When I started dancing and listening to tango music two years ago, I quickly discovered that one of the easiest ways to identify an orchestra was to pay attention to the final two chords of the song (the dominanc-tonic, characteristic “chan-chan” ending ). Each orchestra plays those chords in its own, distinctive way, so by learning how the chords sound like, one can infer the orchestra even of songs one is unfamiliar with. The video below, which I created a while ago for my own amusement, provides a sample of the tango endings of 20 of the most popular tango orchestras. I am now posting it here in case it is of interest to readers of this blog.
Author Archives: Pablo Stafforini
My favorite performances: La capilla blanca (Di Sarli)
My choice for this week is ‘La capilla blanca’ (Carlos Di Sarli with Alberto Podestá, 1944). I reviewed 36 performances.
My favorite: Michelle & Murat Erdemsel and Roxana Suárez & Sebastián Achával (ex aequo).
I also liked the performance by Natacha Lockwood & Claudio Coppola.
My favorite tandas: D’Agostino – ‘Adiós, arrabal’
A “gently melancholic” tanda about things past (“la milonga porteña, que nunca más volverá“). I am not at all bothered by the fact that the first song was recorded more than a decade after the other three and does not feature Ángel Vargas–especially since ‘Café Domínguez’ is one of the most beautiful tangos of all time–, but purists might want to replace it with ‘Mi viejo barrio’ or ‘Quien tuviera dieciocho años’ (both from 1944 and sung by Vargas).
- Café Domínguez (1955)
- Tres esquinas (1941)
- Adiós, arrabal (1941)
- A pan y agua (1945)
My favorite performances: Invierno (Canaro)
My choice for this week is ‘Invierno’ (Francisco Canaro with Roberto Maida, 1937). I reviewed 56 performances.
My favorite: Noelia Hurtado & Pablo Rodríguez.
Home
Hey there, I’m Pablo. I’m the director of Tlön, a small org that translates content related to effective altruism, existential risk, and related topics into various languages. I am also a co-host of the podcast La bisagra de la historia and a member of the Samotsvety forecasting group. I used to write a newsletter together with Matthew van der Merwe.
I’ve been part of the effective altruism community since its inception and have collaborated with several EA orgs and people over the years. As Will MacAskill‘s research assistant, I was responsible for much of the background research for Doing Good Better.
Some of my other interests and hobbies include modern and classical languages, travel, tango dancing and DJing, minimalism, Borges, and wasting time on my Emacs configuration.
Feel free to get in touch. You can also find me on the Effective Altruism Forum, Metaculus and LessWrong, though I am no longer active on these platforms.
We live during the hinge of history. Given the scientific and technological discoveries of the last two centuries, the world has never changed as fast. We shall soon have even greater powers to transform, not only our surroundings, but ourselves and our successors. If we act wisely in the next few centuries, humanity will survive its most dangerous and decisive period. Our descendants could, if necessary, go elsewhere, spreading through this galaxy. In Nietzsche’s words, there has never been such a new dawn and clear horizon, and such an open sea.
— Derek Parfit
My favorite tandas: Di Sarli – ‘Tristeza marina’
A dreamy, evocative Di Sarli/Rufino tanda with a marine flavor.
- Tristeza marina (1943)
- Navegante (1943)
- Verdemar (1943)
- Mañana zarpa un barco (1942)
My favorite performances: La bruja (D’Arienzo)
My choice for this week is ‘La bruja’ (Juan D’Arienzo with Alberto Echagüe, 1938). I reviewed 55 performances.
My favorite: Stefania Colina & Juan Martín Carrara.
I also liked the performances by Mary Ann & Oscar Casas, Paulina Cazabon & Carlitos Espinoza and Noelia Hurtado & Carlitos Espinoza.
My favorite performances: Ella es así (Donato)
My choice for this week is ‘Ella es así’ (Edgardo Donato with Horacio Lagos, 1938). I reviewed 66 performances.
My favorite: María Antonieta Tuozzo & Ezequiel Herrera.
I also liked the performances by Ariadna Naveira & Fernando Sánchez and Daniela Pucci & Luis Bianchi.
My favorite performances: Cara sucia (Di Sarli)
My choice for this week is ‘Cara sucia’ (Carlos Di Sarli, 1957). I reviewed 17 performances.
My favorite: Michelle & Murat Erdemsel.
I also liked the performance by Mila Vigdorova & Rodrigo Fonti.
My favorite performances: Amurado (Laurenz)
My choice for this week is ‘Amurado’ (Pedro Laurenz with Juan Carlos Casas, 1940). I reviewed 20 performances.
My favorite: Ariadna Naveira & Fernando Sánchez.