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
Sur: Los Sueños
Astor Piazzolla Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Pompeya y, más alla, la inundación,
tu melena de novia en el recuerdo,
y tu nombre flotando en el adios...
La esquina del herrero barro y pampa,
tu casa, tu vereda y el zanjon
y un perfume de yuyos y de alfalfa
que me llena de nuevo el corazón.
Sur... paredón y después...
Sur... una luz de almacen...
Ya nunca me veras como me vieras,
recostado en la vidriera
y esperandote,
ya nunca alumbrare con las estrellas
nuestra marcha sin querellas
por las noches de Pompeya.
Las calles y las lunas suburbanas
y mi amor en tu ventana
todo ha muerto, ya lo se.
San Juan y Boedo antiguo, cielo perdido,
Pompeya y, al llegar al terraplen,
tus veinte años temblando de cariño
bajo el beso que entonces te robe.
Nostalgia de las cosas que han pasado,
arena que la vida se llevo,
pesadumbre del barrio que ha cambiado
y amargura del sueño que murio.
Sur... paredón y después...
Sur... una luz de almacen...
The lyrics to Astor Piazzolla's Sur describe the memories of a person who is emotionally attached to the old neighborhood of San Juan y Boedo antiguo, Pompeya, and the surroundings. The nostalgia is embedded in the remembrances of the old places, the smell of fields, the long hair of a beloved, and the essence of the past. The yearning for the old times is further emphasized by the pain that is associated with the loss of the old neighborhood. The singer feels as if everything has changed and what remains is only the bittersweet experiences that have become memories.
The chorus of the song, "Sur...paredón y después...Sur...una luz de almacen..." reinforces the emotional depth of the singer's feelings. It translates to "South...wall...and then...South...a light from a shop," evoking a reference to the past, where the wall and the light from the shop served as symbols of the beloved memories that have been lost forever. All that remains is a hint of the past represented by the light from the shop.
Overall, the song is a melancholic portrayal of how the past shapes us, how it is always with us, and how the loss of the past is a pain that never truly goes away.
Line by Line Meaning
San Juan y Boedo antiguo y todo el cielo,
Reminiscing on San Juan and Boedo's olden days, a time when the sky seemed infinite.
Pompeya y, más alla, la inundación,
Remembering Pompeya, a place now submerged in the floodwaters.
tu melena de novia en el recuerdo,
Thinking back on your bride-like hair, a striking memory.
y tu nombre flotando en el adios...
As your name drifts away in farewell.
La esquina del herrero barro y pampa,
Imagining the corner of the blacksmith amidst clay and grasslands.
tu casa, tu vereda y el zanjon
Visualizing your home, your sidewalk, and the ditch nearby.
y un perfume de yuyos y de alfalfa
Breathing in the aroma of weeds and alfalfa.
que me llena de nuevo el corazón.
Feeling my heart fill up with emotion all over again.
Sur... paredón y después...
South...the wall and beyond...
Sur... una luz de almacen...
South...a light from a warehouse...
Ya nunca me veras como me vieras,
You will never see me as you once did,
recostado en la vidriera
Reclining by the shop window,
y esperandote,
Anticipating your arrival,
ya nunca alumbrare con las estrellas
Never again will I light up the sky with stars
nuestra marcha sin querellas
Our journey without quarrels
por las noches de Pompeya.
Through the nights of Pompeya.
Las calles y las lunas suburbanas
The suburban streets and moons
y mi amor en tu ventana
And my love by your window,
todo ha muerto, ya lo se.
Everything has died, I know it.
San Juan y Boedo antiguo, cielo perdido,
San Juan and Boedo antique, lost sky,
Pompeya y, al llegar al terraplen,
Pompeya and, upon reaching the embankment,
tus veinte años temblando de cariño
Your twenty years trembling with affection
bajo el beso que entonces te robe.
Under the kiss that was stolen from you then.
Nostalgia de las cosas que han pasado,
Feeling nostalgic for things of the past,
arena que la vida se llevo,
Sand that life carried away,
pesadumbre del barrio que ha cambiado
Sorrow for the neighborhood that has changed,
y amargura del sueño que murio.
And bitterness for the dream that died.
Lyrics © Warner/Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: ANIBAL CARMELO TROILO, HOMERO NICOLAS MANZIONE
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
mendo cina
Lindo che!! Se nota que los años me están llegando...cada vez me gusta más el tango... Dicen que al tango no se lo busca..al tango se lo espera
Diego M
Yo soy re rockero y musico. Pero esta musica no puede no ser escuchada y valorada.. hermosa.. ah.. y soy mendocino tambien.. jaa
Fernando Casas
Soy un melomano consumado en busca de la libertad.
Solo Dios sabe porque sendos caminos he andado tratando de ser libre, sin caer en el libertinaje. Y ahora, al escuchar a Piazzolla me puedo proclamar libre, Piazzolla me ha liberado.
Carlos Libenson
Nunca más un genio como este!
Ricardo Diaz
Mi viejo Piazzolla, oh mágico Astor, toca con las teclas, de mi corazón
Laureano Dominguez
Excelente !! Gracias.
Marce Vega
Eterno Astor , nunca te vas a ir...