Until a few years ago in my tango career, I mostly preferred listening to tangos about lost love and similar topics of sorrow. Even though the (rich) landscape of tango lyrics is quite varied in themes, I’d still say, based on no serious statistical research at all but just my experience as a DJ, that a majority of the lyrics are about heartbreak (predominantly) and a few other forms of grief. These feelings and experiences are universal and they are expressed in musical genres worldwide, so in a sense, a lot of tango music is far from unique, and at the same time, that also explains its broad appeal.

However, tango also offers us many lyrics that are, in a way, less universal and more firmly embedded in Buenos Aires and its culture – I always call tango “the folklore of Buenos Aires”, and I’m becoming increasingly enamored with all the signs in our music that you can find of that unique cultural world. That is not to say I wasn’t interested in that background before, but it feels like I am going through a transition toward those themes becoming even more important to me than the dominant heartache category mentioned earlier. It might be a maturation of taste leading me into a new direction, or possibly a sign that I am looking for even further depth in how I experience tango music and how it was embedded in a specific historical context during its Golden Age.

The song I chose to translate for you this time is called ‘Chirusa’, and it’s an excellent example of different elements of tango’s backdrop of an exciting city full of immigrants and the opportunities of their promised land. Even though the numbers of immigrants were so massive and overpowering that they changed that land and culture to a great extent, we also have to take into account that there were already ‘natives’ living there who inherited the traditions of colonial times and a young post-colonial, independent Argentina. Tango lyrics often refer to poor outskirts of the city, and it weren’t always only European immigrants living there, but also the already existing population (‘criollos’) of partly mixed descent, including not only descendants of Spanish settlers and Native Americans (I am referring to America as the American continent here, the Americas) but even descendants of African slaves, who have an interesting, somewhat mysterious history I unfortunately cannot elaborate on this time, considering the restraints of these short blogs.

Anyway, I left the title in this translation untranslated, but in fact ‘chirusa’ is a lunfardo word with a bunch of different connotations: it first of all refers to a poor woman, so someone of a low social class and with probably no education, and then, second, it’s connected with the interior of Argentina/the countryside, just like the word ‘china’ that is often referred to in lyrics about gauchos and life in rural areas. And third, there’s a connotation of ‘vulgar’ or a lack of morals, which to me sounds like an euphemism for prostitution. Certainly, the lyric below combines these three elements: a poor girl from the outskirts of Buenos Aires is seduced by a Casanova-like type and follows him to the city center, where he abandons her and she ends up in prostitution. This most likely refers to a type of higher-class prostitution in milongas where those women would work as taxi dancers and were also sexually available for rich men. I draw that conclusion because there are several lyrics alluding to that odd phenomenon – how some women could lead a ‘modern’ urban lifestyle but at the expense of paying for it with their bodies – and it’s likely also the ‘luxury’ that is referred to in the lyric below.

This type of lyrics is also a little weird, especially considering our modern-day standards about gender and sexuality, because they seem to morally condemn these women while also maybe praising them at the same time, for a lifestyle that is convenient for certain men but awful for these women themselves. However, this type of lyric is still representative of some dark aspects of the culture of Buenos Aires at the time, probably especially in the 1920s from what I can remember, and also combines other typical elements of tango culture, like the glorification of the ‘arrabal’, the poor neighborhood of origin. So, while I feel a bit ambiguous about the somewhat misogynist or at least awkward tone in its lyric, ‘Chirusa’ is still very helpful for us to imagine the ‘folklore’ of the Buenos Aires portrayed in tango lyrics, and certainly, the D’Arienzo version from 1940 is just an absolute banger and one of my favorite tracks ever.

I once made a long video about this exact song with more details about several themes discussed above and the D’Arienzo orchestra at the time. If you like the song and have too much free time, give it a watch.

Chirusa
Composition: Juan D’Arienzo
Lyrics: Nolo López

Chirusa, la más linda de las pebetas,
tejía sus amores con un Don Juan;
él, con palabras buenas y cariñosas,
le prometió quererla con mucho afán.
Confiada en sus promesas, una mañana
ató toda su ropa y se fugó;
cegada por el lujo siguió la caravana
y el alma del suburbio le gritó:

Chirusa, the prettiest of all the girls,
became infatuated with a real Don Juan.
With flattery and tender words
he promised to love her with mad desire.
Believing his promises, one morning
she gathered up her clothes and ran away.
Blinded by luxury, she followed him to the city
while the soul of her poor neighbourhood lamented:

‘¡No dejes a tus viejos!
Cuidado che, Chirusa;
el lujo es el demonio
que causa perdición,
y cuando estés muy sola
sin una mano amiga
has de llorar de pena
tirada en un rincón.’

‘Don’t leave your old folks behind!
Be careful, Chirusa,
luxury is a demon
that will ruin you.
And once you are all alone
without a helping hand,
you will cry with sorrow,
curled up in a corner.’

(Hastiada de la vida, sin un consuelo,
vencida para siempre por el dolor,
pensaba en sus viejitos que dejo un día
en la casita blanca donde nació.)
El viento le traía dulces recuerdos,
pasajes de su vida llenos de sol;
y el alma del suburbio, hasta su pieza,
como una voz lejana le recordó…

(Tired of a life without solace,
forever defeated by sorrow,
she thought of her parents that she had one day
left behind in the little white house where she was born.)
The wind carried back sweet memories,
scenes of life, full of sunshine,
and the soul of her neighbourhood, like a faint echo,
brought it all back to her room…:

Music about heartbreak, sadness and longing is something we see across cultures and around the world, and the genre of tango is no exception: often, the lyrics talk about these realities of life in their different forms, but without any particular (historical) context and without anything thematic that would set it apart from other genres. However, tango music and lyrics do have their distinctive character as, like I always say, the folklore of Buenos Aires as a city and culture. That means you also have lyrics that are quite specifically about certain traditions or characteristics of the city, about places or types of characters dwelling the streets, and also often about the bohemian lifestyle of nightclubs and tango dance halls.

The orchestra of Ángel D’Agostino, usually referred to as D’Agostino-Vargas because the orchestra and singer are so uniquely inseparable, is one of the richest orchestras in terms of the different ”landscapes” of that exciting Buenos Aires from the past. In general, the orchestra sound is deeply nostalgic and always transports me not only to the typical streets and corners of the city but particularly to how I imagine they were in the era this music was recorded. And less metaphysically, perhaps, it’s quite possibly (just guessing here) the orchestra with the most lyrics about life in Buenos Aires and other concrete historical, cultural phenomena connected to it. It’s important to realize that a sizeable amount of these stories and anecdotes refer to even older times that were looked at with nostalgia and a sense of loss by the musicians and lyricists of the Golden Age of tango music and even earlier.

The lyric below is a reflection of not only the more universal themes of lost love or sorrow about life in tango but also some of the cultural themes that I mentioned above. First, it refers to an extremely important topic in tango lyrics, namely the distant neighborhoods, usually poor, on the outskirts of the city, that are often looked at with nostalgia (like a type of ‘innocent’ life from the past) or a current longing to return to said areas. These ‘suburbs’ (sometimes literally called ‘suburbio’) tend to be called ‘arrabal’ in the lyrics and host a number of archetypal figures, such as the tough guys who dominated the streets or the virtuous local girls who ended up as a prostitute in the city center. And the second ‘trope’ we see in this lyric is the bohemian lifestyle of the tango world in Buenos Aires: the main character has returned to his poor neighborhood and is now lonely because of the life he chose to live in that bohemian environment. I think this lyric, and the way the orchestra brings it to life in the recording (notice how the bandoneons complement the singing!), are a beautiful representation of the melancholy of tango through its typical scenes and ‘landscapes’ and how the protagonist experiences them.

Notas de bandoneón (Notes of a bandoneon)
Composition: Orestes Cúfaro and/or Francisco de Lorenzo
Lyrics: Enrique Cadícamo

Tengo en un barrio apartado
una casita chiquita
refugio para mis cuitas
de calavera olvidado.
Solo, sin nadie a mi lado
sin un cariño quedé.
Porque de tanto que amé
sin un amor me he quedado.

In a distant neighbourhood
I have a little house,
a shelter for my sorrows,
for having been a womaniser.
Alone, with no one by my side,
I am left without affection.
For as much as I have loved,
I have been left without a love.

Llegan notas de bandoneón
en la noche de mi arrabal
son las notas de un corazón
que al pasar, el viento trae…
Llegan notas de bandoneón
y es más negra mi soledad.
Llueve en mi alma su triste son
y hace florecer mi honda emoción.

Notes of a bandoneon sound
in the night of my barrio.
They are notes of a heart,
carried by the wind.
Notes of a bandoneon sound
and my loneliness becomes darker still.
The sad sound raining in my soul
makes my deep emotion flourish.

(Por eso en mi noche triste
sólo… más viejo y cansado,
recuerdo muy apenado
lo mucho que me quisiste.
Sabiendo que te perdiste
yo vivo evocándote,
y sueño esperándote
aquí, en mi barrio apartado.)

(And so, in my sad night,
alone, now old and tired,
I remember sadly
how much you loved me.
Knowing that I lost you,
I live remembering you,
while I dream of your return
here, in this distant neighborhood.)

“Alberto Gómez? Who….??”
Many tango dancers are not necessarily familiar with some of the most important singers in tango history. Whether it’s Charlo, Ignacio Corsini, Ada Falcón or even pretty much the first ever tango singer, Carlos Gardel, these are all names that escape most people’s attention nowadays. However, that’s not strange considering how little they are connected to the actual music we dance to – maybe apart from some older orchestra tunes that are cherished particularly by certain DJs, collectors and crowds of dancers. In these older tunes, we can hear some of these famous singers, like Charlo and Alberto Gómez, sing a refrain within a song meant for dancing, yes, just a refrain and nothing else. However, many others who sang these refrains for the orchestras never reached the same level of status. And we also have to realize that in most of the more sophisticated music of the Golden Age, even those famous names are all absent, and their ‘place’ is taken by mostly a new generation instead.

“But Lucas! How did they become famous, then?”
That’s a good question. The key here is that tango singing and dance music always had a problematic relationship, because the ambitions of orchestras and singers often collided. From its inception until its decline, the tango genre attracted many people who wanted to shine as a soloist, following the original example of Gardel, and many became popular with their listeners this way. We have many recordings of singers who are simply accompanied by guitars or an entire orchestra for their voices to shine, and this subgenre is usually referred to as ‘tango canción’ (‘tango song’). Even in the middle of the Golden Age, singers routinely abandoned the best orchestras we know because they wanted to go solo and be in complete control of the music they created. For dancers nowadays, singing with Di Sarli or Troilo may seem like an immense honor, and to a large extent it was, but there was certainly more to be attained for a popular performer. Or at least it seemed, because while some of these men who became soloists did reach the prime of their career alone, others saw their career decline, and in some cases it’s not easy for us to determine what truly happened, because of a lack of recordings or historical sources.

(British accent) “But Lucas, you must be mad! Why on earth would you create an entire video just for a song not a single dancer ever cares about?”
Well, Alberto Gómez is one of the great, prolific solo singers, and I think it’s really nice sometimes to listen to dance classics from another angle and with voices that were popular and influential back in the day. These singers followed trends among the orchestras, but also the other way around, which means there are dance classics that were inspired by people outside of the orchestras. And in any case: because I understand Spanish, I can always listen to whatever renditions I want, but many of the visitors of my website have to rely on translations. While I generally think it’s more ‘useful’ to present translations of popular tracks, I also think it’s good to stimulate people to understand tango history a bit better and also get to explore the less obvious repertoire out there. Lastly, tango lyrics often have ‘unsung’ parts that are worth the attention but are easily overlooked, and the tango soloists tend to sing the entire lyric or at least a big part of it. All of these reasons are why I choose to present to you, in this case, a nice tango canción that may help you to appreciate the more famous Fresedo version in a different light.

Isla de Capri (Isle of Capri) – sung by Alberto Gómez
Composition: Will Grosz
Lyrics: Miguel Ángel del Valle

Yo tuve un amor,
sueño embriagador,
en una isla de Capri.
Paisaje azul
rebosante de luz.
Mi canción de amor
dulce desgrané
en el perfume de Capri
y mi querer
en sus ojos canté.

I once had a love,
an intoxicating dream,
on the Isle of Capri.
A blue landscape,
of dazzling light.
I sweetly declared
my song of love
in fragrant Capri,
as I sang my adoration
to her eyes.

Labios de miel que besaron mis labios,
ojos de sol que me hicieron soñar
y en la emoción de sus besos tan sabios
desglosaba mi alma un cantar.
Y así, los dos por senderos de dicha,
bajo ese cielo radiante de amor
vivimos juntos un suave romance
que duró lo que dura una flor…
¿Y dónde estarás ahora
acordándote de mí?
Mientras mi querer te llora
vuela mi ilusión hacia ti.

Honey lips that kissed my lips,
sun bright eyes, making me dream…
and in the ardour of her knowing kisses
my soul broke into a song.
And so, together on pathways of bliss,
under a radiant sky of love,
we enjoyed a sweet romance
that only lasted as long as a flower.
And… where are you now,
thinking of me?
While my love cries for you,
my hope flies to your side.
my emotions fly to your side.

(Labios de miel que besaron mis labios,
ojos de sol que me hicieron soñar
y en la emoción de sus besos tan sabios
desglosaba mi alma un cantar.
No puedo olvidar
horas que viví
en una isla de Capri…
Cuánta emoción
desbordó mi canción,
ansias de vivir
dulce recordar
de gratas horas pasadas
y revivir
en un beso un cantar.)

(Honey lips that kissed my lips,
sun bright eyes, making me dream…
and in the ardour of her knowing kisses
my soul broke into a song.
I shall never forget
those days I spent
on the Isle of Capri.
My singing overflowed
with such strong emotion,
a yearning to live.
It’s sweet to remember
those pleasant times
and to relive
a song in a kiss.)

I remember once stumbling upon this [see the photo above] aptly-named ice cream café on the streets of – you guessed it – Buenos Aires, and thinking to myself, “These people must be big fans of Fresedo!”. However, it is probably only in my autistic little inner world where such connections are indeed logical. After a short, but sobering inquiry on the internet, I recently found out there are a lot more “Isla de Capri” and Capri-referring ice cream parlors in the world, and I bet only few (read: none) of those have anything to do with Osvaldo Fresedo. Even in Buenos Aires, the awareness of what tango music really entails is much less widespread than it should be, based on how major it once indeed was as a kind of amazing and sophisticated folklore of a fascinating city.

OK guys, Capri, Italy, ice cream, Naples, pizza, blah blah, I get it. But I am a so much more noble tango snob, who thinks of different things when I see the title “Isla de Capri”! My personal theory is that it’s the song of a nostalgic Italian immigrant who praised the beauty of his native region in music and lyrics and …. WRONG! ….they sometimes say even an old dog can learn new tricks. Aware as I actually am (in contrast with the general population of Buenos Aires) of the grand heritage of tango music, this genre is full of unknown territory for me too. A while ago, I was listening to another version of this song and I noticed that especially the violins, but also the piano particularly reminded me of the typical melancholic style of European tangos. And that’s how I found out that in reality, “Isla de Capri” has a much different origin than I was expecting!

In fact, as some of you may actually already know, “Isle of Capri” is a European tango/popular song released in England in 1934 and composed by Wilhelm Grosz, an Austrian-Jewish refugee who had fled his homeland due to the looming threat of a Nazi takeover. Grosz worked together with an Irish/British lyricist to create an international hit that was then adapted by Fresedo as a dance tango in proper Argentine style. Interestingly enough, the lyrics of the English hit and its Argentine version are totally different – the Argentine version has its own poet listed and, as is often the case, it seems impossible to find any info about him (or a ‘her’ with a pseudonym, who knows…). This kind of adaptation of something foreign is not unique, considering there are other famous Fresedo, Canaro, Lomuto tracks that are actually European tangos or foxtrots, jazz or other genres. It’s good to realize that even though the world back then wasn’t as globalized as it is now, the world always has been a story of trends that move beyond borders.

And now some final words about “Isla de Capri”: even though its origin was foreign, I still like to think that, back then, the romantic, nostalgic lyricism of this song, combined with Fresedo’s magic and these Argentine lyrics, surely appealed to the masses of Italian immigrants living in Argentina. For them, and even for us nowadays, this song is a great chance to dream away, and I hope my translation below will help you to fully understand its charm.

Isla de Capri (Isle of Capri)
Composition: Will Grosz
Lyrics: Miguel Ángel del Valle

(Yo tuve un amor,
sueño embriagador,
en una isla de Capri.
Paisaje azul
rebosante de luz.
Mi canción de amor
dulce desgrané
en el perfume de Capri
y mi querer
en sus ojos canté.)

(I once had a love,
an intoxicating dream,
on the Isle of Capri.
A blue landscape,
of dazzling light.
I sweetly declared
my song of love
in fragrant Capri,
as I sang my adoration
to her eyes.)

Labios de miel que besaron mis labios,
ojos de sol que me hicieron soñar
y en la emoción de sus besos tan sabios
desglosaba mi alma un cantar.
Y así, los dos por senderos de dicha,
bajo ese cielo radiante de amor
vivimos juntos un suave romance
que duró lo que dura una flor…
¿Y dónde estarás ahora
acordándote de mí?
Mientras mi querer te llora
vuela mi ilusión hacia ti.

Honey lips that kissed my lips,
sun bright eyes, making me dream…
and in the ardour of her knowing kisses
my soul broke into a song.
And so, together on pathways of bliss,
under a radiant sky of love,
we enjoyed a sweet romance
that only lasted as long as a flower.
And… where are you now,
thinking of me?
While my love cries for you,
my hope flies to your side.
my emotions fly to your side.

(Labios de miel que besaron mis labios,
ojos de sol que me hicieron soñar
y en la emoción de sus besos tan sabios
desglosaba mi alma un cantar.
No puedo olvidar
horas que viví
en una isla de Capri…
Cuánta emoción
desbordó mi canción,
ansias de vivir
dulce recordar
de gratas horas pasadas
y revivir
en un beso un cantar.)

(Honey lips that kissed my lips,
sun bright eyes, making me dream…
and in the ardour of her knowing kisses
my soul broke into a song.
I shall never forget
those days I spent
on the Isle of Capri.
My singing overflowed
with such strong emotion,
a yearning to live.
It’s sweet to remember
those pleasant times
and to relive
a song in a kiss.)

There are only a handful of movie scenes with performances from tango orchestras, but when you do come across one, it’s always a special feeling. As I was doing some research for my translation of “Pregonera” (click here for the original post with some context) I found a live version of this De Angelis classic from the 1948 movie “El cantor del pueblo” (“Singer of the people”), which also contains some D’Arienzo footage you might just enjoy as well. Let’s take a brief look at some interesting aspects of this movie performance of Pregonera.

Unfortunately, the original footage is a bit choppy and quite likely also too fast. I have not found any different versions of the movie, so I don’t know what causes the choppiness (you’ll notice that it often slightly jumps forward or skips) but I don’t think it can be fixed. The speed may still be tuned but I did not want to manipulate the original material too much. I’ve noticed there’s a lot of interest in correcting pitch in tango songs nowadays, so if you’re up for a challenge go ahead and slow it down a bit! 🙂

As you shall see below, the orchestra is playing on quite an interesting-looking stage with multiple levels, and a venue or at least a movie set that reminds me more of a church than anything else. It makes me wonder whether this was an actual venue and how the average real tango venue looked like in comparison. Other movie scenes and some photos I’ve seen show a somewhat more modest style, but I do not know enough for a truly satisfying conclusion. I also wonder whether the crowds you see in scenes like this were just a bunch of actors or walk-ons, or true fans of the orchestra who would normally come to dance or simply listen to the tunes of the moment. Just like in today’s popular entertainment, I’m not always sure what’s authentic and what isn’t, but in any case I always really enjoy philosophizing a bit about the many things in tango we don’t yet know or will never really find out about.

Likewise, when I look at the way De Angelis and his team are performing in this movie, I can’t help but wonder how ‘authentic’ this performance is (considering it was, to some extent at least, adapted for the big screen) and how it would have compared to their actual regular shows around town. The singers, Carlos Dante and Julio Martel, present themselves in a slightly extravagant way, but it does fit the music and the theme of the lyrics, and it’s of course possible they always behaved like this in their duets or even their solo performances. Also, we get a better view of piano man De Angelis at the final notes, and I find his body language and gestures slightly amusing. Are we looking at something natural and authentic here? But then again, this might be either something artificially fancy for a movie set, or maybe they were just being their normal Argentine selves, not exactly a people known for being all that ordinary or boring.

I guess we’ll never truly know. The best thing would be to ask the people who were involved, and ask them privately about the true and sometimes hidden ‘ways’ of the entertainment business of that time, but we’ve come quite a bit too late for that. I’m still waiting for someone to come up with a time machine, and when it arrives, I’ll be checking out some concerts and writing down a bunch of observations to tell you good people all about it. Well, I guess I’ll write it down but I’ll actually never come back to tell you, because I’ll probably be too busy in 1930s-1940s Argentina to ever come back to our current age. Farewell, suckers!

Pregonera (Flower Seller)
Lyrics: José Rótulo
Composition: Alfredo de Angelis

Princesita rubia de marfil
dueña de mi sueño juvenil,
la que pregonando flores
un día de abril,
recuerdo por las calles de París.
“Una rosa roja para usted,
roja como el ansia de querer,
rosas y claveles blancos,
blancos de ilusión”
y sigue la princesa su pregón.

Blonde princess of alabaster skin,
mistress of my youthful dreams…
she whom I remember, one April day,
selling flowers on the streets of Paris.
“A red rose for you,
red like the desire to love…
roses and white carnations,
white like a dream of hope…”
and so my princess, calling out, passes by.

“Un cariño y un clavel
para el ojal, para el querer.”
El clavel es de ilusión,
mi corazón rojo punzó.
Ay, la tarde va muriendo,
y el pregón me va siguiendo.
“Un cariñito y un clavel”
sólo el clavel, lo que quedó.

“A caress and a carnation,
for your jacket, for love.”
A carnation for hope,
for my yearning heart.
And as the evening fades,
her cry still follows me.
“A caress and a carnation!”
now, only the carnation remains.

Princesita rubia de marfil,
dónde fue tu risa tan sutil,
junto con tus flores muertas
muere mi ilusión.
Y escucho el eco tenue de tu voz.
Es como un susurro sin cesar,
que va despertando mi ansiedad,
es mi fantasía loca
que vuelve a soñar.
De nuevo soy feliz con tu cantar.

Blonde princess of alabaster skin,
what has become of your subtle laugh?
Along with your dead flowers
my hope dies too.
But as I hear the faint echo of your voice,
like a ceaseless whisper,
it awakens a feeble hope.
It’s my infatuation…
making me dream again.
Your song… making me happy again.