Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Tanda of the Week 39/2010 - Juan D'Arienzo (instrumentals)

Download or listen Tanda of the Week 39/2010 - D'Arienzo


1. Juan D'Arienzo - "Canaro En Paris" 1950
2. Juan D'Arienzo - "Yapeyu" 1951
3. Juan D'Arienzo - "El Simpatico" 1951
4. Juan D'Arienzo - "El Puntazo" 1952

Ok I'll admit it. I played at the Tokyo Milonga last friday and I went a bit overboard with romantic tangos for some of the japanese dancers. What can I say? I'm a romantic guy, heh. So this tanda is for Japan. My personal favorite from the tanda is "Yapeyu". I usually tag songs with "uptempo" or "dramatic" and so on but this song was tagged with only one word and some exclamation marks: "BASS!!!!!". Oh and "El Puntazo" was tagged with "uptempo killer!". Somehow tags like this catch your eye better when scrolling through your library of tangos.

ps. I was asked to play again at the Tokyo Milonga on the 7th of October so one too many romantic tandas certainly wasn't too much for the organizer. Next time though I will focus more on the rhythmic strong tangos like in this tanda.

D'Arienzo, Juan - TOTW - Todo Tango tango.info - iTunes Store

Monday, September 20, 2010

Tanda of the Week 38/2010 - Enrique Rodriguez

Download or listen Tanda of the Week 38/2010 - Rodriguez

1. Enrique Rodriguez / Armando Moreno - "Este Es Tu Tango" 1945
2. Enrique Rodriguez / Armando Moreno - "Ya No Cantas Chingolo" 1943
3. Enrique Rodriguez / Armando Moreno - "Traje De Novi" 1945
4. Enrique Rodriguez / Armando Moreno - "Tu Y Cielo Y Tu" 1944

For me Rodriguez is one of the orchestras I need to play in every milonga to make the night complete and this is possibly my favorite (and a great alternative to the most common) tanda from Rodriguez. The amazing "Este es tu tango" starts the tanda with it's strong midtempo drive and the tanda finishes with the beautiful "Tu Y Cielo Y Tu". When I created this tanda I had these two songs I wanted to play, but I didn't want to put them one after the other as they were too different in my opinion. I had to find songs that would work as a bridge between the two and was able to create a tanda which I feel has a smooth transition between songs that were slightly different style.

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As I am writing this and analyzing the tanda again I'm not at all certain that you can't play the example songs one after the other. Sometimes a dj thinks too much. But nevertheless... this tanda is lovely to dance to.

Sunday, September 12, 2010

Tanda of the Week 37/2010 - Adolfo Carabelli



1. Adolfo Carabelli / Alberto Gómez - "Alma" 1932
2. Adolfo Carabelli / Carlos Lafuente - "Mentira" 1931
3. Adolfo Carabelli / Mercedes Simone - "Volvé" 1932
4. Adolfo Carabelli / Alberto Vila, Alberto Gómez - "Tango del querer" 1932

http://open.spotify.com/user/anttiveikko/playlist/6OoCijXBh4T6WyiD40Et3R
http://www.deezer.com/playlist/1016081821Carabelli (1893-1947) was an outstanding pianist, composer and orchestra leader often described as "one of the musicians of most complete training that appeared in the tango field but also one of the most underrated".* Fortunately the tangos from Carabelli have lately been very popular among many dj's and dancers. * More about Carabelli at todotango.com

Carabelli, Adolfo - TOTW - Todo Tangotango.info - iTunes Store - TangoTunes 

Monday, September 6, 2010

Tanda of the Week 36/2010 - Francisco Canaro (milonga)




1. Francisco Canaro / Roberto Maida - "Milonga criolla" 1936
2. Francisco Canaro / Roberto Maida - "Silueta porteña" 1936
3. Francisco Canaro / Roberto Maida - "Milonga brava" 1938


http://open.spotify.com/user/anttiveikko/playlist/6u2nQEdOi3c8qatNgqOehm
http://www.deezer.com/playlist/1016192301I love the milongas from Francisco Canaro and here are some of my favorites. The tanda starts with two midtempo classics and finishes off with a great uptempo milonga. Unfortunately "Milonga Criolla" was not available on Spotify and Deezer so I changed it to "Milonga de mis Amores" for the playlists and the tanda for fine like that too.

A lot of dancers are absolutely crazy about milonga music and the milonga tandas can be their highlight of the night. Since only one out six tandas is milonga, meaning that in a 4 hour set there will be only 3 or 4 milonga tandas, the dj has to be sure that the dancers really get what they crave for.

Milonga tandas are most commonly only three songs and I believe this is the perfect lenght to dance milonga. Milonga is really about dancing the rhythm of the song and playing with it and a fourth song might be too much especially if the songs are uptempo. The dancers usually want to give it their all and even after three songs you can see people sweating and breathing heavy.

The dj has to feel what is the right tempo for a milonga tanda for the moment and the crowd. In some milongas you might find that people don't want fast milongas at all. But in general first milonga tanda of the night should be slower or midtempo and when the dancers are ready for it later in the night you should give them all that you got; Either having the tanda start off midtempo but finishing more uptempo or just going uptempo all the way. Then again... this theory is just one theory and often I find that people are ready for more uptempo milongas from the start and I might save something a bit slower for the late night.

Canaro, Francisco - TOTW - Todo Tango - tango.info - iTunes Store