Search - Astor Piazzolla :: Muerte del Angel

Recorded in 1973, this short recording of Astor Piazzolla's newly lean quintet shows the composer reaching away from the Conjunto 9's larger sound and toward a more rootsy, almost stark take on the "new tango." Piazzolla's bandoneon stands out here as an often doleful flag, reaching points of such pathos that the ensemble responds with equally hair-raising energy. The passion of the full-group parts is almost physical, with the violin churning and hitting upward-tilted glissandi that almost shriek and the piano taking manic downward tumbles. Although Piazzolla helped birth the new tango in the mid-1950s, there is a constant sense of discovery in this set, much different than the rounded sense of perfect, and perfectly executed, exactness that marks fellow classics like Tango Zero Hour and the Vienna Concert. --Andrew Bartlett