Photograph of Piazzolla playing his bandoneon.

Astor Piazzolla (March 11, 1921 – July 4, 1992) is widely considered the most important tango composer of the latter Twentieth Century. In addition to his work as a bandoneon player, his compositions revolutionized the traditional tango with a modern style — incorporating elements from jazz and classical music in a style termed nuevo tango. He is known in his native land of Argentina as "El Gran Astor" ("The Great Astor"). Image File history File links Astor_Piazzolla. ... Image File history File links Astor_Piazzolla. ... 11 March is the 70th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (71st in Leap year). ... 1921 (MCMXXI) was a common year starting on Saturday (see link for calendar). ... July 4 is the 185th day of the year (186th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 180 days remaining. ... 1992 (MCMXCII) was a leap year starting on Wednesday. ... Tango may refer to: Tango (dance) Tango music Tangos, a type of flamenco Tango Province, an old province of Japan. ... (19th century - 20th century - 21st century - more centuries) Decades: 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s The 20th century lasted from 1901 to 2000 in the Gregorian calendar (often from (1900 to 1999 in common usage). ... The bandone n is a free-reed instrument instrument particularly popular in Argentina. ... Jazz master Louis Armstrong remains one of the most loved and best known of all jazz musicians. ... Classical music is a broad, somewhat imprecise term, referring to music produced in, or rooted in the traditions of, European art, ecclesiastical and concert music, encompassing a broad period from roughly 1000 to the present day. ... Nuevo tango or Tango nuevo is a form of music, which was born as elements of jazz and classical music were incorporated into traditional Argentinian tango. ...

History

Born in Argentina in 1921, Piazzolla spent most of his childhood with his family in New York City. While there, he acquired fluency in four languages: Spanish, English, French, and Italian. In addition, he picked up the bandoneon, quickly rising to the status of child prodigy. While still quite young, he met Carlos Gardel, another great figure of Argentine tango. He returned to Argentina in 1937, where strictly traditional tango still reigned, and played in night clubs with a series of mediocre groups. Finally, the pianist Arthur Rubinstein (then living in Buenos Aires) advised him to study with the Argentinian composer Alberto Ginastera. Delving into scores of Stravinsky, Bartók, Ravel, and others, he gave up tango temporarily and worked as a modernist classical composer. 1921 (MCMXXI) was a common year starting on Saturday (see link for calendar). ... The city is at the center of international finance, politics, entertainment, and culture, and is one of the worlds major global cities (along with London, Tokyo and Paris) with a virtually unrivaled collection of museums, galleries, performance venues, media outlets, international corporations, and stock exchanges. ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... Carlos Gardel (1933) Carlos Gardel (11 December 1890 – 24 June 1935) was an enormously popular tango singer from Argentina (see birth-place controversy) who was killed in an airplane crash at the height of his career. ... 1937 (MCMXXXVII) was a common year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar). ... Arthur Rubinstein photographed by Carl Van Vechten, 1937 Arthur Rubinstein (January 28, 1887 – December 20, 1982) was a famous Polish-American pianist, best known for his performances of Chopin and his championing of Spanish music. ... Buenos Aires (Good Airs in Spanish, originally meaning Fair Winds) is the capital of Argentina and its largest city and port, as well as one of the largest cities in Latin America. ... Alberto Evaristo Ginastera (April 11, 1916 – June 25, 1983) was an Argentinian composer of classical music. ... Igor Fyodorovitch Stravinsky (Russian: ) (June 17, 1882 – April 6, 1971) was a Russian-French-American composer of modern classical music. ... Béla Viktor János Bartók (March 25, 1881 – September 26, 1945) was a composer, pianist and collector of Eastern European and Middle Eastern folk music. ... Joseph-Maurice Ravel (March 7, 1875 – December 28, 1937) was a French composer and pianist, known especially for the subtlety, richness, and poignancy of his music and generally considered to be one of the major composers of the 20th century. ...

At Ginastera's urging, in 1953 Piazzolla entered his "Buenos Aires" Symphony in a composition contest, and won a grant from the French government to study in Paris with the French composer and conductor Nadia Boulanger. The insightful Boulanger turned his life around in a day, as Piazzolla tells beautifully in his own words: Nadia Boulanger (September 16, 1887 – October 22, 1979) was an influential composer, conductor, and music professor. ...

When I met her, I showed her my kilos of symphonies and sonatas. She started to read them and suddenly came out with a horrible sentence: ‘It's very well written.’ And stopped, with a big period, round like a soccer ball. After a long while, she said: “Here you are like Stravinsky, like Bartók, like Ravel, but you know what happens? I can't find Piazzolla in this.” And she began to investigate my private life: what I did, what I did and did not play, if I was single, married, or living with someone, she was like an FBI agent! And I was very ashamed to tell her that I was a tango musician. Finally I said, “I play in a ‘night club.’” I didn't want to say “cabaret.” And she answered, “Night club, mais oui, but that is a cabaret, isn't it?” “Yes,” I answered, and thought, “I'll hit this woman in the head with a radio....” It wasn't easy to lie to her.

She kept asking: “You say that you are not pianist. What instrument do you play, then?” And I didn't want to tell her that I was a bandoneon player, because I thought, “Then she will throw me from the fourth floor.” Finally, I confessed and she asked me to play some bars of a tango of my own. She suddenly opened her eyes, took my hand and told me: “You idiot, that's Piazzolla!” And I took all the music I composed, ten years of my life, and sent it to hell in two seconds.

Piazzolla returned to Argentina in 1955, formed the Octeto Buenos Aires to play tangos, and never looked back.

Upon introducing his new approach to the tango (nuevo tango), he became a controversial figure among Argentines both musically and politically. The Argentine saying "in Argentina everything may change — except the tango" suggests some of the resistance he found in his native land. However, his music gained acceptance in Europe and North America, and his reworking of the tango was embraced by some liberal segments of Argentine society, who were pushing for political changes in parallel to his musical revolution. A satellite composite image of Europe Europe is the worlds second-smallest continent in terms of area, covering around 10,790,000 km² (4,170,000 sq mi) or 2. ... World map showing North America A satellite composite image of North America North America is a continent in the northern hemisphere bordered on the north by the Arctic Ocean, on the east by the North Atlantic Ocean, on the south by the Caribbean Sea, and on the west by the...

During the period of Argentine military dictatorship from 1976 to 1983, Piazzolla lived in Italy, but returned many times to Argentina, recorded there, and on at least one occasion had lunch with the dictator Jorge Rafael Videla. However, his relationship with the dictator might have been less than friendly, as recounted in Astor Piazzolla, A manera de Memorias (a comprehensive collection of interviews, constituting a memoir): 1976 (MCMLXXVI) is a leap year starting on Thursday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1983 (MCMLXXXIII) is a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Jorge Rafael Videla Redondo (born August 2, 1925 in Mercedes) was the de facto President of Argentina from 1976 to 1981. ...

Q: One year before the Los Largartos issue you went to Videla's house and had lunch with him, why did you accepted that invitation?

A: What an invitation! They sent a couple of guys in black suits and a letter with my name on it that said that Videla expected me a particular day in a particular place. I have a book around in some place, with pictures of all the guests: Eladia Bláquez, Daniel Tinayre, Olga Ferri, the composer Juan Carlos Tauriello, there were painters, actors [...]

- Astor Piazzolla, A manera de Memorias, Libros Perfil 1998, ISBN 9500809206, p. 85

Also, from the same source:

"Q: What do you think of Pinochet?"

"A: I think that we Argentinians needed a character like Pinochet. Maybe Argentina needed a bit of fascism at some moment of its history."

- ibid., p. 86

General Augusto José Ramón Pinochet Ugarte (born November 25, 1915) was dictator of the military government that ruled Chile from 1973 to 1990. ... This article needs to be cleaned up to conform to a higher standard of quality. ...

Music

Piazzolla's nuevo tango was distinct from the traditional tango in its incorporation of elements of jazz, its use of extended harmonies and dissonance, its use of counterpoint, and its ventures into extended compositional forms. Piazzolla also introduced new instruments that were not used in the traditional tango, including the flute, saxophone, electric guitar, electronic instruments, and a full jazz/rock drum kit. Jazz master Louis Armstrong remains one of the most loved and best known of all jazz musicians. ... Counterpoint is a musical technique involving the simultaneous sounding of separate musical lines. ... This article is about the musical instrument. ... Saxophones of different sizes play in different registers. ... An electric guitar is a type of guitar with a solid or semi-solid body that utilizes electronic pickups to convert the vibration of the steel-cored strings into electrical voltage. ... An electronic musical instrument is a musical instrument that produces its sounds using electronics. ... A drum kit (or drum set or trap set - the latter an old-fashioned term) is a collection of drums, cymbals and other percussion instruments arranged for convenient playing by a sole percussionist (drummer), usually for jazz, rock, or other types of contemporary music. ...

Piazzolla played with numerous ensembles beginning with the 1946 Orchestra, the 1955 "Octeto Buenos Aires", the 1960 "First Quintet", the 1971 "Noneto", the 1978 "Second Quintet" and the 1989 "Sextet". As well as providing original compositions and arrangements, he was the director and Bandoneon player in all of them. His numerous compositions include orchestral work such as the "Concierto para Bandoneón, Orquesta, Cuerdas y Percusión", "Doble-Concierto para Bandoneón y Guitarra", "Tres Tangos Sinfónicos" and "Concierto de Nácar para 9 Tanguistas y Orquesta", as well as song-form compositions that still today are well known by the general public in his country, like "Balada para un loco" (ballad for a madman). Biographers estimate that Piazzolla wrote around 3,000 pieces and recorded around 500. 1946 (MCMXLVI) was a common year starting on Tuesday. ... 1955 (MCMLV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ... 1960 (MCMLX) was a leap year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1971 (MCMLXXI) is a common year starting on Friday (click for link to calendar). ... 1978 (MCMLXXVIII) was a common year starting on Sunday (the link is to a full 1978 calendar). ... 1989 (MCMLXXXIX) is a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

See also

• María de Buenos Aires, a tango opera by Piazzolla

María de Buenos Aires is a tango opera (tango operita) by Astor Piazzolla. ...

External link

• Piazzolla.Org founded by John Buckman
• Todo tango:Piazzolla (in Spanish)
• Piazzolla Revolucionario (in Spanish)
• Querido Astor (in Spanish)
• Piazzollazzo (in Spanish)