Classical Music | Music for Trio

Recorded on 12/18/2013, uploaded on 07/02/2014

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

Ástor Piazzolla was the foremost composer and ambassador of tango music. Born in Argentina, Piazzolla lived in New York from 1924 until 1937, where he tuned into the vibrant jazz scene and bandleaders such as Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway. At age 12, he received his first bandoneon (a type of button accordion that is the principal voice of tango), and began playing music from the classical repertoire. In 1937, Piazzolla joined the popular tango orchestra of Anibal Troilo, and established himself as a talented bandoneon player and arranger, at the same time, continuing to study classical music with the composer Alberto Ginastera and others, including Nadia Boulanger in Paris. Back in Argentina in the late 1950s, Piazzolla laid the groundwork for what became known as tango nuevo – new tango. In the ensuing years his music increasingly used dissonance, metrical shifts, counterpoint, and other techniques inspired by modern classical composition and jazz orchestras. Some tango purists were incensed by these radical departures from tradition, and in the late 1960s even Argentina’s military government criticized Piazzolla for being too avant-garde. 

Although perhaps inspired in some way by Vivaldi’s famous concertos, the movements of Piazzolla’s Cuatro Estaciones Porteñas (The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires) originally were not conceived as a suite. The Spring movement was composed in 1965, Autumn in 1969, and Summer and Winter both in 1970, and they were originally scored for violin (viola), piano, electric guitar, double bass and bandoneón. The piano trio version is by José Bragato (b.1915), a cellist who often performed with Piazzolla.      Program notes by Andrea Lamoreaux

Courtesy of International Music Foundation.