Astor Piazzolla (1921-1992), he and the bellows, indivisible like his music and Buenos Aires.
When the echoes of the planetary celebration of the centenary of his birth still resound, this Monday (July 4th) will be the 30 years since the death of Astor Piazzollaone of the most important figures of Argentine music to whom he has given a notable international projection.
from the tango genre that has renamed music of Buenos Aires, also integrating jazz and classical -the three territories from which he was nourished- the composer e bandoneonist created an inspired and daring synthesis that erased the boundaries between those styles and against the barrage of criticism that raised the bethas expanded the reach of the sounds of this part of the world like no other.
Piazzolla’s death took place after nearly two years of long agony for a cerebral thrombosis which took place on August 5, 1990 in a hotel in Paris, the city where he lived.
Classical and modern: he was a member of the Aníbal Troilo orchestra between 1939 and 1944.
nine days later, in a coma and with irreversible brain damagehe was transferred to Argentina and despite recovering from a coma 15 days later, his condition forced him to be hospitalized several times until he died.
Mar del Plata
In the prolific and busy life of the artist, having been around 23 months without being able to create was a painful exception since the one born on 11 March 1921 in Mar del Plata, has generated an opera with about a thousand original compositions.
The great tango revolutionary was born in Mar del Plata on 11 August 1921.
In that production that includes music for some 40 filmsdevised agreements cannot be ignored, for example, for the Aníbal Troilo orchestra – who composed between 1939 and 1944 – and others by various authors who exhibited in his various ensembles.
Throughout his life Piazzolla had his first orchestra with which he accompanied the popular singer Francisco Fiorentino and although the experience was not very extensive, he left excellent visits to We met as we passed, blind old man Y came back one night and his first two instrumental pieces: the crazy Y Pink color.
Astor with Roberto Goyeneche, and it is impossible not to think of “Balada para un loco”.
With other voices (including those of Aldo Campoamor) and an increasingly personal beat, he has recorded versions of Touching, Inspiration, Dear Earth, Bell Y The curve and more of your own work, among them, To show off, prepare, joke, triumphant, joke Y What will come.
Paris will be the key
Scholarship from the Paris Conservatory he established a relationship with the musicologist Nadia Boulanger who reconciled him with the tango and in the French capital and with the strings of the Paris Opera Orchestra, he recorded other creations of his stamp: Nonino, Brown and blue, Bye Paris, Bandó Y picassomore.
Back in the countryside, he led a bandoneon and string orchestra with which his style continued to flourish. Three minutes with reality, Tango del ánge? Y Melancholy Buenos Aires.
But she also gave birth to the innovative Octeto Buenos Aires (two bandoneons, two violins, double bass, cello, piano and electric guitar) who is mainly dedicated to reinterpretation The Marne, The Vertigo, My Refuge Y suburbto name just a few traditional tangos.
Furthermore, in his work there is a special place for cinema: he has written soundtracks for 40 films.
After another settlement abroad, in this case a couple of years in New York, in 1960 he created the Quinteto Nuevo Tango (bandoneon, piano, violin, electric guitar and double bass).
Goodbye Nonino, etc, etc …
It was a decisive formation in his expression and with which he premiered his impactful work as Goodbye Nonino, Decarissimo, Cramp, The Possessed, Introduction to the angel, Death of the angel, Revirado, Buenos Aires Zero Hour Y Fracanapa.
Between a fleeting New Octet and the fruitful formation of a quintet, he recorded his own compositions on poems and texts by Jorge Luis Borges with the singer Edmundo Rivero and actor Luis Medina Castro and at that time launched Buenos Aires summerfirst of the famous saga of the Four Seasons.
Towards the end of that decade he looked more decisively at the tango song associated with the poet Horacio Ferrer for give birth to the work Maria of Buenos Aires and popular pieces like Ballad for a fool Y Chiquilin de Bachínthen registered by the partner at that time, Amelita Baltar and Roberto Goyeneche.
Around 1972 and at the helm of Conjunto 9, he gave shape to his first symphonic piece, the “Concerto by Nácar, for nine tango players and philharmonic orchestra and releases records of explicit new tango whose salient expressions are Sadness of a double A, Vardarito Y wave nine.
Another revolution, the incorporation of the electric “viola” from the Quinteto Nuevo Tango.
Suffering from a heart attack, he settled in Italy where he forged the Electronic Ensemble (an octet composed of a bandoneon, electric or acoustic piano, organ, guitar, electric bass, drums, synthesizer and violin, later replaced by transverse flute or sax) and from there he launches Ballad for my deathwith singer Milva, Libertango and the magnificent Troilean suitecreated after knowing the death of Aníbal Troilo (May 19, 1975).
With various returns to the formation of the quintet (although in its latest versions a cello has taken the place of the violin), Astor has also undertaken projects with George Moustaki, Gerry Mulligan and Gary Burton, among other world celebrities.
Astor is and will be a value of tango recognized all over the world. Piazzolla is the same as the modern tango.
We love Astor so much
In these days of tributes, several voices remembered him like this:
– “The great message we want to give is that Piazzolla is Argentine but his work belongs to the whole world, it is the patrimony of humanity”. (Daniel Villaflor Piazzollagrandson of the musician and vice president of the Astor Piazzolla Foundation).
Daniel Villaflor and “Pipi” Piazzolla.
– “My grandfather influenced us all, he showed us a completely new path and music. He also taught us that you have to work hard, that you can fight for what you believe in and dressed Argentina with very beautiful music that represents us in the world. There is a before and after Piazzolla “. (Daniele Pee Piazzollagrandson of the musician, composer and drummer).
– “Piazzolla was simple, popular and musical and that is why he is part of the music of the people. He continues to provoke me interpretative challenges and every time his presentations begin, they stimulate sensitive engines, which no other music encourages”. (William Fernandezsinger and composer).
William Fernandez.
– “Many people in different places give space to Piazzolla’s music because it is of enormous power, it generates a need and in it lives a magic recipe that contains contemporaneity and novelty and that is why it continues to be heard and played. songs there is an idea and someone who made it and I try to assimilate that teaching: ‘fight for your ideas, defend them, study and deepen’ “. (Paolo Mainetticomposer and bandoneon player).
Paolo Mainetti.
– “I adopted this music from the very beginning when I started to know her and Astor and I fell deeply in love with it and it also made me change my vision of what I was singing the tango. For me it was like waking up a new form of expression of Argentine popular music “. (Raul Laviesinger and actor).
Raul Lavie.
– “Knowing the intimacy of Piazzolla’s world led me to wonder what avant-garde is or who makes avant-garde and I don’t know what the answer is but the avant-garde certainly has to do with the fact that the results arrive shortly after the creator created his works In Piazzolla’s case he always said ‘what I did yesterday no longer counts, what I will do tomorrow counts’. (Daniel Rosenfieldmovie director).
Daniel Rosenfield.
– “I grew up listening to Piazzolla’s music; let’s say that thanks to him I decided to play the bandoneon and to devote myself to composition and this musical language.
For me he has always been a reference, perhaps the greatest of my career because he was someone who staked everything on creation and innovation and was a fighter who opened the doors to all of us who came after him “(Giovanni Paolo Jofrebandoneonist and composer residing in the United States).
Juan Pablo Jofre.
– “Piazzolla founded a deep and painfully authentic style that boasts an immediacy, almost a universality and what moves me is the strong, elegant and furious way in which he overlaps different metrics …
How he creates bridges between the beats and also that obsession with repetition, like a ‘condemned man breaking stones’, the same gesture, the same determination, the same fury, as if he were trying to remove all the violence from his body ” . (Luisa JalluFrench bandoneonist).
– “Piazzolla’s is one of the few subversive music that Argentina has produced and the listener who invents it is a perfect mix of intelligence and driving force”. (louis curioswriter and psychoanalyst).
Fuente Telam / Sergio Arboleya
CJL
Source: Clarin
