Philly Spot Online Community Forum Chat Directory Classifieds for Philadelphia area

Directory • Classifieds • Forums • Chat • Contact

Home

Directory

Tech

Music

Community

a - b - c - d - e - f - g - h - i - j - k - l - m - n - o - p - q - r - s - t - u - v - w - x - y - z

Argentina's hybrid music tangos and seethes

There are reasons to be troubled by the shrinking global village, not least of them the spread of a Disneyfied monoculture. But among the benefits are the educational possibilities: When a groove from around the globe captivates one's interest, it takes just minutes to learn more about it and find other works related by geography or sensibility.

That happened to me this year with the hybrid music coming from Argentina.

The land of tango hasn't exactly been a new-music hotbed. Since the 1992 death of visionary composer Astor Piazzolla, it's been easy to overlook the pop music of Buenos Aires and more traditional music out of the country's rural regions. A notable exception is Dino Saluzzi, a master of Argentina's accordion, the bandoneon, who replaces tango's demonstrative heel-stomps with less resolute, ethereal tone poems.

Then along came Juana Molina's Segundo, a dazzling gem that links forlorn singer-songwriter vocals with ethnic percussion, delicate loops, and renegade synth blasts. During the months it took up residence in my CD player, I got curious about what else was going on in Argentina, and embarked on one of those search-engine odysseys that makes you forever thankful for the Internet.

First I stumbled onto the Gotan Project's La Revancha del Tango (XL Recordings, ***1/2 out of four stars), a 2001 release that made it to the States in April. The 10-piece band's name is a play on tango, and so is its music: The French and Argentine crew drops the melancholic swoops and swoons of tango into an echoey netherworld of Jamaican dub. Turns out to be a perfect fit: The thudding beats provide a framework for heartbreakingly fragile melodies, delivered by Nini Flores on bandoneon, that unfold slowly, guided by tango's slow-simmering tension. Among the best: a version of Frank Zappa's "Chunga's Revenge" remade into a slithery, slow-motion stalking scene.

Next came an inevitable discovery. Piazzolla, the man who invented "new tango," has been repurposed: Milan Records, which issued several of the master's important later works, opened its vaults to electronica DJs for Astor Piazzolla Remixed (Milan ***). Though not everything clicks - "Vuelvo al Sur" by the Swedish duo Koop is too fey - there are moments such as Zeb's samba fantasy "Prelude Fugue (Zeb vs. Piazzolla)" and the pulsating 4Hero track "El Viaje" in which the originals expand magically.

There are other tango-electronica projects, too. Bajo Fondo Tango Club (Surco/Universal Latin ***1/2), from a loose confederation of DJs and musicians of the same name, sets tango's violin, bandoneon and piano into a smooth, futuristic glide driven by drum machines and samplers. Sometimes the results are pleasantly ambient, but other times - as on rock en espanol pioneer Gustavo Santaolalla's take on Piazzolla's "En Mi/Soledad" - tango's seething emotion is absorbed into the hypnotic throb of clubland.

Santaolalla produced Carnabailito (Nonesuch ***1/2), the first solo work by Gaby Kerpel, who composed the music for the theater troupe De La Guarda. The vocalist and loop maven uses weird circus instruments and detuned guitars to transform folk melodies and chants into odd, phantasmic schemes that grow from small blips into chilling howls. The lyrics are mostly about lost love: The brilliant "Seguis Sin Volver/You Keep Not Coming Back to Me" employs a blueslike mantra while the music, a collage of acoustic percussion, brooding strings and sampled sounds, clomps along, sullen and intoxicating at the same time.

Exploring the latest incarnations of tango got me thinking about flamenco, the dance music of Spain that is its distant cousin. Most flamenco is played on guitar, but one day I read a Web posting about Seville pianist Diego Amador, whose amazing Piano Jondo (Milestone ****) was released here in August.

The CD's title translates as "deep feeling piano," and it's that and then some. Amador's compositions are technically demanding and full of fire, and with the help of an incredibly well-rehearsed trio, he tears through tricky passages and spectacularly fluid improvisations notable for their jazzlike velocity and spry melodic sense.

The last stops on my journey were some cuts by Argentina's Federico Aubele produced by the Washington production duo Thievery Corporation. Aubele's full-length debut isn't expected until spring, but a pair of deliciously understated tracks turn up on the compilation Den of Thieves: The Sound of Eighteenth Street Lounge Music (ESL, 3 stars). Aubele utilizes snippets of bass clarinet, electric guitar and bandoneon to create unusually contemplative, brooding atmospheres. Sometimes the rhythms sit squarely in one style (the bulk of "El Amor De Este Pueblo" is set in a downtempo reggae), but more often Aubele slides around furtively, finding commonality between the sweet melancholy of tango and techno's chill that illustrate how closely linked these disparate worlds really are.

a - b - c - d - e - f - g - h - i - j - k - l - m - n - o - p - q - r - s - t - u - v - w - x - y - z

Site

International Airport 76ERS Phillies Eagles City of Philadelphia Tourist Info Museum of Art Phila Zoo The Franklin Institute Online Orchestra Flyers Philadelphia University University of Pennsylvania SEPTA

Philadelphia Forums Community Directory Businesses