Program: Quinteto Astor Piazzolla
Celebrating 100 Years of Piazzolla
November 20, 2021
Berklee Performance Center
Performers
Pablo Mainetti — bandoneón
Serdar Geldymuradov — violin
Armando de la Vega — guitar
Bárbara Varassi Pega — piano
Daniel Falasca — bass
Julián Vat — musical director
About Quinteto Astor Piazzolla
New Tango composer, player, and bandleader Astor Piazzolla (1921–1992) left a challenging legacy.
His music is a lived-in mix of traditional tango, classical music, jazz, and even elements of popular styles such as Neapolitan song and klezmer. It can be lyrical, elegant — and coarse. It might sound logically designed yet push forward with the bad disposition of a street brawler. This music is a Piazzolla self-portrait in motion, constantly remade and reframed; a biography told in winks and nods, fleeting phrases, and unexpected turns.
His New Tango attracted admirers and collaborators from distant regions of the music universe, including classical luminaries such as Yo-Yo Ma, Mstislav Rostropovich, Gidon Kremer, and the Kronos Quartet; jazz masters such as Gerry Mulligan, Phil Woods, Gil Evans, Al DiMeola, and Gary Burton, and even dance music diva Grace Jones, who turned one of his pieces into a club hit.
To play this music, instrumental virtuosity is essential — but not enough. Piazzolla’s New Tango also demands a certain attitude, commitment, fearlessness, and an undefinable quality in the playing that he called roña, grime — the perfection of the imperfect.
For the Quinteto Astor Piazzolla, the repertory ensemble of the Astor Piazzolla Foundation, the nightly challenge is not all on the music stand, but conjuring that spirit in the music. Read more.
Astor Piazzolla Biography
Latest Recording
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