Saturday, May 24, 2014

Tanda of the Week 21 / 2014 - Carlos Di Sarli and the Encyclopedia of Tango



1. Carlos Di Sarli - "Bahía Blanca" 1958-11-14
2. Carlos Di Sarli - "Una fija" 1958-11-12
3. Carlos Di Sarli - "Indio manso" 1958-11-13
4. Carlos Di Sarli - "El abrojo" 1958-11-13


http://open.spotify.com/user/anttiveikko/playlist/19PzuK6MIPyJlh3xl14sFihttp://www.deezer.com/playlist/876354511The recently released "Encyclopedia of Tango" by Gabriel Valiente is a huge book. Not only in size but in importance to many tango DJ's and collectors. The 800 page book compiles discographies of 148 orchestras with the essential information about singers and recording dates but also, which I find very interesting, who were the members of the orchestra for each time period and which companies the orchestra recorded for. The discographies have been compiled from various sources - rare unreleased or limited release discographies, different collections and publications as well as numerous online resources.

After studying the book I made a playlist of 1950's Instrumental Tango from 48 different orchestras, of which some I had never heard of before. I tried to put together songs from the playlist for this weeks tanda but I wasn't happy with the results. A lot of the orchestras had similar styles but, with the very limited selection of songs available on Spotify, what I could put together felt too much like a compromise at it's best. Especially when the tanda would be up against the most important orchestras of the 1950's like D'Arienzo, Di Sarli and Pugliese. Sure I could make a four song compilation of interesting music but I didn't feel I could make the case for a tanda of the more unknown orchestras that would make you want to dance all the way through. So I figured it's just best to listen to the full playlist. For danceable more unknown orchestras from the playlist I would recommend looking more into at least Alfredo Attadía, maybe Carlos Demaria, definitely Ricardo Pedevilla (who was featured on TOTW earlier in two tandas) and also definitely Juan Polito.

So for the tanda I decided to go with Di Sarli to show how high the standards were set for 1950's tango music. Di Sarli recorded 84 songs for Music Hall in 1951-1953, 79 for Victor in 1954-1958 and the songs for the tanda are from the last 14 of Di Sarli's recordings for the Philips label in 1958.

Many people don't know that Di Sarli recorded "Bahia blanca" twice and although the 1958 version is almost identical to the more famous 1957 version - the slight change in the sound of it can be refreshing to many. Mostly it will probably be unnoticed except for the two DJ's in your milonga and the other will love it while the other curses you for overplaying Di Sarli instead of overplaying Canaro. This is a joke.

The second song "Una fija" is featured on the 50's playlist as a version from Miguel Calo. However I feel that both Di Sarli's 1958 and the 1953 versions are better. On a sidenote - DJ's who want to find less played Di Sarli but want to have the powerful 50's style I recommend digging deep into the recordings from 1951-1953.

The orchestra of Di Sarli from 1956 to 1958 was José Libertella, Julían Plaza, Alfredo Marcucci and Domingo Sánchez on bandoneons, the maestro himself on piano, Szymsia Bajour, Elvino Vardaro, Elías Slón, Alfredo Rouco and Antonio Rossí on violins and Alfredo Sciarreta on double bass.

Enjoy!


Di Sarli, Carlos - TOTW - Todo Tangotango.info - TangoTunes - iTunes Store

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