Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Tanda of the Week 42 / 2011 - Anibal Troilo

Listen to the tanda - MP3

1. Anibal Troilo - "Quejas de bandoneón" 1952
2. Anibal Troilo - "Ojos negros" 1953
3. Anibal Troilo - "Prepárense" 1951
4. Anibal Troilo - "Melancólico" 1963


I'm going way out of my comfort zone as a dj with this tanda and I've never played any of these songs in a milonga yet. I've been looking into a lot of 1950's music lately and also into alternatives for Pugliese to give people their dose of the "grande pasión" with orchestras like Troilo, Gobbi and Demarco.

I think the song I really wanted to play was "Melancólico" which has been one of my favorite "concert" tangos and even as a very traditional tango dancer I feel I would enjoy dancing to it with the right partner. I wanted to find songs that had similar style and drama but I felt the very similar classics like "Orlando Goñi" and "Danzarin" made the tanda too massive so to speak so I started the tanda with the familiar "Quejas de bandoneón". I had both the '52 and '58 version and although the soundscape of the later version is more similar to "Melancólico" from 1963 I preferred the earlier version. I went through all of the instrumentals between 1950-1963 and wanted to have the tanda go smoothly through the time period but ended up sticking to the songs from 1951-1953 and then jumping up to 1963. "Prepárense" is one of Piazzolla's classic compositions which suits the style of the tanda well and in order to bridge the gap of the sound quality I changed "Melancólico" from stereo (stereo recording became widespread in the music business by the 3rd quarter of 1957) to mono format which flattened the song a bit in a good way. I hope nobody minds this editing but I assure you this procedure is also good for the playability of the song for milongas as stereo recordings might sound different in the sound system. I also added some reverb to the end of the songs to make the transitions from song to the next smoother.

I concidered songs like "Inspiracion", "Responso", Contratiempo", "Cenizas", "Para lucirse", "A mis viejos" and the earlier mentioned "Danzarin" and "Orlando Goñi" but decided to leave them for other tandas. I believe this tanda is too much for most dancers and therefore I've decided to leave this one on the shelf so to speak and play something else from Troilo in the milongas. Nevertheless these songs are great for listening as they are true masterpieces of tango music.

EDIT 26.8.2013: I still have never played this one in a milonga but I really love to listen to this tanda. I will make a Spotify playlist for this soon....

Check out the growing collection of digitalized Troilo shellacs in the TangoTunes.com in great quality.

Troilo, Anibal - TOTW - Todo Tangotango.info - iTunes Store

4 kommenttia:

  1. Antti,
    I think you're right in your comments. This would be a tough tanda in most cases. Interesting songs, but I would be hard-pressed to find the right time to play them. Thanks for posting this though. It's fun to consider the possibilities.
    Paul - Minneapolis

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  2. Thanks for this tanda!
    I like to play one or two tandas of Troilo (1940's-50's) if there are dancers experienced enough to dance to them. Unfortunately I don't have "Melancolico" in y own library. So I have combined f.ex. 'Chique' and 'El Marne' with Quejas de bandoneon and Ojos negros.
    Troilo is great!
    -Jaana

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  3. Thanks for the comments. "El Marne" is a great song and also nice and short and goes well with the other songs (OTV and D'Arienzo versions are my favorites)... "Chique" is a bit too much all over the place for me.

    I'll keep looking for the right moment to play this tanda or a slightly adjusted version of it. I think I'd replace "Melancólico" with something from the early 50's as well.

    I'm curious about how people feel about the differences/similarities of 50's Pugliese and Troilo? I know 50's Troilo isn't played that much but as long as the songs are familiar enough and danceable they'd sort of do the same trick as some of Pugliese right? I don't really trust myself with the "how danceable a song is issue" when it comes to this style for the fact that I don't like to dance to these that much but then again being a tango addict and a dj I know the songs very well therefore being able to dance to them somewhat comfortably.

    ps. I play a lot of 40's Troilo... both vocals and instrumentals.

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  4. I'd leave out "Ojos Negros", as I don't find that one very danceable, and I feel the tanda will be challenging enough with only 3 songs.

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