are famous violinists who led orchestras and continue to play. I think Gobbi would be the most clear example. More often though they stopped playing when they started leading an orchestra, like Canaro and D'Arienzo, but then neither of them were first-rate players, so that's kind of complicated. And to co-lead with someone playing the same instrument as you, that's going to need personal qualities, isn't it? Like if I'm a violinist and you're a bandoneon player and I say, okay, let's get together and we'll make a band, then we've each got our area of responsibility. But if we're both playing violin, then to get together I need to be a little bit humble, because otherwise I'm going to be upset that I'm not number one.

36:56And what do we know about these two guys? We know that Donato was this kind of fun-loving crazy guy who liked to do tricks with his violin, and he was on stage and liked to tell jokes and was very absent-minded. Um, and so Zurijo ended up happily married, didn't he? He went on tour with the Donato-Zerrillo band, went on tour with a female singer, and Zurijo married the singer, and that was the end of the Donato-Zerrillo orchestra. I'm really looking forward to getting people's reactions to the sound of this band, because it doesn't sound like Donato, does it, Dag? No, it doesn't at all. It's got a special quality that relates to this era that I like very, very much. I like this band and I like dancing to it.

37:41Yeah, we'll listen to one song. We are Huerfanitos de la Vida, with Luis Díaz singing. And about the solos here, I'm curious who takes the violin solos in their songs, you know. I don't, that's a really good question. Um, perhaps we can guess from the character of the solo. Let's try to guess, we don't know, so let's try to listen to this. Huerfanitos de la Vida, with Donato-Zerrillo, Luis Díaz in.

40:41So dark and depressive, and reminds people of Brunswick. Well, it reminds me of typical Brunswick, but we can't leap to a conclusion from just one track, because quite a few of the other songs played by Donato-Zerrillo are more up-tempo. And if you, after the show, maybe you go and compare with a typical Brunswick, and one of the things that they have really in common is the piano accompaniment, which is a very simple, very simple but a little playful piano accompaniment. Yeah, part of the style of the time. So not taking on board what the De Caro band and those bands, the bands in that school, are doing, not following them in terms of the piano.

41:47And people seem to think that it's Donato, just the solo. And Therese also writes that it reminds her of early Donato, and I agree. I like the Donato from 30, 31. It's a little bit the same, like this heavy beat to the songs. Yeah, I like it a lot, although perhaps it's a bit more playful, the early, early Donatos. Yeah, maybe. And oh, so he has the cello then, Donato has a cello in his band right from the beginning. One of his brothers, he may be playing also in this band, but I didn't particularly notice the cello in this last recording. There was a moment where I wasn't sure if I heard a cello or not in our last, last week's programs.

42:21Michael, we talked about how D'Arienzo lost his whole orchestra in 1935. We talked about what we see as his start, but I don't know if everyone knew that D'Arienzo was already recording way before this, and that he recorded 45 songs in 1928 and 1929. Well, let's tell the whole truth. So partly he only really sang these songs because the Electra Record Company was looking for a band to accompany the singer Carlos Dante, which is a name that we all know from his time much later with Alfredo de Angelis. So they were looking for a band, and it just so happened that D'Arienzo's wife was related to the owner of the record company. You know, D'Arienzo was a lucky guy. Like, time and again, he was lucky. And this was one of his first pieces of luck. Yeah.

43:22And when you listen to his songs from this time, it doesn't really remind us of the later stuff, does it? No, not at all. He's playing largely in the style of these times. This was on the Elektra record label, and the recording quality of Elektra was not quite as good as Victor and especially Odeon at this time. So unless you get really quite a clean transfer, it can be quite hard to appreciate the music. But certainly D'Arienzo is not quite at the level of the other bands at this time, but he does have some nice touches.

43:54Well, I'm not going to play a whole song, but I thought just for fun we'd listen to one of his early recordings. And when we played Laurenz's first recordings in 1937 we listened to a ranchera, and so I think let's listen to a little part of a ranchera of D'Arienzo from 1929. I'm not going to listen to the whole song, but, and as you said, the sound quality is really bad, so be aware of that. But I'll play a little part of it, and also let's see who you can guess who the vocalist is on this song. It's the ranchera. Mais Frito. Pedarenzo.

44:50Sorry guys for exposing you to that horrible thing. So did people guess who the vocalist was? A few have. Well, perhaps they knew rather than guessed. Yeah, maybe. Because you can't really hear it, can you? Yeah, it's Fiorentino. So Fiorentino also recorded for D'Arienzo in 29. Yes, and that would have been as a singer, he wouldn't have come in as a bandoneon player and just doubled.

45:20One more comment about the singers. So at this time, because the dance bands weren't using the singers that much, although you know they're on the records, but they weren't necessarily using them for the dances very often, the singer was imposed on the band by the record company. So you happen to be signed to, in the case of the Luis Díaz it's the Brunswick label, I believe, if I'm not mistaken, doesn't really matter, but I think it's Brunswick. So all the bands on Brunswick, when they need a vocalist, you've got the house vocalist, it's Luis Díaz, he's going to sing for you. So you didn't have much choice. Well, I guess we can conclude after hearing this that both D'Arienzo and Fiorentino did much better some years later, but everyone's got to start somewhere, right? Yeah.

46:14So, um, but in 1940 the new first violin player in D'Arienzo's orchestra was Cayetano Puglisi, the buzzing bee. So let's listen to him, because he had his own band back in 29. Michael, this is a really good band, this is a really good band, advanced music making. So it's very easy just to simplify and say everything advanced from this era is De Caro or De Caro flavor. So clearly it's influenced by De Caro, but it sounds rather different. It's a very special flavor. I'm really looking forward to hearing this with everyone. Yeah.

46:53I want to play Mi Noche Triste, which is a song we love. We know from many, many recordings, many orchestras. And the singer again is Roberto Díaz. This is a different Díaz. There's Luis Díaz and Roberto Díaz. All right. But again, imposed by the label. Now we've moved to Victor. Interesting that it's just the same stage names for the vocalists. Perhaps they're real names. Cayetano Puglisi, Mi Noche Triste, with Roberto Díaz singing.

50:06I see what you mean with the comparison with the choro and this kind of stretching out the tones on the bandoneon, and it's not really dance music, is it? No, there are some that are more danceable from this band, but there's lots of musical colour. Yes, and the beat wasn't a fixed square beat, there was a little bit of rubato, which is what you're alluding to there. Lots of colors in the music.

50:42Let's just pick up on something because it's relevant. People were saying, oh, 29, Great Depression. What's happening? Is that affecting the music? Only a little bit so far. In fact, probably no. It's probably not affecting the music yet. So yes, 1929 is the year of the Great Depression. But at the beginning, Argentina's not very much affected, because it's got an export economy, an agricultural export economy, and it's still making those exports. So the Argentine economy doesn't suffer too much in 1929. I think GDP contracts by about 10%, which six months ago sounds like a lot, but now we all know isn't that much.

51:241930, it begins to have a bit more of an impact and is one of the factors behind the military coup that takes place in September. But the year when the country really suffers economically is 31, and it's at the end of 31 that you hear very special things happening in music. End of 31, beginning of 32, then you hear it very clearly reflected. But I wanted to mention that now because it has an impact on this band. So at this time Victor is the record label that's giving a lot of new orchestras a chance. In the late 30s we know it was Odeon, they would sign people up on these three-year deals. At the moment Victor is one of the companies that are giving people a chance, and Cayetano Puglisi, a violinist, is one of the bands that has an opportunity.

52:08But once the economy starts to contract, then there's pruning that's going to take place, and the first band to get the chop is Cayetano Puglisi's band, because it doesn't grab the attention in the same way that some other bands are doing. So middle of 1930, can I tell you when? Yeah, July 1930, so still a year before the worst of the depression is going to arrive, he gets the chop and that's the end for his band. But some very, very fine playing, almost like chamber music.

52:41And you know, in a way, and you write about in your books, that well, it's not really the depression that hits the tango music and tango bands hard in this period, it's the introduction of the talking movie, isn't it, because people lose their jobs. Well, it's a double whammy. And, um, 1930, 1931, the cinemas start introducing the sound equipment, and it's really bad during the carnival season. People aren't watching the movies, they're going dancing, so the cinemas take the opportunity, and when they come back to work after carnival week there isn't any work, because the cinemas have all installed equipment. And that was one of the main platforms for the tango bands to perform and where people would go to listen to them, and that's taken away. So these things come at the same time, and it hits them really hard.

53:33Yeah, a bit earlier tonight you mentioned the bandoneon player Pedro Maffio, and he's also in your books. He's one of the three players you name as inspiration, main inspiration, on Troilo, and he has an orchestra in this period. What can you say about Maffio's orchestra? Well, it's a beautiful orchestra. He's spent, um, let's see, two or three years playing with Julio De Caro, where he came first via, um, first bandoneon. He wasn't first bandoneon to start off with, there was another guy, Luis Petrucelli, I don't know if we're going to hear him tonight. He left De Caro right at the beginning because he was pissed off that the band had De Caro's name. And they'd all agreed that if they got work just for once, because they were all good musicians, it wasn't going to have anyone's name, and then it became Julio De Caro's band, so he quit, and then Laurenz came in.

54:19So Maffio has spent two or three years in Julio De Caro's orchestra, and together with Laurenz they're kind of defining the modern vocabulary of the bandoneon. Then he starts his own orchestra, and look at the names of the people he calls to join him in this orchestra. He picks the very best people, musically speaking. Pugliese is the pianist. He's not going to sound like Pugliese does in the 50s, so don't expect that, but he calls Pugliese to be the pianist and Elvino Vardaro to be the violin. Now, Vardaro violin sound, you know, you can't miss it. The moment you hear it, you know it's him. He's playing on nearly all the bands that are recording with Típica Víctor as kind of the house musician, but that's just on the records. He wouldn't have been playing with them if they were playing outside in a cafe or something, but here he's a member of the band.

55:14So this is advanced music, and Maffio's quality as a bandoneon player is legato, smooth, velvety, soft, linked, a real sense of phrase, and this is the quality that he tries to give to his orchestra. That's a kind of a general theme with musicians, the qualities they have as individual players they try and put on their orchestras. Think about Biagi, for example. Yeah. And he makes 26 recordings in 1929, and I listened through them, and there's, I think there's one that stands out. Inspiración. Yes, yeah, it's like Inspiración.

55:52People, so everyone I think here, um, knows Inspiración, and those who don't recognize the name will recognize it immediately when you play it. But when Pedro Maffio picks up Inspiración, it's a tango that's been around for about 10 years and it's forgotten. It's really forgotten. It started out, the guy who wrote it dedicated it to the company in the army that his brother was in. So the first title of Inspiración was the very catchy Sixth Regiment of the Second Battalion. That sold a lot of records. And then Firpo picks it up, and Firpo records it in 22, has no repercussion, no impact at all. It's completely forgotten. And Maffio picks it up and does this with it.

56:46Now, you're going to play. And what we are all going to listen to, as well as all the qualities that I've been speaking about, is we're going to listen to the cello. Because, yes, you know what I'm talking about. Maffio has a cello, a cellist in this band. And we know the player's name, Agesilao Ferrazzano. And the reason that we know the name is because he has a very, very big role. What were we saying about Maffio? He likes the soft, long phrase. Well, that's something that a cello can do. And when the cello gets the counterpoint, the countermelody, you will recognize what you recognize in Inspiración from the 40s with Troilo.

57:26When Piazzolla does the arrangement and gives it to the, well, he does it with violin and cello. But Piazzolla's ideas for that arrangement, the Troilo recording, they come from this recording of Pedro Maffio in 1929. So let's listen to the cello of Agesilao Ferrazzano and this work of beauty.

1:01:02Oh, exquisite and stunning. Wow.

1:01:17It's advanced music. Just the opening phrase, there was this slow crescendo, a real sense of dynamic. Now, that's not something we heard in any of the other bands yet tonight. Yeah, that's something. Okay, De Caro's done it a bit, but Maffio's doing it more.

1:01:31It's his advanced music making. Did you notice? So after the crescendo you get this little bandagnon riff, and sometimes Maffio played it on his right hand and sometimes he played it in the bass notes of the bandagnon on the left hand. You never knew which it was going to be, he alternated. But the left hand was the really tasty one, the dark notes inside that bandagnon, and beautiful piano break from pulizia. It's got everything.

1:01:54Yeah, what happened to the cello in tango? Because it came back later, didn't it, like in the 40s, or yeah. I mean, Donato kept it in there all along. As the music becomes brighter and more exciting it gets submerged, and the bands bring it back because the arrangers want it. The arrangers are, you know, they're looking at the musical scale and they've got violins up here and they want to make lower notes, so there's a big gap between the violins and where the double bass is. So they start filling it in, and then the bands are kind of forced to reintroduce first the cello. So Troilo reintroduces a cello in 42, and finally the viola, which comes into Troilo's band in 47, so that you can write a string arrangement anywhere on the scale and you've got a string instrument that can play the notes. Gerardo writes it's hard to carry and takes too much space, but then the double bass should also be out of the battle, and the piano in Cuba.

1:02:54Once I saw a double bass player going to the gig and he got a lift on the back of a friend's motorcycle, so he's on the back of the bike with the double bass going down a cobbled street.

1:03:03Okay, another band on this, you mentioned him, is Luis Petrucelli. We had to listen to him too. And he directed the house orchestra of Victor, didn't he, for a while? Yeah, for quite a long time. But now he has his own orchestra, and I'm going to play two tangos, the instrumental Milagrosa Virgencita.

1:03:22Oh, that's nice. It's very nice. And the vocal, Tan Grande, Tan Zonzo. Which means so big and so stupid. Yeah. That's also a really excellent, it's a fun title, isn't it? It's a great title. And he, Petrucelli, plays the band, but for me it's the violins also here that stands out, and the counter melody of the violin. Well, who's the violin player? It's, this is one of the bands playing with the Victor label, so the violin player is going to be Vadaro.

1:03:49I was wondering about that because it sounds so beautiful. Spadaro, baby. What can you say? Milagrosa Virgencita and Tan Grande y Tan Zonzo with Petrucelli.

1:04:19 · They playMilagrosa VirgencitaLuis Petrucelli · 1929

From Petrucelli's own orchestra (he had also directed Victor's house orchestra); the violin countermelody, played by Elvino Vardaro, stands out.

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♪ Music · 5:15 · What the transcriber heard

1:09:35The funny comments there in the chat. They liked it. Yeah. They liked it. The quality of the music. There's some similarities to the band of Cayetano Puglisi that we heard a bit earlier. There's sort of a bit like a chamber music quality, but it's got a bit more personality. It's more complex than Cayetano Puglisi.

1:10:03And somebody commented in the chat window, when Cayetano Puglisi's band was playing, oh, you can hear that the violinist was in charge. But now I think you could hear that the band was in charge. The band was doing a lot, and there was often more than one thing to listen to. So a very obvious example of that, while Diaz was singing, Bodara was playing a true counter melody, not just a obligato couple of notes thing. There was a true counter melody going on in the violin behind Diaz's voice, but that's only one of the examples of having two things to listen to. Very often the left hand of Petrucelli was playing dark and complex chords underneath other things that were happening in the music, so very interesting to listen to.

1:10:47But somebody even called it jazz, which, you know, the word jazz comes to mind because it's musically so rich and there's a lot of space for the individual musicians. But you can imagine that didn't sell a lot of records, you know, because it's advanced music making. Got a bit more personality than the Cayetano Puglisi we heard a bit earlier, but not so much more, so you won't be surprised to hear that this is the second band that gets the chop. Let me just have a look on my list here, not till January 31, but January 31, as the Depression's starting to bite a bit more, they're going to lose their contract as well. So this is going to be a theme of the evening and, um, you know, you start to understand why people celebrate this era of the sextets, because there was this great flowering of experimental groups, people trying their own thing before economics comes in and chops them down.

1:11:41Next on my playlist are two women singers, Tita Merello with Kienteva. It's a funny lyrics on this, and you write about the lyrics in your Dersale book, Michael, because he records this and it's kind of unusual as a tango lyrics, because it's about a man behaving immorally and bad for a change. And the second song I want to play is with Mercedes Simone. And we heard her singing Paris e Mentira in 1935 program, and here she is with the waltz, Silenziamento. And both of these are backed by guitars and beautiful recordings, I think.

1:17:17Two beautiful voices. Tita Merello's voice there, so full of personality. She's more like a cabaret singer, isn't she? She reminds me of, I don't mean the Parisian cabaret. I mean more like the Weimar cabaret from Berlin or the Polish cabaret or the Russian cabaret, that kind of cabaret song.

1:17:37Now, Tita Merello, she wasn't on stage for you to look at her. She was there to deliver a lyric and to act in In Se Dice De Mi, which became like her anthem. There's a bit where she says, well, I'm ugly, but she doesn't care, it's not about her looks. She's one of the only people who manages to transcend that, and Mercedes Simone, for listening to, what a voice, and for some people the best voice of that era. It's meaningless, isn't it? It's a bit stupid to say the best, but I'll tell one story about that.

1:18:08So around this time, I think 1930, there was a competition for the women singers to decide who was the best, and Libertad Lamarque won the competition, and she's then crowned the la dama del tango or the reina del tango, the queen of tango, the woman of tango. And she goes on stage and accepts the award and she says, well, I'm not the queen of tango, it's Mercedes Simone, but she wasn't able to be here tonight. Oh my god, that's pretty generous. And coming from Libertad Lamarque, who's very, very successful, although not often to our taste today, super successful and popular, that was a high compliment indeed.

1:18:51And just to respond to Jotti, and maybe have some other people are wondering that, and we have spoken a bit about this before, about the prevalence of women. You have to keep in mind what's tango canción, tango just for singing and listening to, and what's tango milonga, tango for dancing to, being played in the dance halls by the dance bands. So in this period, tango canción is by far the biggest stream. There aren't so many dancers and the women singers are singing tango canción. They don't circulate in the kinds of environments where the men are going, you know, some of which are quite disreputable, but they're playing in theaters for seated audiences, places like that. They're very successful and they're rich, many of them have wonderful sparkling full careers. Now, if there's fear of them in the 40s, it's just because tango milonga has taken over after the death of Gardel, you know, that's something we explored in some of the programs. So when the dancing form of tango comes up, then there are fewer women, just because they don't move in those kinds of environments, but they're still around. There are still women having successful careers, but they have a smaller place than before, because tango canción is smaller than before.

1:20:12I would love to hear Mercedes Simone sing with Troilo, for instance. It would have been amazing.

1:20:17Yeah, the alto voices, the lower voices work much better with the dance bands than the sopranos. I would have loved to have heard Mercedes Simone sing with some of those bands. Yeah, we're lucky to have those 10 recordings of Nelly Omar with Canaro from 46 to 48. They're really special. Yeah.

1:20:35So let's move on to an orchestra we haven't listened to before, actually, because he died in 1934, Juan Maglio. Yes! Yeah. Guy with a really, an irresistible beat. Yeah, band-honorist and composer. He composed a few non-sangos like Copitín, Sabado Inglés, and waltzes like Origas de Plata and Violetas, which we know really well from Costillo's performance in the late 40s. And we're going to listen to Organito del Suburbio with Roberto Baso singing. And the second one, and then Rincón, or El Rincón de Café, with Carlos Viván. Good songs, aren't they? They're cracking.

1:21:17So just a question before we listen to them. I read in Todo Tango when I was reading about Maglio that in 1929 at the Bandoneon section appeared a young boy who was scarcely 15 years old named Annibal Troilo. So he was actually playing with Maglio in 1929. So I was just curious if the Bandoneon variation at the end of El Rincón de Café, which is recorded in September actually, could that be Troilo or was he just playing with the band? Do you have any idea?

1:21:45Yeah, I do. Yeah, let's just talk around this a little bit. So Juan Maglio in the 1910s was one of the top bands. His nickname was Pacho. He was so successful and people would just go into the record shop and say, give me a Pacho, to mean I want to buy a tango record. By this time, as we've heard in, for example, the Petrucelli recordings, tango bandagnon technique has come on a long way thanks to Maffio and Laurens and Petrucelli, those three people actually, all of them who've come through the De Caro school. And Maglio can't cut it anymore. We've got a couple of bandagnon solos by Juan Maglio from around this time, not from the 1910s, from now. And he plays Paraguayan waltzes and polkas on these solo recordings rather than tangos. And you can hear why. His technique is nowhere near the level of the best players.

1:22:48So that doesn't stop him. You know, he's got a good name. So he recruits young players into his band. So the band continues to improve, but he's not having much to do with what it's doing any longer. He's just the name on the outside of the tin.

1:23:01When I first heard these tracks, particularly the second one, that you guys are going to get blown. If you don't know this, you're going to be blown away by the band and young at the end of the second song, but no, it's not Troilo. Now, when I researched the Troilo book, Troilo talks about his time in the Juan Maglio orchestra, but you can imagine these guys lived such amazing and rich lives. Troilo must have played in two dozen different formations, sometimes three or four in a year, and he could, he literally couldn't remember when people asked him what year he played with Maglio. He couldn't remember because there was just so much going on. Why would you remember a little detail like that?

1:23:43But I think probably it's not Troilo here. I think that the variation is Federico Scorticati. And the reason that that's, I know it is a shame, isn't it? But the reason that we think that is around this time, this is something you can all seek out after the show. Around this time, Maglio's bandagnons section does record a couple of numbers, the trio of bandagnons of Juan Maglio. And because of those particular recordings we know who the bandagnon players were at that moment, and it's Scorti Catti, Klausi, who's a great player but lived out the rest of his career later in Chile, third player I forget, top players. So let's listen to Maglio, Organito del Suburbio and Rincón de Café.

1:29:59Oh, Dan! I can't move my fingers that fast. You're good at airbound alone, Michael. I've been training for years.

1:30:36So what a fantastic beat. That's the first thing about this band, is the beat. Heavy, deep, and with the arastra. Really heavy beat, great for walking. Any arastra-driven beat is a walking beat. That's great for walking.

1:30:55Full of emotion. The pianist is amazing. We don't know who it is. At least I don't know who it is. I tried to find out, couldn't work it out. Really has a big personality, big influence on the sound of the band. But could you notice as well the link to D'Arienzo? Maglio has got a huge influence on D'Arienzo. What are these influences? Let's enumerate them. First of all, the repertoire. You mentioned some of Maglio's big hits. Let's just remind ourselves.

1:31:25Sabado Inglés, he wrote that. D'Arienzo 35. Origes del Plata, the waltz. D'Arienzo 35. So that's the first thing. The second was the violin, which a few people, Tara especially, was going crazy for that obligato sound. So it's not like a fancy, very complex counter melody. It's a more simple second melody, which is exactly what D'Arienzo goes on to do with Matseo.

1:31:50And then when the variation came, it was one of these ones in bursts, wasn't it? It didn't go running, running, running, running, running, running, running, goes for a bit and then stops. And in fact there were certain points where the band did what we call in jazz stop time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then it picked it up again. That's something again we associate with D'Arienzo later. So a very different sound of band, but there's some very strong inspirations for D'Arienzo. So Maglio's a giant of the old guard, in the sense that without Maglio there's probably no D'Arienzo. And I think that's fabulous to dance to. It's really neglected, possibly because when we first came across Maglio we were listening to these scratchy old things from 1912, with Maglio as a solo band, a non-player who's not that great, and a guitar going dum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum, which wasn't very exciting. But that I love, that full of emotions.

1:32:47Yeah, I mean, I would have a lot. It's a pity he died in '34. I would have loved to hear Maglio from like '39 or something with, uh, I think I don't think he'd have been able to cut it. No, I know, I, you know, because he was so far behind as a musician, as a player. I think we've got the best of him here, although of course, you know, it's always sorry when people die reasonably young. I don't know what he was, 40s, 50 something like that.

1:33:16Right, let's go on to Orquesta Típica Víctor, and I was wondering, is it Petrucelli who's directing them at this point in time in '29? Yes. So, um, one of the musicians in an interview says we were like a mafia. So there's this pool of musicians and they're playing in all the orchestras, Petrucelli's orchestra, it's all the same guy, Típica Víctor, Cayetano Puglisi, it's all the same guys, but very, very different personalities. Well, not hugely different, but a big difference in the personalities of the bands according to who's directing. I don't know what was the hits at the time, but I think today the two big hits for dancers are the instrumentals Viento Norte and Coqueta. And since we were in summer now, I will not play Viento Norte. The northern wind has left us. So I play Coqueta, and I also want to play a second song called Vieja Calesita with Roberto Díaz singing. Vieja Calesita I remember very well because it's one of the songs that Rodolfo and Maria Sieri used to do their canyengue demonstrations to. Okay, Coqueta and Vieja Calesita by Orquesta Típica Víctor.

1:39:29Look at the comments. Yeah. Look at the comments window. People absolutely love it. Now, I just want to make one comment. It's quite simple music, isn't it? Like, if you just listen to the beats, actually, it was more like a Canaro D'Arienzo beat. It wasn't an arrastre beat. And the four beats were pretty much the same volume. The beat went bang, bang, bang, bang, like that, pretty much through the whole piece. So the band keep it really simple, but they've got very, very good musicians like Vadara on violin. So it's very, very accessible music. It's less danceable, you think, than the Maglio? Not at all. Um, not at all. Uh, it's very danceable. For me personally it's not my favorite orchestra. And yeah, in terms of the beat, like the beat that we heard from Maglio propels me more.

1:40:54Yeah, that's something I don't want to say too much, you're going to start throwing eggs at me. But yes, of course they're beautiful musicians, they know what they're doing, but they keep it very simple, much as Canaro does with Maida 35 to 38. That's music we all like to dance to, and with the right vocalist you can really generate emotion. Yeah, but, uh, with Canaro, Maida, and also it's a bit same like this early, early recordings, that as a DJ you're a bit careful with playing too much of it, because more than a tanda or two in a night the energy is going to fall really fast. I love to listen to it, but it's hard to keep people dancing to. Depends on the people in the room, because you know there's some people who dance to this all night. But yeah, you're not going to generate that kind of energy with this music.

1:41:41And it's kind of less varied. I mean, last week when we listened to 1940s music, it's much more variation. I think for, as a DJ, you can choose between the more lyrical and the more energetic, and here it's more, more in the same genre, I find. Yeah, they get in a groove and they stick with it. All right, it's a nice groove. It's a nice groove. Yeah. What's next, Dag?

1:41:56Uh, well, uh, every week I try to, on almost every week I try to play some tango from another part of the world, and we've been to Europe, we've been to Asia, and today I want to take us to North America, and a song by American jazz violinist called Ben Bernie, I Kiss Your Hand, Madame. You know this? I've never heard this particular interpretation. But, um, I Kiss Your Hand, Madame, now that was a mega big, that was one of the songs of the year globally in 1929, and it's often known by its German title, Ich küsse Ihre Hand, and I don't know if the German version came first, uh, but I think there's a Canaro version as well. There's a Petrucelli version, Os beso la mano, Madame. Yeah, yeah, but this is a global hit. There were global songs in those days. Just because they didn't have internet didn't stop them having global hits. So let's listen to American tango 1929 with Ben Bernie, I Kiss Your Hand, Madame.

1:46:10Okay, maybe not the best for dancing, but it's interesting music, isn't it? Very interesting music. Just about the, someone asked about the brass. So in the acoustic era, it was very, very difficult to record the double bass because it was just too deep an instrument to be recorded with the poor technology they had. So at that time, it was very common for the double bass part to be played by a brass instrument, very often a tuba. So that kind of hung around for a bit, even once it wasn't necessary anymore. People did struggle sometimes still with the double bass. You can hear on the Típica Víctor, not in the recordings we listen to tonight but some of the earlier ones, that there is sometimes a brass instrument, or possibly even an oboe, extra instruments being added to play the double bass lines that are easier to record. So that's probably what we're hearing there. What the whole makeup of the brass section was, uh, I don't know. An orchestra like the Dachos Bella orchestra had all the different kinds of saxophones, and yeah, that was probably a tuba.

1:47:38It's great for the comments too. Did you see, Michael, there's someone posted it was also released in Denmark. I didn't know there was a Danish, a global hit like I was saying. Like, you know, yeah, German version we knew because it has a German title, but then Polish version, okay, not too surprised, but Danish version, yeah, wow.

1:48:02All right, I'm gonna play two more orchestras, and the first one's gonna be Roberto Firpo. Firpo made 100 recordings this year, and in earlier programs we've listened to his songs and agreed that he's underplayed at the gates of mongos. And I just, I think his, some of his recordings from this year are just stunning. They're really, really nice. Firpo in 1929 is awesome. He's got a killer beat, that's the first thing. Like Maglio, it's got a beat that just rips you out of your chair, and it's just got even more feeling than Maglio, I think. There's just so much there. So we're gonna listen to Palabra de Honor with Teófilo Ibáñez singing, and the second, come on, Una Noche en la Milonga. It's an instrumental.

1:48:48Oh, so can I just say something very briefly about Una Noche en la Milonga? Of course. Because we'll enjoy it more if I do. So Una Noche en la Milonga means one night in the milonga. And there's a very nice version with Ada Falcón singing, but she doesn't sing it as a dance number. She sings it with Canaro, but it's for her to sing as a soloist with Canaro's orchestra backing. So you can't dance to it. And in that version, which you know you can go and listen to after the show, you get a very short lyric, and it's just about falling in love with somebody at the milonga, but then you don't see them again because they disappear. Which is, I mean, that's something we've all lived, even if it was just, you know, for a moment, and then actually we decided we weren't in love after all.

1:49:30You see someone at the milonga. I met you there. Yeah, so you meet someone at the milonga and then you want to meet them again, but you don't. So that's what you'll hear, I think. We're going to be listening to, um, the cello striking back. We heard the cello earlier, the cello of Agesilao Ferrazzano in Maffia's orchestra. Now we're going to hear an unknown cellist, another player we don't know who it is, also doing fabulous work with Firpo's orchestra. Firpo in '29, wow. So glad you're playing this. Good. Let's listen to these two songs by Firpo, Palabra de Honor and Una Noche en la Milonga.

1:50:33 · They playPalabra de HonorRoberto Firpo · Teófilo Ibáñez · 1929

One of roughly 100 Firpo recordings this year; praised for its arrastre-driven beat and an unnamed, excellent cellist.

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♪ Music · 5:30 · What the transcriber heard

1:53:03 · They playUna Noche en la MilongaRoberto Firpo · 1929

An instrumental version of a song Ada Falcón also recorded with Canaro as a non-dance number, about meeting someone at a milonga and never seeing them again.

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1:56:03Oh, what can we say, Michael? It's one of the most beautiful things. Yeah, it's just pure emotion. A fantastic walking beat, strong arrastre beat, with the main beats much stronger than the offbeat. Yep. Yep. Can you hear the prototype of the Di Sarli beat there, anyone? Definitely. That's an influence on Di Sarli. Wonderful emotion. Oh. Yeah. What a pleasure to listen to that together with everyone. We should have finished off with that maybe, but actually we're going to go on. No, there's other good stuff. There's more good stuff. There's Di Sarli.

1:56:55Since you mentioned Di Sarli and the walking beat, what can you say about Di Sarli's sextet in 1929, Michael? Oh, it's making wonderful, wonderful music. You can hear all the instruments. The Di Sarli records on Victor, and their technology is often not quite as good as Odeon, but you can generally really hear what the double bass player is doing. You can hear, of course, what Di Sarli is doing as well. He's still got this kind of beat, not all the way through the tango, but a lot of the time it's there. And he has some fine singers. I hope that at least one of the numbers you're going to play is going to be a vocal number. But, you know, we've got the after party. So whatever you play, it's good.

1:57:41I'm going to play Flor Machita with an instrumental and then Campaneando with Santiago Devincenzi singing. Oh, two really great songs. Flor Machita, okay, we don't have a lyric to deliver the emotion, but the title means withered flower. And I really feel that intense melancholy of the title in the song. Campaneando is one of my favorite tangos of the Di Sarli sextet period. I love the singer Santiago Devin or De Vincenzi. I think he's the best singer for the Di Sarli sextet period. And yeah, well, let's just listen to it together.

1:58:19I fell in love with the early Di Sarli sextet tracks twice, actually. First one, Tango Tunes came out with the full, like the complete edition, and then when I was reading your book again, when it came out, Michael, two years ago or something, and I listened through all the songs again, and it is amazing music. I was particularly struck by the lyric of this. Campaneando is a lunfardo word for keeping watch. So we imagine a guy keeping watch, he's looking out for someone, and then you realise what he's looking out for is his past and his lost love. That's what he's looking for, not a person.

2:03:57 · They playCampaneandoCarlos Di Sarli · Santiago Devincenzi · 1929

Campaniar is lunfardo for keeping watch; the lyric's narrator is really keeping watch for his own lost past love, not a person.

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2:04:48Oh, killer. Yes, I'd misremembered the lyric. What he remembers as he's keeping watch is the time when he believed in love. God. It's all there in tango, isn't it? Yeah.

2:05:25We'll get back to Di Sarli maybe already next week. I had a reason for finishing with Di Sarli, actually. Because next week we're going to take a giant leap to the other end of his recording career. Michael, we're going to go to 1958. You didn't expect that, did you? I didn't, no?

2:05:44So you have a hard week of work in front of you. Di Sarli made his last recordings in 1958 because he died of cancer in early 1960. So there's those, but there's also a lot of other nice music from 1958. We'll see next week.

2:06:03Very nice seeing everyone. And you'll find all the information on previous programs and upcoming events in the Tango by Year Facebook group. And there you can also find a link to GoFundMe, where you can support Michael's work if you can afford it. It's also okay to attend this for free, but if you can afford it, please keep Michael working, doing his work for this.

2:06:29And yeah, Michael, want to say something about the sponsors? We have a couple of sponsors also. We do have sponsors. So thank you to our sponsors, our Tango clubs, El Abrasso in Bergen. El Abrasso. And Tango Norfolk here in my city and also the Marabu Cabaret in Buenos Aires also sponsoring us. I'm very grateful to our sponsors and I'm also grateful to our sound engineer, Paul Stradwick. Yes. Who's been helping us with our microphone technique and setup. So thank you very much, Paul. It's made a difference. Thank you. I hope you all noticed the sound was better today from the conversation.

2:07:07So that's very nice, thank you, Paul, and as always we'll end with a Cumparsita from the year in questions, and there is, as far as I know, there are six recordings from 1929. You are now the Cumparsita expert, I'm telling you. Yeah. There's one by Canaro, there's one that Donato Zerrillo, and, um, but I want to play the one that was mentioned actually earlier by Gerardo. It's one recorded by Cayetano Puglisi, and I think it has a really melting violin solo and it has a good bandoneon variation. So with that track we say buenos noches and see you next week in 1958.

2:07:48And the fellow who still don't want to go to sleep, I think Michael has plans for an after party. Yeah, I've got a glass of wine here which I'll now permit myself a little something. So let's first listen to Puglisi with La Cumparsita. Thank you very much, Dag, for your selections. Thank you very much.

2:13:48What a creative talent. That's a wonderful lyric, isn't it? That's the Waters, ladies and gentlemen. I never heard it before. That was fantastic. I heard it before a few days ago. Yeah.

2:14:00So you want to take over the music sharing? Well, we've still got over 170 guests, so let's play them a little bit of music. Yeah, please do. So what I propose is I'll play a little tanda of Canaro, a little tanda of Lomuto, and a little tanda of Firpo. And then between them, I'll add my little cortinas. Maybe bands we've already heard tonight or maybe bands we didn't. Now let's think, who are we going to end up with out of those three? I'm not sure.

2:14:32Well, I think Canaro will be first. But before, as a little amuse-bouche, a little sorbet to clear the palates, I'm going to play a track by Julio De Caro. He's on the Brunswick label. So we don't have the records in good quality from this year, but the track that I've chosen, I've chosen because the piano is just absolutely fantastic. The track we're going to hear is called which means I want to have fun, it doesn't and the what we're going to hear is especially you're going to hear some fantastic piano work from Francisco de Caro, who's one of the inspirations behind many of the periodists of this period. First recording of Julio De Caro in 1929 on the Brunswick label. A little sorbet before we get into some of the juicier stuff, schon me quiero divertir, with Luis Díaz on vocals.

2:18:35What did you think of that? Playful. Interesting, huh? So that's a little transition song. Now I think we need to listen to some Canaro.

2:18:50So those of you who have iTunes will know that a couple of years ago, maybe it was more than a couple, maybe five, they introduced the heart thing where you could love a song. And the reason they did that is because although there's five stars, most people don't use five stars, they just, if they like a song, they give it five, so then there's nothing left and when you really like it they needed something else. Now I don't do that, um, but I keep the heart thing just for the really, really super special ones. So I don't know, 20,000 songs on the laptop, 150, 200 have got the heart, but 1929 has got more hearts than any other year. Can you believe that? And just Canaro, I've got four, five, six songs with a heart on. Wow.

2:19:38So Dag, you played some great songs, but there are some more truly great songs of Canaro from 1929, so I'll play two or three. Well, we're going to start off with Felicia. Now Felicia's a track these days that we associate mostly with Juan D'Arienzo, but I'd like to suggest that this is the best Felicia ever.

2:20:24 · They playFeliciaFrancisco Canaro · 1929

Lavocah's pick as the best version of Felicia ever recorded, a tango now mostly associated with D'Arienzo.

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♪ Music · 2:50 · The lyrics, on the song's page

2:23:15Not bad, huh? For a tango that's never played. I don't think I've ever heard that. Wonderful. And people commented about the beat. So it is on the beat, but it's not on the one. The many phrases began on the one, but then put the emphasis on the two.

2:23:46Teresa, I think, or somebody commented, that's part of the Siri Sinfonica, which means it was arranged music. So they had the opportunity to make it a little bit more complex than you could normally afford to do when you're banging out 300 tracks a year. So did you notice there was a bit where there was what they call canjenge? Canjenge means many, many things, but one of the things it means is this syncopated slapping on the bass, using the instruments for percussion. And there was a little passage of that canjenge slapping.

2:24:21So let's listen to another Canaro tango that really has a very strong canjenge section, and it's the B-side of La Morocha. I'm going to play you the Canaro Don Juan from 1929. Again, absolutely exquisite track. God, imagine bringing that home from the record shop. La Morocha on the A side and Don Juan on the B side. Let's have a listen to this.

2:25:10 · They playDon JuanFrancisco Canaro · 1929

The B-side of La Morocha's original release, chosen for a strong canyengue (syncopated slapped-bass) passage.

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♪ Music · 2:30 · The lyrics, on the song's page

2:27:40They're good, aren't they? Okay, let's have one more Canaro, and then I'm going to play a little tango cortina. How about something with Charlo's voice? Yeah, because Charlo has a great voice. Let's listen to Tengo Miedo. Tengo Miedo means I'm afraid, and the lyric is about that feeling when you're frightened to fall in love.

2:28:10There's a very beautiful version of this tango from Ada Falcón, of course being backed by Canaro, but that's not a dance number, so we can't dance to her version, but we can dance to this one. And you know, those of you who speak Spanish can enjoy the lyric when Charlo comes in: tu cariño, your affection, it's driving me crazy, but sin embargo, all the same, tengo miedo, I'm afraid, tengo miedo de quererte, I'm frightened of loving you.

2:29:09 · They playTengo MiedoFrancisco Canaro · Charlo · 1929

About the fear of falling in love; there is a non-dance Ada Falcón/Canaro vocal version, but this danceable Charlo version was played instead.

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♪ Music · 1:52 · What the transcriber heard

2:31:01There's so much great Canaro from 1929. 29 to 31 is the peak for Canaro. You could argue that 29 is his best year. So many really, really good songs from 29. So, cortina time. A waltz, another waltz from Ignacio Corsini. And he has, there's two really, really good ones from this year. But let's play you the one that's not such a common theme. La Pulpera de Santa Lucía.

2:31:54Pulpera is the girl who serves in, um, you know, imagine a shop where you can also get an alcoholic drink, that's la pulpería, and the pulpera, so it's the girl who serves in this shop. It's one of course seen his greatest recordings.

2:32:11 · They playLa Pulpera de Santa LucíaIgnacio Corsini · 1929

One of Corsini's greatest recordings, about the girl who serves in a pulpería (a village general store that also sold drink).

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♪ Music · 1:24 · The lyrics, on the song's page

2:35:03You like that? Beautiful, Michael. Okay. So who's next? Firpo or Lomuto? I think Firpo. So many good songs from Firpo from 1929.

2:35:22So yeah, I'm going to stick with the tender format. I'm going to play three. First two, Sombras de la Tarde, which is awards. And then Oí Mo Levo, which means listen up bad guy. And then the third one I'm going to introduce before we listen to it, uh, just to give a bit of context. So first Sombras de la Tarde, uh, shadows of the afternoon, of the evening, as awards, and that will be followed straight away by flutterate for me level.

2:36:11 · They playSombras de la TardeRoberto Firpo · 1929

First of a four-song Firpo run in the afterparty; title means 'shadows of the afternoon.'

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♪ Music · 5:44 · What the transcriber heard

2:41:46That special Firpo sound. There's nobody like him. Okay, this is turning into a four-song tander because we didn't... Paul's cheering. Because we didn't yet hear any recordings of the tango Misa de Once, 11 O'Clock Mass, which was one of the really big, big songs of 1929, also into 1930. Sometimes it's really awkward if a song comes out November, December. Is it a 1929 song or is it a 1930 song? But there's two really strong versions from 1929, one of them's fiat Paul. It's a really simple lyric. The guy goes to church just because there's this girl that goes to church and he likes to see her, so he's always going to the eleven o'clock mass to be with the girl. That's it, pretty much. Um, and of course the opening in all the versions tries to imitate the church bells, but in a way that I find much more attractive than the opening of Carijon de la Merced, where you get the sort of hammered chimes. Here you get some much more subtle chimes.

2:43:39 · They playMisa de OnceRoberto Firpo · 1929

One of two strong 1929 versions of this major hit about a man who goes to church just to see a girl; Firpo's opening bell-chime imitation is subtler than rival versions.

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♪ Music · 2:21 · What the transcriber heard

2:46:29Not bad, huh? It's over. We've still got 129 guests listening to 1929. How about that? So the fourth song I'm going to play, the last song of Firpo tonight, is La Eterna Milonga, The Eternal Milonga. Now, I mean, I loved it before I understood it because Firpo has got an arrastra-driven beat.

2:46:59One of the things to observe, like when I'm teaching, I invite people to think about whether they prefer rhythmic music or melodic music, you know, according to the orchestras. And something that's emerged to me tonight, and it came with the comment from Eleanor. I don't know if Eleanor is still here with us. The appeal of Orquesta Típica Víctor, for example, is the way they deliver the melody. It's not the beat. Same with Canaro from 35 to 38. It's not the beat. If you listen to the beat, it's not very interesting, but they deliver very clear and very beautiful melodies. Now, with an orchestra like Firpo, the beat is more important. You've got this arastra-driven beat, which is something that generates a walking feeling in the dance.

2:47:45La Eterna Milonga means the eternal milonga. Now, what does that mean? It just means that, you know, milonga is a very broad term in Argentina. It could mean the specific rhythm that we call milonga, or it's a way of referring to the old music or the whole genre, all of it at once. But here it has another meaning. So do you know the word pajada? I'll just type that in the chat window. Pajada, and a pajador is somebody who does pajadas. Now, what's a pajada? It's a verse duel. So we know that the gauchos, as they rode around the countryside on their horses, they would strum their guitars and sing like cowboys would. But then when they met, they would have verse duels.

2:48:26Now, if you know Cuban music really well, you'll have heard this in Cuban music, where the soneros, sonero is somebody, well, originally it means somebody who sings the song, which is the music of Cuba of the 20s and 30s, but sonero today, or since the 70s, means someone who's got the capability to improvise as a salsa singer. Hence Ismael Rivera was known as el sonero mayor, the best sonero, because he could improvise. And when you have two soneros, and this still happens in Cuba today, somebody sings a verse, like somebody just lays down a riff, somebody sings a verse and the other guy has to sing a verse back, and then you sing and then they sing, and that just goes on and on and on.

2:49:07Now, in Argentina the same thing exists, and it's in the pajada. The pajada was a verse duel: two gauchos sitting around the fire with the guitars, somebody improvises a verse, the other guy improvises a verse, and you go on and on and on. Now, that's what La Eterna Milonga is referring to, very specifically. It's the eternal milonga. What's the eternal milonga? Why does it last forever? Because two gauchos are sitting around the fire, two pajadores, and they are improvising, and in these verse duels, whether it's the salsa version or the gaucho version, the one who wins is somebody comes up with a verse and the other guy runs out of ideas and he can't come back. But here it goes on forever. That's what we're meant to understand from the title, and the song itself has got the most irresistible beat, probably, I've ever heard. The quality is not five star, but the music is ten stars.

2:50:15 · They playLa Eterna MilongaRoberto Firpo · 1929

Title refers to the payada, a gaucho verse-duel: this milonga is 'eternal' because neither of the two dueling singers in the story ever runs out of verses.

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♪ Music · 3:00 · What the transcriber heard

2:53:15Hey, Dag, we've got over 100 guests who want their DJs to play more Firpo. Yeah, yeah, let's do that. Yeah, so take that away with you, people. Take that away with you. It's fantastic, but you've got to give it some attention. It's not the most obvious music and not so easy maybe to find the recordings, but it's marvellous.

2:53:42Okay, so um, Svetlana, Paul, Bebel, you've all asked why no Forseda tonight. Would somebody like to type the answer in the chat window please? We'll give you 10 seconds. There is no, there, Theresa has the answer: there are no recordings of Forseda in 1929 because he's buggered off. He's a quip word as Iris. He's in Europe. He's in France. He's having a great time. But he's not in Argentina. He's not in a recording studio and there are no records. Sorry.

2:54:26Okay, now time for our Cortina. Our Cortina will be Juan Guido. Guido is like a contemporary of Maglio, another really old, old guy with the virtues of the old music. He's recording on Victor, so that means he can draw on all the musicians in the Victor stable, like Vadaro for his violin player, like Scottie Cattie for his bandoneon player, at least on the records. You know, live is not the same, but on the records, you just choose from the Victor Mafia. The tango I'm going to play for us, just one from Guido, it's our cortina, is Bello Juguete, Bello Juguete, which means beautiful toy.

2:58:10Delicious. Delicious. There's more nice Guido, not so easy again to find in good fidelity, but there's more good. So we've had our Canaro tanda, we've had our Firpo tanda, so now it's time for some Lomuto. Now Dag, you played Soy un Arlequín earlier, I think, so we can't have that, but that still leaves us loads of great choices. Let's start off with Pinta Maleva. The word pinta, that's a lunfardo word that you hear a lot. The way to remember the meaning, if you're an English speaker, is paint. It means your look, how you look. So Pinta Maleva means evil look.

2:59:09 · They playPinta MalevaFrancisco Lomuto · 1929

Lunfardo title meaning 'evil look' ('pinta' is look or appearance).

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♪ Music · 2:26 · What the transcriber heard

3:01:35So that was Pinta Maleva. The next one is Patadura. I'm not 100 sure what that means, but um, patadura, pata means foot and dura means tough, so it probably refers, so imagine you're a gaucho and you're about to have a knife fight, you have to stand very strong on the ground and not run away and not give away. So the police tango from 1956, pata ancha, ancha meaning broad, that's referring to that situation when you confront another person, but you root yourself in the ground like a Tai Chi master. So I imagine, but I don't know, I'm just guessing, that Patadura has the same meaning. And this is a tango with a wonderful final variacion.

3:03:03 · They playPataduraFrancisco Lomuto · 1929

Lavocah guesses, without certainty, that the title refers to standing your ground in a knife-fight stance; praised for its final variación.

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♪ Music · 5:30 · What the transcriber heard

3:08:33So it's time for the last tango. Oh. 1929. I think for quite a few people, it's been a surprising year. And the quality that I feel for this year, a lot of the music is quite intimate. But not all of it, you know, Canaro is not so intimate, although Charlo's always intimate when he sings, but it's a really beautiful music. And I was very happy that we had a year like 1929 this year. Like if we'd had 1958 this week, I'd have found that quite difficult because I had a difficult few days. So then this kind of music I find very consoling. It's comforting. It's very rich, yeah, it's very rich music. It's not superficial at all, it's quite complex and deep, but there's a comforting quality about it that I was very happy to listen to.

3:09:38So the last tango we're going to listen to, um, is Lomuto. Lomuto was pretty good in this time. It's called Mamita, little mum, little mother, Mamita. And I'm not going to speak any more now. The exceptional thing about this tango is the violin line at the end. Now we're used to hearing different kinds of simple violin lines, like there's the D'Arienzo style obligato low on the fourth string. You can do the same thing high on the first string, but Lomuto goes one step beyond here with his violinist, and I don't know who he is, which is to make an artificial harmonic. Now, if you play the guitar you know that instead of fingering a note you can just rest your finger on the string and play it and you get the harmonic. And violin players use this technique to generate notes that are so high it shouldn't be possible to play them on the violin. And that's what happens at the end of this tango. I think it's the only tango, well, it's the only tango I've heard that has a solo using artificial harmonics on the violin. Really exquisite.

3:11:03Dag, thank you so much for the opportunity to share music with everyone. I really appreciate these evenings. They really give me a lot.

3:11:12Thank you to everyone who's come tonight. We're still over a hundred guests united here by our love of tango music. How about that? Thank you, Michael, for sharing your enormous knowledge with us and making this a special night for everyone. Thank you. It really is a great pleasure for me. So here we go with, um, Mamita.

3:11:42 · They playMamitaFrancisco Lomuto · 1929

Closing track of the night; its violinist takes a rare solo using artificial harmonics, which Lavocah says is the only tango he knows with such a solo.

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♪ Music · 3:34 · What the transcriber heard