A Century of Parisien Tango
Gwen-Haël Denigot
This article contains excerpts from the book Dictionnaire Passionnée du Tango co-edited by Gwen Haël Denigot,
Jean-Louis Mingalon and Emmanuelle Honorin and published by Seuil, in 2015
On the Western side of the Atlantic, they say:
Buenos Aires is the wife, Paris is the mistress
Paris has infected, and sometimes upset, the history of
tango. The first intervention took place at the beginning
of the 20th century. when Parisian high society falls head
over heels in love with this music and dance, born about
thirty years earlier in Argentina and Uruguay. The French
capital, considered at that time to be the cultural center
of the world, lent its nobility to the tango. Paris offered at
an ideal place for the reception for the tango, the cabaret,
a formula that has evolved since 1911.
It all begins with a legend. Around 1905-1906, a few mu-
sical scores arrived in Europe aboard the Argentinian
frigate, Sarmiento, at the port of Marseille. From there,
they must have taken to Paris. Among these melodies
to arrive from the Rio de la Plata, were two titles ahich
would become huge successes in coming the years —
El Choclo and La Morocha. An alternative hypothesis is
that a French violinist, named Pierre Baetz was engaged
on a liner between Le Havre and Buenos Aires. after
hearing El Entrerriano, he is said to have stolen tango
scores there to publish them in hs own house of musical
editions which would later become Universal Editions,
after its purchase by the Baquet brothers.
Beyond 1907, the hypotheses give way to almost
certainties since many testimonies exist. In that year,
the company Gath & Chaves sent to Paris some
musicians to record with a new process, acoustic
disc recording.
The Uruguayan singer-actor-songwriter Alfredo
Gobbi and Uruguayan singer-songwriter Flora Ro-
driguez, along with the Argentine composer-song-
writer-guitarist-singer Ángel Villoldo arrived in Paris
as special envoys. . In those same years, l’Orchestre
de la Garde Républicaine played many tangos, in-
cluding a recorded version of El Sergeant Cabral by
Manuel Campoamor.Gobbi, who will return not re-
turn to Argentina until 1914, records, publishess his
music scores with Baetz. The Gobbi couple performs
in the great music halls of Europe, before giving birth
a boy who is to become one of the greatest musi-
cians in the history of tango, Alfredo Gobbi.
— 5 —
Alfredo Gobbi.
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