(This verges on a “commercial” post - which L rules allow once a year - to share and present to those who’ve never heard).
In 2000 after more than 10 years of continually collecting all the tango music I could find, and loving it and dancing and dj-ing and learning with a passion, something unique happened which changed my relationship with tango. It was an innocent question from a woman I dated which caused an epiphany. She grumpily asked while dancing, “why do you like that OLD music?” She was happy to dance all night to Color Tango or anything recent, but really did not want to hear the great old orquestas for more than a tanda at a time. It blew my mind that Biagi/D'Arienzo or Canaro or old Pugliese didn't make her jump up and want to dance. This really bothered me. It seemed to me she wasn’t HEARING the music and feeling it; and I knew she wasn’t alone in this. I started losing sleep over it. If people hearing just the noise and lack of quality caused them to totally miss the beauty and creativity in the music and the possibilities for their dancing, was there something I could do about that … humble, just-a-dancer and sound engineer me? And wouldn't dancers who already loved the old music not appreciate it even more if the quality improved from what is available on CDs? So I got serious about finding out if I could make a difference. Thus began my odyssey of tango restoration. My first renderings weren’t nearly as good as I’d hoped to achieve but people around the world (many here) encouraged me keep going. How I love them for that; THEY are actually responsible for the later break-through, you could say. Together with finding better source material, the pro audio technology rapidly progressed after 2006 and I kept buying new devices to aid in the work and developing nuanced techniques. Every time I made advances I went back over all my tracks and re-did them. Of course I am limited by how good my source material is, so I constantly collect, searching for versions even a teensy bit better that what I already have. My goal has been to put better sounding music in the hands of people who love tango and to make the dancehalls of the world create optimum environments for dancers. I teach dj’s how to be better through quality, organization and optimum choices in the moment. It’s a symbiotic relationship between me and dancers: I work on the music; people buy it and I put the money back in to revealing more and more of the old recordings in their original glory. I have almost 5,000 songs in my restored catalogue now, and I tell folks that not all are purely for dancing – some are just interesting for what the universe of tango recordings is and recreating the times in one’s mind. Those curiosities are basically thrown in for free in a package I call Collector. I tell you this so you know there is one guy in the world that can answer the question for skeptics as to WHY the old music is the best. “Listen to this!” Virtually no noise, everything enhanced and leveled, cut to optimum length for milonga play, sounding hot on any sound system in any dancehall. Organized so everything sits in chronological/alphabetical order in your Tango/Milonga/Vals folders. If there is a singer on the track, the name appears in the file name (Biagi 40 Ortiz_Todo Te Nombra - released in 1940 and Ortiz is the vocalist). Available in Wav or MP3 or both. Buy a few via download or buy a lot. I just want people to have it - sounding as good as it can today. I always tell people that the musicians and singers were kids when they made it – when you hear it as good as it can sound, it goes right to your heart with the force it had the day it was recorded. It wasn’t old then – and it doesn’t have to sound old now. So if you ever meet someone who would like to really hear it, please tell them about me. Based on the feedback I get, they will probably thank you. As much as hoping people would support me if they knew what I am doing, I’ve just wanted people to be aware of choosing the best music they can for dancing; being able to identify what sounds good and what ought to be replaced with a better choice. I also take my stories and tips on the road and love sharing when I get invitations to other cities. I love doing dj workshops for people who have no desire to dj; more knowledge from dancers makes everything work better and keep going up. I loved being in Pittsburgh; loved being in New York at New Year’s for 6 wonderful gigs and look forward to Australia’s south-eastern cities. And as always, thank you for reading. Keith Details and free demo and more: http://ToTANGO.net _______________________________________________ Tango-L mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/tango-l
