El Cafe

EL CAFE

PLAYLIST

01 BOLICHE, Angel Vargas
02 VAYAMOS A AQUEL BAR, Argentino Ledesma
03 CAFE DE LOS ANGELITOS, Blanca Mooney
04 EL ULTIMO CAFE, Rosana Falasca
05 CAFETIN DE BUENOS AIRES, Enrique Dumas
06 CAFE LA HUMEDAD, Ruben Juarez

SYNOPSIS

Early in the twentieth century El cafe became a neighborhood institution. It was the place to meet friends who conformed to a particular category, people with whom one could talk about everyday life, about football and politics, on the events of the neighborhood or personal problems. These conversations rarely entered their respective homes as if home and coffee were completely opposite places.
For the tango, El cafe is also the site where one can learn from other more experienced men.

“Cafe in a Buenos Aires neighborhood Sunday night, paper’s sixth edition, cup, the topic, soccer and ponies.
Four guys around the table discussing whether River Plate is better than Boca Jrs.
If Leguisamo is a better jockey than Antunez or which orchestra is superior.
Anselmo shares his sorrows, Ricardo his bad luck, and Jose very sadly tells that his things are getting worse.”

El Cafe is the warm shelter of the man who is alone and waiting, smoking, staring distantly into his memory. It represents the occult science of knowledge, the quiet intelligence.
Going to a coffee always gave me an almost savage joy since I was very young, when after the theater my father would treat me to a delicious chocolate with churros. Why in the cafe? Yeah, sure, we could go anywhere, to a bar, or a self-service. But what mattered about El cafe, was the magical air, that air of magic hospitality that sometimes made me think that the elves of Buenos Aires  lived there…

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CHARACTERS OF THE BUENOS AIRES FAUNA

LISTEN TO PROGRAM

PLAYLIST

1.SHUSHETA, Angel Vargas with Angel D’Agostino
2. NINO BIEN, Tita Merello with Francisco Canaro
3. COMPADRON, Carlos Dante with Alfredo De Angelis
4. AMARROTO, Alberto Echague with Juan D’Arienzo
5. CHORRA, Hugo del Carril

SYNOPSIS

The tango lyrics draw images of characters of the Buenos Aires fauna who have been typified as the years have given the tango a narrative character and have accepted it as a faithful reflection of the city and the people that gave it origin.

There is the phony type who feels the need to try to be what he is not, mainly because he believes that that will overcome his innate complex of inferiority and social disorientation. The niño bien represents that caricature. Other characters are notorious for their propensity to boast. The compadron, for example is the caricature of a false gutsy man, and often confused it with the compadre. The compadrito, is essentially an imitator, a half size hero, a fetus that didn’t reach its term, a suburban premature baby, a braggart, indecent, somebody similar to the dandy from Madrid. He is recognized by his gratuitous provocation, the boastfulness of a false anger, and taking credit for other people’s feats.

For a society that inherited from Spain an allergy to work, all type of tasks that generally involve manual activity or a relation of dependency, was reserved for riffraff, rabble, the tanos, the gallegos. In contrast, there is a character who makes an obsession of work, thus becoming the target of ridicule by the wise guys because he does not to share the same tastes in matters of leisure and relaxation. The obsession is more about being stingy, being an amarroto. The amarroto eventually falls in love with a mature matron that spends his money as if there is no tomorrow. That is the deserved punishment he gets for not being capable of enjoying a hard fought horse race at the racetrack.

The ambitious and egoistic woman also has her place in our history. Product perhaps of a society where being born in the wrong cradle is akin to a life sentence of poverty and suffering, the tango draws images of women without purity, with no heart and no feelings. A common scheme of the social life of the population is to seek a wealthy future for a maiden daughter, speculating with candidates with money and if it is possible without a brain. Too late, the man discovers that he married a chorra, a thief, not only of his fortune but also of his love. For this man there will never be a good woman that will restore his faith and his confidence in love.

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