Astor Piazzolla (March 11, 1921 – July 4, 1992) was an Argentine tango comp… Read Full Bio ↴Astor Piazzolla (March 11, 1921 – July 4, 1992) was an Argentine tango composer and bandoneón player. His oeuvre revolutionized the traditional tango into a new style termed nuevo tango, incorporating elements from jazz and classical music. An excellent bandoneonist, he regularly performed his own compositions with different ensembles. He is known in his native land as "El Gran Astor" ("The Great Astor").

Ástor Pantaleón Piazzolla was born in Mar del Plata, Argentina in 1921 to immigrant Italian parents, 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. He also started playing 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 groups. The pianist Arthur Rubinstein (then living in Buenos Aires) advised him to study with the Argentine composer Alberto Ginastera. Delving into scores of Stravinsky, Bartók, Ravel, and others, he gave up tango temporarily and worked as a modernist classical composer.

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:
"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.

During the period of Argentine military dictatorship from 1976 to 1983, Piazzolla lived in France, 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):

In 1990 he suffered a thrombosis in Paris and he passed away two years later in Buenos Aires.

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.

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. He also recorded an album with jazz sax player Gerry Mulligan. 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) and "Adiós Nonino" (dedicated to his father) which he recorded many times with different musicians and ensembles. Biographers estimate that Piazzolla wrote around 3,000 pieces and recorded around 500.

He suffered a cerebral haemorrhage in Paris on 4 August 1990, which left him in a coma, and died in Buenos Aires, just under two years later on 4 July 1992, without regaining consciousness.

other albums not listed here
~ The Birth of Tango Nuevo, Vol. 1 - Sinfonia de Tango
~ Mis 30 Mejores Tangos
~ Piazzolla Interpreta A. Piazzolla (Original Album - Remastered)
~ Ensayos
~ Tiempo Nuevo
~ Se Armó
~ El Milrago - The Early Recordings, Vol. 2 (Astor Piazzolla With His First Own Orchestra, So Called 1946 Band.)
~ Tango Moderno

Cristal
Astor Piazzolla Lyrics

Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴

Tengo el corazón hecho pedazos,
Rota mi emoción en este día...
Noches y más noches sin descanso
Y esta desazón del alma mía...
¡Cuántos, cuántos años han pasado,
Grises mis cabellos y mi vida!
Loco... casi muerto... destrozado,
Con mi espíritu amarrado

A nuestra juventud.

Más frágil que el cristal
Fue mi amor
Junto a ti...
Cristal tu corazón, tu mirar, tu reír...
Tus sueños y mi voz
Y nuestra timidez
Temblando suavemente en tu balcón...
Y ahora sólo se
Que todo se perdió
La tarde de mi ausencia.
Ya nunca volveré, lo se, lo se bien, ¡nunca más!
Tal vez me esperarás, junto a Dios, ¡más allá!

Todo para mi se ha terminado,
Todo para mi se torna olvido.
¡Trágica enseñanza me dejaron
Esas horas negras que he vivido!
¡Cuántos, cuántos años han pasado,
Grises mis cabellos y mi vida!
Solo, siempre solo y olvidado,

Con mi espíritu amarrado
A nuestra juventud...

Overall Meaning

The lyrics to Astor Piazzolla's song Cristal depict a brokenhearted and emotionally shattered individual who is reflecting on his past love. The singer expresses his despair, acknowledging that his heart is in pieces and his emotions are shattered. He has been suffering sleepless nights and a deep sense of unrest within his soul. He compares his current state to his past, reminiscing on how much time has elapsed since then, how gray his hair has become, and how his spirit is now tied to their youth. He acknowledges his madness, near-death experiences, and emotional devastation.

The singer then reflects on their past love, describing it as fragile as crystal, and how it was once all-encompassing for him. He remembers the way her heart, gaze, and laughter shone like crystal, as well as their intimacy, dreams, and their shyness together. However, he realizes that he has lost it all, and that his prolonged absence has destroyed any chances of them rekindling their relationship. He has accepted that he'll never be able to return to her, but he still hopes that they will be reunited someday in a different world.

Line by Line Meaning

Tengo el corazón hecho pedazos,
My heart is shattered,

Rota mi emoción en este día...
My emotions are broken today...

Noches y más noches sin descanso
Nights and more nights without rest

Y esta desazón del alma mía...
And this uneasiness of my soul...

¡Cuántos, cuántos años han pasado,
How many, how many years have passed,

Grises mis cabellos y mi vida!
My hair and my life have turned gray!

Loco... casi muerto... destrozado,
Crazy.. almost dead.. destroyed,

Con mi espíritu amarrado
With my spirit tied

A nuestra juventud.
To our youth.

Más frágil que el cristal
More fragile than glass

Fue mi amor
Was my love