Tango 1949
Dag Stenvoll and Michael Lavocah · 17 Mar 2021 · 3:54:37
Stenvoll and Lavocah describe 1949 as the year the 1940s party ends: the crisis that began with censorship and state pressure in 1948 is at its worst, Di Sarli gives up, Laurenz makes no records, Biagi makes four, and there are few new songs, hence the medleys. It is the last year the lyrical, singer-led style dominates Buenos Aires before the Piazzolla-influenced instrumental turn of 1950-51 (Troilo, Fresedo). D'Arienzo sounds softer and more joyful, with strong instrumentals that foreshadow the 1950s; Pugliese reaches his own style with Malandraca; Gobbi is the rising vanguard; Troilo is at his most lyrical, just before a break with RCA Victor. The second half is an afterparty with more Gobbi, Pugliese, Troilo and a bundle of one-offs, and ends on Julio Sosa's arrival, Jorge Vidal's discovery and a long lyric reading of La rodada.
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Tango 1931Episode 36 · 31 Mar 2021 · 4:07:30What this episode gave Tangopedia
Facts said in the episode, each now cited to the minute it is said.
1949 is worse for the tango bands than 1948: more bands give up, Di Sarli stops, Laurenz makes no records and Biagi only four. Lavocah says the 1940s party is over.
The crisis comes from censorship, which is lifted too late, and a lack of new songs, since lyricists are uninspired by censorship. Many recordings are old songs or medleys.
Medleys appear as a way round the shortage of new songs; Stenvoll found at least four this year and notes dancers dislike them.
Lomuto spent nearly two years in Spain waiting out the difficult time and returned in 1949 with a sound similar to before.
Basso, pianist for Troilo after Goñi in 1943, formed his own orchestra in 1949; every pianist Troilo had eventually left to lead a band. Basso keeps good singers because by the late 40s the public comes for the singers.
Chapter · 2:23
The year tango ran out of songs
In 1949 bands started recording medleys.
A medley of six tangos, played to show how the shortage of new songs led bands to string old ones together; Lomuto is just back from nearly two years in Spain.
Basso's first year with his own orchestra; a tango about drinking to forget, where Fiorentino sounds more and more drunk by the end.
♪ Music · 3:55 ·
A duet of two voices nobody would pair, Fiorentino and the buttoned-up Ricardo Ruiz, which blend beautifully; the song is known from D'Arienzo 1936 and Troilo 1942.
A nostalgic milonga, backed by Eduardo del Piano, with a spoken glosa at the start that is probably Vargas himself.
Only in the episode
♪ Music · 2:25 ·
Chapter · 27:47
Why D'Agostino's singer sounds like D'Agostino
D'Agostino wouldn't leave his cafe.
A blind guessing game: identified as Francini-Pontier by the violin opening and the strapatta bass effect, with Podestá back in the band.
Only in the episode
♪ Music · 3:10 ·
Chapter · 33:40
The first double poaching
Caló lost both singers, then stole two back.
Second guessing-game track: many guessed Domingo Federico because of the plain walking bass; it was Maderna, restrained and grounded for once. The lyric is friendly advice to a young woman.
Only in the episode
♪ Music · 2:40 ·
A French tango with a strong dance beat; Stenvoll's 'excursion to Europe' and a sensual, very square beat.
A milonga whose lyric gives sharp but friendly advice to a girl who wants to be rich; Lavocah prefers D'Arienzo's earlier milongas.
Only in the episode
♪ Music · 2:04 ·
A restrained instrumental with lots of detail, chosen to show the change of style that is coming.
♪ Music · 2:35 ·
The big hit of the year for D'Arienzo; Laborde has begun to sound a little like Echagüe, with more edge to his voice.
Watch it danced · 14
A lovely De Angelis waltz, sung as a duet; the piano plays a two-against-three figure at each break, like Peruvian waltzes.
Only in the episode
A tango with a prison theme: a man tells someone not to bring their mother to visit him in jail.
♪ Music · 3:35 ·
A Peruvian waltz sung as a duet; Maciel, later Pugliese's singer, sounds different here.
♪ Music · 2:25 ·
Watch it danced · 3
Third of the three works that define Pugliese's style, and to Lavocah the first written, the most joyful, 'violent joy' despite the pressure on the orchestra.
♪ Music · 2:45 ·
Watch it danced · 88
Chapter · 1:28:50
The longest bass solo in tango
A bass player was left on stage to doodle.
Lavocah tells the story of the double-bass solo that began as improvisation while the band rested in the cafes.
Only in the episode
Morán on fire in 1949; Stenvoll gets goosebumps.
♪ Music · 2:24 ·
Watch it danced · 5
A 1915 Canaro number that Pugliese transforms beyond its composer's intention, as he does with La mariposa.
Castillo's outstanding take on a Filipo song, with an arrangement by Eduardo Rovira, later a jazz-leaning vanguard musician, and a cello in the introduction.
Only in the episode
♪ Music · 3:06 ·
A surprise: De Caro with a woman singer, in a lyric about a woman who goes wrong that blames the social pressures of the time.
♪ Music · 2:59 ·
A new version of a De Caro classic; he no longer plays violin in these recordings, first violin is Manuel Francia.
Watch it danced · 1
A tribute to Troilo; Lavocah calls it more substantial than much De Caro, with the bandoneón standing out.
Watch it danced · 39
Known better from Pugliese and Morán; Calderón's soft voice and a silky ending.
♪ Music · 3:08 ·
Watch it danced · 3
A theme from Pugliese's repertoire; Troilo's arrangement has less power and more feeling.
Watch it danced · 12
An introvert, bittersweet waltz sung as a duet.
The lyrics, on the song's page
Watch it danced · 10
An old Gardel number; Lavocah calls it the culmination of Troilo's lyricism and the end of an era.
The lyrics, on the song's page
Watch it danced · 6
Chapter · 2:24:04
Troilo's lyrical farewell
The last great lyrical year.
A party-time accordion orchestra, played to lift spirits; Salgán later transformed this waltz.
♪ Music · 3:08 · The lyrics, on the song's page
Watch it danced · 9
Brunelli sold huge numbers of records and was perhaps the first Argentine artist to get a gold disc.
Lavocah's non-tango break: the blind tres player, 'the greatest Cuban band of all time'.
Only in the episode
♪ Music · 3:15 ·
Played because De Angelis in 1949 is better than people think; the marcato is more intense.
♪ Music · 2:07 ·
Watch it danced · 1
A lyric about a child begging outside a party, told to beg at churches and cemeteries instead.
An arrangement few will know, more natural and acoustic than his 1950s sound.
♪ Music · 2:47 · The lyrics, on the song's page
Watch it danced · 45
A tribute to Enrique Delfino with an unexpected left-hand solo by Héctor Varela on the bandoneón.
♪ Music · 2:23 ·
Lavocah's first Gobbi instrumental: the ears are satisfied and, if we were dancing, the body would be too.
Only in the episode
An ordinary lyric lifted by Maciel's remarkable phrasing and note-bending.
Watch it danced · 3
Chapter · 3:04:32
Gobbi's tribute to a friend who drank himself to death
A tango for Orlando Goñi.
Gobbi's tribute to his bohemian friend Orlando Goñi, who had drunk himself to death; unusually it has three sections, in the old style.
Watch it danced · 39
An Agustín Bardi tango; Lavocah narrowly prefers Pugliese's version to Gobbi's and finds it joyful.
Watch it danced · 1
By Emilio Balcarce, who joined Pugliese in 1948; listen for the bomba and a strange scratchy violin effect.
Watch it danced · 2
Morán using his soft mezzo voice; Lavocah says it raises the hairs on his arms.
♪ Music · 2:51 ·
Watch it danced · 1
Chapter · 3:25:18
The singer who slept on a snooker table
Pugliese found his new singer asleep in a cafe.
One of the greatest tangos of the 40s, recorded in Vidal's second session with Pugliese.
Watch it danced · 21
A Mariano Mores song that would have belonged to Canaro had Troilo not recorded it; Calderón enters first, very tenderly, then Rivero.
One of two Rivero songs Lavocah chose to show Troilo's subtle 1949 work, which needs good fidelity.
Only in the episode
A lyric by José María Contursi, part of the cycle that begins with Gricel.
Marino, now a solo singer on the Odeon label, sings a countryside story of a rider whose horse crushed his legs.
Only in the episode
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Tango By Year is Dag Stenvoll and Michael Lavocah's, published here with their permission. The audio plays from SoundCloud.