Enrique Santos Discépolo
Encyclopedia
Enrique Santos Discépolo (Discepolín) (27 March 1901 - 23 December 1951) was an Argentine
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
tango and milonga
Milonga
Milonga can refer to an Argentine, Uruguayan, and Southern Brazilian form of music which preceded the tango and the dance form which accompanies it, or to the term for places or events where the tango or Milonga are danced...
musician and composer, author of famous tangos such as Cambalache and many others performed by several of the most important singers of his time, amongst them notably Carlos Gardel
Carlos Gardel
Carlos Gardel was a singer, songwriter and actor, and is perhaps the most prominent figure in the history of tango. He was born in Toulouse, France, although he never acknowledged his birthplace publicly, and there are still claims of his birth in Uruguay. He lived in Argentina from the age of two...
.
Discépolo was born in Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
. He was attracted to the arts from an early age and tried acting and theater writing (with moderate success) before finally "arriving" to Tango
Tango music
Tango is a style of ballroom dance music in 2/4 or 4/4 time that originated among European immigrant populations of Argentina and Uruguay . It is traditionally played by a sextet, known as the orquesta típica, which includes two violins, piano, double bass, and two bandoneons...
. Even when his decision to write popular music wasn't totally separated from his previous exchanges with theater and acting
Acting
Acting is the work of an actor or actress, which is a person in theatre, television, film, or any other storytelling medium who tells the story by portraying a character and, usually, speaking or singing the written text or play....
, his older brother Armando resisted this move and therefore in the beginning things weren't easy for Enrique. Armando had taken over his education after his parent died when Enrique was very young.
He wrote a few songs (including, the later famous Que vachaché, an old lunfardo
Lunfardo
Lunfardo is a dialect originated and developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in the lower classes in Buenos Aires and the surrounding Gran Buenos Aires, and from there spread to other cities nearby, such as Rosario and Montevideo, cities with similar socio-cultural situations...
phrase meaning "Whatcha gonna do") with little success until his break came in 1928, when singer Azucena Maizani performed his Esta noche me emborracho ("Tonight I'm getting drunk"). Days after this performance, the lyrics to this tango circulated across the nation and gave him notoriety. Later on that year, actress and singer Tita Merello
Tita Merello
Laura Ana Merello best known as Tita Merello was a prominent Argentine film actress, tango dancer and singer...
rescued Que vachaché, and propelled it to the same popularity as Esta noche me emborracho. To finish a great year in 1928, he also met his wife, Tania, who would be with him for the rest of his life.
He continued to gain notoriety in the ensuing years, and, in 1935, he wrote "Cambalache
Cambalache
Cambalache is an Argentina's tango composed in 1934 by Enrique Santos Discépolo for the movie The Soul of the Accordion , released the following year.-Context:...
", a song whose lyrics not only reflected the world political climate of the era, but also almost predicted its future. Argentines sometimes contemplate on how much those lyrics still reflect life in the world today, some 80 years later.
Style
Discépolo wasn't as prolific as some other TangoTango music
Tango is a style of ballroom dance music in 2/4 or 4/4 time that originated among European immigrant populations of Argentina and Uruguay . It is traditionally played by a sextet, known as the orquesta típica, which includes two violins, piano, double bass, and two bandoneons...
writers (like Enrique Cadícamo
Enrique Cadícamo
Enrique Domingo Cadícamo was a prolific Argentine tango lyricist, poet and novelist. From an initial Symbolist bent, he developed a distinctive, lunfardo-rich style from an early age, and by 1925 he had his first piece, Pompas de jabón, sung by Carlos Gardel...
, for example), but he was very versatile in his styling. He was not only able to write ironic and moralistic songs ("Que vachaché", "Yira... yira...", "Que sapa señor", "Cambalache"), but also romantic ("Sueño de juventud"), sarcastic ("Justo el 31", "Chorra"), expressionist ("Soy un arlequín", "Quién más, quién menos"), passionate ("Confesión", "Canción desesperada") and nostalgic ones("Uno", "Cafetín de Buenos Aires").
His tango songs, as those of most other tango composers, make extensive use of Lunfardo
Lunfardo
Lunfardo is a dialect originated and developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in the lower classes in Buenos Aires and the surrounding Gran Buenos Aires, and from there spread to other cities nearby, such as Rosario and Montevideo, cities with similar socio-cultural situations...
, thus making understanding his lyrics an exercise in patience for listeners unused to that dialect.
He died after suffering a stroke on Christmas Eve
Christmas Eve
Christmas Eve refers to the evening or entire day preceding Christmas Day, a widely celebrated festival commemorating the birth of Jesus of Nazareth that takes place on December 25...
in 1951.
Selected Songs
- Que vachaché ("Whatcha gonna do")
- Yira... yira... ("Go round... and round...")
- Que sapa señor ("What's up sir")
- Cambalache ("Junkshop")
- Sueño de juventud ("Dream of youth")
- Justo el 31 ("Right on the 31")
- Chorra ("She-Thief")
- Soy un arlequín ("I am a harlequin")
- Quién más, quién menos ("Who more, who less")
- Confesión ("Confession")
- Canción desesperada ("Desperate song")
- Uno ("One", in the figurative sense of "oneself")
- Cafetín de Buenos Aires ("Buenos Aires Cafe")