Piazzolla

102 tracks that traces the history of tango. The first 3CDs are dedicated to Astor Piazzolla and contain his most well-known hits such as Libertango, Adios Nonino and Milonga del Angel. CD4 & CD5 cover 50 tracks from the Golden Age of Tango, featuring Carlos Gardel, Osvaldo Pugliese, Anibal Troilo, Juan d'Arienzo, Julio De Caro and others.

The highlight of the Chandos disc is a real rarity, the 1953 Sinfonietta written as a fruit of Piazzolla’s studies with Ginastera prior to his trip to Nadia Boulanger in Paris. Vigorously rhythmic (as one might expect), the three spans are dramatic, sober and jubilant by turns, even if the melodies do lack the distinctive Piazzolla sound. It’s a well-constructed work, though, and Gabriel Castagna’s account is full of verve.

Star violinist Arabella Steinbacher presents Antonio Vivaldi's world-famous Four Seasons alongside Astor Piazzolla's Cuatro estaciones porteñas, creating a lively combination of baroque and tango. The enormous popularity of Vivaldi's Four Seasons tends to make us forget the original and ground-breaking nature of these violin concertos. Coupling them with Piazzolla's tango-inspired Four Seasons of Buenos Aires makes both pieces sound fresher than ever before, thanks to Steinbacher's personal engagement with the repertoire and the inspired accompaniment of the Münchener Kammerorchester.

A rendition of a tango operita, commissioned by the Argentinian Ministry of Culture (this rendition anyway), was revived by violinist Gidon Kremer, who had such a love for the original LPs from Piazzolla and Horacio Ferrer that he wanted to recreate the music. Ferrer was kept on as El Duende (the Goblin) – the role that he created when he wrote the libretto thirty years earlier. Regrettably, Piazzolla had passed on prior to the remake. Nonetheless, the arrangements and orchestrations are remarkable. The suffering and the passion of Maria (the main character in the show) are perfectly portrayed by the tango. The music changes forms as her character progresses, taking on traditional tangos, modern tangos, milongas, waltzes, and other styles to reflect changes in Maria. The music is always well-composed. This is an opera for the display of modern music, and the tango of Piazzolla is modern music at its finest.

Who is María? Horacio Ferrer,librettist of this unconventional operita , said that she was a representation of Buenos Aires, embodying the spirit of tango itself. María de Buenos Aires lies outside any known genre. According to Ferrer, its highly poetic libretto was written not to be understood, but to create emotion and atmosphere .Piazzolla's music, too, offers a charged mix of classical forms and Argentinian traditions milonga, tango and the sparring spoken word of the traditional payada. In this,the first major recording since the 1980s, Delphian stalwarts Mr McFall's Chamber are joined by their long-term collaborators Valentina Montoya Martínez and Nicholas Mulroy, narrator Juanjo Lopez Vidal, and internationally acclaimed tango musicians Victor Villena and Cyril Garac.

Latvian violinist Gidon Kremer's 2000 release Eight Seasons is a conceptual masterwork. Kremer, long known for his skillful interpretations of Astor Piazzolla's Argentinean tangos, had the brilliant idea of matching four of the Latin master's tone poems of the seasons in his native Buenos Aires with Antonio Vivaldi's conceptually similar masterpiece "The Four Seasons," alternating seasons between the two works. Besides the conceptual perfection of the idea, the performances are exquisite. Kremer and his conservatory orchestra, the Kremerata Baltica, do a particularly masterful job with the Vivaldi, avoiding the ornate bloat that affects so many recordings of this work. Their performances are brisk and to-the-point, with bright tempos that add a vitality not often found in this rather shopworn old standard. As always, Kremer's solos in the Piazzolla works are absolutely superb, with the dramatic flourishes of the massed string section providing startling counterpoint, especially on the breathtaking "Verano Porteno". Eight Seasons is a truly remarkable work by an underrated performer.

The Pulsacion set is sort of a musical orphan that has been tacked on to other compilation CDs over the years, but here it is in the logical sequence of its original issue. Those who have never heard it will find it surprisingly different from much of Piazzolla's other works. Different though it is, Pulsacion still screams Piazzolla.

Ástor Pantaleón Piazzolla (Spanish pronunciation: [piasola], Italian pronunciation: [pjattsɔlla]; March 11, 1921 – July 4, 1992) was an Argentine tango composer, bandoneon player and arranger. His oeuvre revolutionized the traditional tango into a new style termed nuevo tango, incorporating elements from jazz and classical music. A virtuoso bandoneonist, he regularly performed his own compositions with a variety of ensembles.
In 1992, American music critic Stephen Holden described Piazzolla as "the world's foremost composer of tango music"