Homero Manzi’s special touch turned the conventional themes of tango lyrics into a certain new magic. His gift was, in a sense, for rewriting, or recasting earlier tangos into new images, and in this haunted tango he draws on “Griseta” as well as “Los mareados” and a hundred other booze-laden songs as his sources.
The tango lyricist credited as Luis Mario, or sometimes as Mario Castro, was in reality María Luisa Carnelli—one of the few women who wrote lyrics for tangos during the Golden Age.
The 1926 tango “Tiempos viejos” is a classic song for a few different reasons, whose intertwining tells us some important things about the tango’s backstory…
José María Contursi hit his full stride in the early 1940s, and a tango like “En esta tarde gris” shows how he had become the Petrarch of the tango songbook, establishing romantic anguish as the theme of the decade.
Francisco Gorrindo’s pessimistic but memorable lyrics for “Las cuarenta” elevated the song into a classic of the genre almost immediately. Singer Azucena Maizani premiered the song in 1937 at the Teatro Nacional, and numerous recordings quickly followed.
The tango’s legacy as a major branch of song begins with “Mi noche triste.” The lyrics come from guitarist and songwriter (and later playwright) Pascual Contursi, who added his words to the existing tune “Lita,” which had been composed a year earlier by Samuel Castriota.
Songs of the sea and the shipping trade figure prominently in the tango songbook, being such a defining feature of the port city of Buenos Aires. And among the many maritime tangos we find “Tristeza marina,” whose music and words come together to form a true gem of the song, one of the finest in the genre.
The lyric of “Muchacho” by Celedonio Flores partakes of that most ancient of poetic modes, the put-down. Here we see the poet turning his satirical wits against the figure who is usually on the periphery in his other songs—the stuck-up son of privilege.
The tango “Tormenta” is one of Discépolo’s most searing lyrics, figuratively situating its speaker in the middle of a lightning storm, during a crisis of faith. Like many of his songs, God and morality lie at the center. Also like many of his songs, this cry of the soul amid the wilderness occurs in the middle of comedy…
The tango known as “Hotel Victoria” (or “Gran Hotel Victoria”) began as an instrumental number, first performed to celebrate the 1906 reopening of a hotel by that name in Córdoba.
That transitory hour when the night recedes before the first gray light of the morning, known well to those among us who are no strangers to insomnia, is called la madrugada in Spanish, and it features in many tangos as the setting of vague emotions—haunting regret, helpless loss, or a general aimlessness.
Héctor Marcó had a knack for writing lyrics of touching sentiment, offering a refreshingly positive vision of romance. The songs almost defy the genre and break the conventions of the tango, except that they actually succeed so completely in their aims.
Homero Manzi brought to tango lyrics a certain genius for scene painting and portraiture, giving a realness of place and a sense of tender nostalgia to his songs. Among his greatest creations is this number, “Barrio de tango,” which evokes the old neighborhood of Pompeya…
The late 1930s were a transitional period in tango, marked by the rise of the hard-hitting D’Arienzo band and the explosion of dancing as the center of popular culture. The tango songbook was changing too…
By the early 1930s, outdoor gas lighting was already becoming a thing of the past. Electric power was rolling in to replace it, with its much brighter and safer illumination… and very often with a taller and less romantic design.
As the new style of tango romanza emerged in the 1920s, tango melodies took on a more emotive role and the genre’s heavy dance rhythms subsided, allowing the tango to emulate, for brief moments it had not risen to before, the soaring notes of the opera.
The young woman depicted here is one of many French working girls, usually shop attendants or seamstresses, known as grisettes for the gray flower-print dresses they originally wore in the 1830s.
With lyrics by Enrique Cadícamo and music by the great singer Charlo—who wrote a handful of sophisticated tunes, including “Fueye” and “El viejo vals”—the song was not only a tango hit in the 1940s, but became popular throughout Latin America in a variety of other stylings.
Among the waltzes beloved by dancers, “Soñar y nada más” stands at the very top of the list. With its winding melody that seems to delve ever further into a romantic mood, the song adds an enchanting atmosphere to its infectious rhythm.
Pascual Contursi had launched the tango on its narrative mission in 1916 with “Mi noche triste”… but by the advent of the 1940s the new generation was turning their focus inward to romantic themes. Foremost among these poets of intense longing was Pascual’s own son, José María Contursi.
