(003) A History of Tango Music

(003) [Julio De Caro (1899 - 1980)]
Musician, violinist, leader and composer.
(Windows media file sample 'MALA PINTA' )

Julio De Caro and Carlos Gardel were born both on 11 December which has been named as the International Day of Tango.

He was born in Buenos Aires in a big family with Italian roots. Despite his father's wishes for his sons to study music and graduate from university Julio and his brother Fransisco devoted themselves to Tango only. It is important to note that De Caro’s importance for tango has been very significant and that the best example to to this is expressed by Astor Piazzolla that - in respect to the great tango artist – recorded the virtuous tango Decarisimo.


He was very reluctant to accept the evolution in tango and in fact paid very strict obedience to historical Decarism with regards to the instrumental aspect of tango. There are over 420 recordings of his works which were mostly, except 38 works, done in the 30 years prior to 1940.

De Caro managed to maintain the essence of the tango as he saw it originating in the slums, brave and playful, and blended it with a sentimental and melancholic expressivities that were unique to him and not done before. He brought together the folk root and the pro-European tango influences in the way that formed the foundation of "classic tango".

Amazing is the recognition of how an evolutionary tango composer himself became the classic!


24tango.