Tango Time Machine — Tango Decoder

Cotorrita de la suerte: Fortune-telling parrot

Here's an updated version of the song. For clarity, I've changed the title from "Lucky parrot" to "Fortune-telling parrot." It works much better, in my humble opinion. Thanks to my friends at "The Tango Now Playing In My Head," including Theresa Faus, Paul Bottomer, Lucas TangoDJ, for their helpful input. 

Cotorrita del la suerte (1927)
Music by Alfredo De Franco
Lyrics by José De Grandis

How the obrerita—the little working girl—coughs at night,
Coughs and suffers the cruel premonition
That the candle of her life is dimming,
That her tender heart will never be free of this torment!
This frisky, high-spirited obrerita,
Who once brought such happiness to her little home,
Now endures long hours of agony
Knowing there’s no salvation from her malady.

A man passes, crying,
“Fortune-telling parrot!
Predicts life or death.
Want to try your luck?”

The obrerita resists, doubting and fearing
the rose-colored card
The parrot is picking out.

On reading it, her face brightens,
and trembling at the promised good fortune
she joyfully reads: A sweetheart, long life.
And she stifles the sob in her throat.
From then on her days slip by,
Anxiously awaiting her dearly beloved,
And on the afternoon of her sad death
She asks her mother: “Didn’t he come?”

A man passes, crying,
“Fortune-telling parrot!”

[Castellano]

¡Cómo tose la obrerita por las noches!
Tose y sufre por el cruel presentimiento
de su vida que se extingue y el tormento
no abandona su tierno corazón;
la obrerita juguetona, pizpireta,
la que diera a su casita la alegría,
la que vive largas horas de agonía
porque sabe que a su mal no hay salvación.
Pasa un hombre quien pregona:
"¡Cotorrita de la suerte!
Augura la vida o muerte.
¿Quiere su suerte probar?"
La obrerita se resiste
por la duda, temerosa,
y un papel de color rosa
la cotorra va a sacar.

Al leerlo su mirada se animaba
y temblando ante la dicha prometida
tan alegre leyó: Un novio, larga vida...
Y un sollozo en su garganta reprimió.
Desde entonces deslizáronse sus días
esperando al bien amado ansiosamente
y la tarde en que moría, tristemente,
preguntó a su mamita: ¿No llegó?

MILONGA DE MIS AMORES

"No one understood better the sentiments and the sorrows of my neighborhood... Even so, they forgot you, and in the alleyway only a guitar remembers... creole like you. And in its moaning it shakes me to the core."

Milonga de mis amores (My beloved milonga) 
Music: Pedro Laurenz
Lyrics: José María Contursi (as a child, right) 
English-language version Copyright © 2014 by Tango Decoder 

Song data at tango.info.

Listen: Charlo • Pedro Laurenz/Farrell • Juan D'Arienzo • Francisco Canaro

Oigo tu voz... Engarzada en los acordes de una lírica guitarra, Sos milonga de otros tiempos... yo te vi crecer Prendida en las polleras de un bailongo guapo y rompedor Como jamás ha de volver. Nadie tal vez... Comprendió mejor las penas y el sentir de mi barriada, Sin embargo te olvidaron y en el callejón Tan sólo una guitarra te recuerda... criolla como vos Y en su gemir tiembla mi ser. Vuelvo cansado de todo Y en mi corazón, lloran los años, Mi vida busca tan sólo La tranquilidad, del viejo barrio. Y encuentro todo cambiado, menos tu canción Milonga mía... El progreso ha destrozado Toda la emoción de mi arrabal. Quiero olvidar... Y tus notas van llenando, de tristeza el alma mía, He cruzado tantas veces ese callejón Llevando entre los labios un silbido alegre y tu cantar Emborrachando el corazón. Era feliz... Entregado a las caricias de la única sincera, Que acunó una primavera que no floreció Milonga... ya no puedo continuar, el llanto me venció ¡Quiero olvidar... y pienso más...!

I hear your voice set to the chords of a dreamy guitar... You are the milonga of another time... I saw you grow, caught up in the swinging skirts of a cracking good barrio dance party* like we'll never see again. No one, perhaps, understood better the sentiments and the sorrows of my neighborhood...  Even so they forgot you and in the alleyway, only a guitar remembers... creole like you. And in its moaning it shakes me to the core. I return tired of it all, and in my heart the years weep. My life seeks only the tranquility of the old neighborhood. And I find everything changed except your song, my milonga... Progress has destroyed the feeling of my arrabal. I want to forget, and your notes keep filling my heart with sadness... I have crossed this alleyway so many times, bearing a happy whistle on my lips, your song intoxicating my heart. I was happy, surrendered to the caresses of the only pure one, who rocked in her arms a primrose that didn’t flower*  Milonga, I can’t go on any longer... weeping overcame me... I want to forget... and I can't stop thinking...

NOTES:

* lyrical guitar: una guitarra lírica. Lírica means lyric or lyrical. Secondary meanings include soñador, dreamy, and utopian or fantastic. Perhaps a guitar whose sound recalls the "milonga of yore" would have a dreamy sound. (Revised 17/7/14)

* cracking good barrio dance party: un bailongo guapo y rompedor. The bailongos were community dance parties often attended by both creoles (Argentines of Spanish descent, later all Europeans) and blacks. It was a melting pot for the transculturation of music and dance that gave rise to the milonga and the tango in the late 19th century. The phrase guapo y rompedor is a slang expression signifying something that is guapo, admirable or of high quality, and rompedor, "breaker," perhaps equivalent to the English expressing "cracking good."

* who cradled in her arms a primrose that did not bloom: The primrose is a symbol of purity. The image suggests a girl who never came to womanhood.

 

 

 

El Cocherito: A streetcar named Tango

"I swear! How peacefully I'd die, if one day while dancing a tango my heart would just give out."

EL COCHERITO (The Streetcar Conductor)
Tango, 1944
Letra de Santiago Adamini
Musica de Ángel D'Agostino
Musica de Alfredo Attadia

Song data at Tango.info 
Listen on YouTube

Bailando!  Empezó a vivir la vida De muchacho paseandero Bailarín de los primeros. Gabino!  Un mentado cocherito Que vivía sus andanzas En el barrio Caballito. Silbando!  Noche a noche en una esquina A la luz de un farolito Esperaba al organito. Y luego Cuando el tango le invitaba A bailarlo se entregaba Empleando el corazón. Bailando en las calles llegó el cocherito a ser en el barrio un gran bailarín;  Soñaba los tangos que el viejo organito Llevaba al suburbio a hacerlo feliz. En todos los bailes que el mozo llegaba Bailando ganaba algún corazón, Su estampa porteña que tanto gustaba Por donde él bailaba, recuerdos dejó. [Sabiendo Que su nombre cotizaban Tomó rumbo para el centro A buscar otro elemento. Y pronto Consiguió lo que él quería El aplauso que anhelaba Desde sus primeros días.] Pasaron Muchos años y una noche Entre amigos y algo en copas El muchacho les decía: ”Les juro que tranquilo moriría, si bailando un tango, un día me fallara el corazón”

Dancing! One of the best dancers,  He started to live the life Of a footloose youth.*  Gabino! A well liked streetcar conductor Who met his fate* in the barrio of Caballitos.* Whistling! Night after night on a corner By the light of a streetlamp He used to wait for the organito.  And then, When the tango moved him, he gave himself up to the dance, surrendering his heart. Dancing in the streets the streetcar conductor became a great dancer of the barrio;  He dreamed of the tangos  that the old organito  Used bring to the slum,*  to make it merry. At every dance the lad went to, Dancing, he won someone’s heart. His porteño style  was so well liked That wherever he danced  he left memories behind. [Knowing That he'd made a name for himself  He set course for the centro Seeking another audience. And soon He got what he wanted,  The applause he'd yearned for For as long as he could remember.] Many years went by, and one night, among friends and a little tipsy, Gabino told them, "I swear! How peacefully I'd die, if one day while dancing a tango  my heart would just give out."

NOTES:

* footloose youth: muchacho paseandero. A paseandero is a person fond if strolling; also someone who goes out every night.

* met his fate: vivía sus andanzas. Andanzas are adventures, deeds, or fate, derived from the verb andar, to walk. An alternate rendering of the phrase might be, "had his adventures" or "lived his deeds."

* Caballitos: A large barrio at the geographical center of Buenos Aires. The barrio was named after a tavern (pulpería) that stood on the corner of El Camino Real del Oeste (present day Avenida Rivadavia) and El Camino del Polvorín (now Emilio Mitre). The tavern owner had erected a pole with a weather-vane in the form of a horse. The tavern, which came to be known "La pulpería del caballito," eventually gave its name to the barrio as a whole.  

* slum: ie., the barrio of Caballitos.

Esta noche me emborracho: Tonight I'm getting drunk

"And to think that ten years ago, I was crazy about her! That I stooped to betrayal for her beauty!..." 

Continuing our Enrique Santos Discépolo obsession here at Tango Decoder, we present our version of ESTA NOCHE ME EMBORRACHO (Tonight I'm getting drunk).  

Disclaimer: The portrait that the song's narrator paints of his former lover is about as unsympathetic as could be imagined. This lyric is presented for scholarly purposes only. Attitudes and opinions expressed in it do not reflect those of Tango Decoder. Read at your own risk....!

Esta noche me emborracho
(Tonight, I'm getting drunk) 
Tango, 1928
Music: Enrique Santos Discépolo
Lyrics: Enrique Santos Discépolo

YouTube: D'Arienzo/Echagüe; Tanturi/Castillo; Biagi/Saavedra. Song data at tango.info.

Sola, fané, descangayada, la vi esta madrugada salir de un cabaret; flaca, dos cuartas de cogote, y una percha en el escote bajo la nuez; chueca, vestida de pebeta, teñida y coqueteando su desnudez… Parecía un gallo desplumao, mostrando al compadrear el cuero picoteao… Yo que sé cuando no aguanto más al verla, así, rajé, pa’ no yorar. ¡Y pensar que hace diez años, fue mi locura! ¡Que llegué hasta la traición por su hermosura!… Que esto que hoy es un cascajo fue la dulce metedura donde yo perdí el honor; que chiflao por su belleza le quité el pan a la vieja, me hice ruin y pechador… Que quedé sin un amigo, que viví de mala fe, que me tuvo de rodillas, sin moral, hecho un mendigo, cuando se fue. Nunca soñé que la vería en un “requiescat in pace” tan cruel como el de hoy. ¡Mire, si no es pa’ suicidarse que por ese cachivache sea lo que soy!… Fiera venganza la del tiempo, que le hace ver deshecho lo que uno amó… Este encuentro me ha hecho tanto mal, que si lo pienso más termino envenenao. Esta noche me emborracho bien, me mamo, ¡bien mamao!, pa’ no pensar.

Alone, worn out, broken down, I saw her at dawn this morning coming out of a cabaret; rail-thin, pencil-necked,* and a coat-hanger at the neckline* under her Adam's apple.*  Bow-legged, dressed like a streetwalker,* dyed hair and flaunting her nakedness... She looked like a plucked rooster strutting around, showing off its pecked hide. I, who know when I’ve had enough, on seeing her that way, hurried away just to keep from crying. And to think that ten years ago, I was crazy about her! That I stooped to betrayal for her beauty!... That this, which is today a total wreck, was the tender indiscretion* to which I lost my dignity; that I, crazy about her beauty, stole food from my own mother, became heartless, a freeloader; That I didn't have a friend in the world, that I lived by cheating others, that she had me on my knees, amoral, reduced to begging, when she left. I never dreamed that I'd consider her "dead to me"* so heartlessly as today. Look, isn't it just to die for, that for this piece of trash I might be what I am!... Harsh, time's vengeance, That brings one to witness the ruin Of the one he loved... This affair left me in such bad shape that if I think of it again   I end up getting plastered.* Tonight I’ll get good and drunk! Pissed! Totally pissed! So as not to think.

NOTES:

* pencil-necked: dos cuartas de cogote, literally, "two hands-breadths of nape." The nape is the back of the neck, but here it seems to refer to the front of the throat.

* a coat-hanger in the neckline: una percha en el escote. Possibly a derisive reference to clavicles that protrude as a result of emaciation, giving the appearance of a coat hanger at the neckline. Alternately, a metaphorical reference to an overly-revealing décolletage. 

* Adam's apple: nuez, a walnut, or Adam's apple.

* dressed like a streetwalker: pebeta. Originally a term that a pimp used to addressed his woman, possibly derived from the Italian per quanto?—How much? A "broad." May simply mean a young girl; an affectionate form of adress, as in the tangos Atenti pebeta or Salí pebeta bailá. The context suggests the original interpretation.

* indiscretion: metedura. The term has several meanings: obsession, infatuation, indiscretion. All seem relevant here.

*  "dead to me": en un requiescat in pace. In Latin America the Latin phrase "rest in peace" is used colloquially to denote a person so despicable that one intends to ignore them and never speak of them again. In English, to say that someone is, "dead to me" has much the same meaning.

* plastered: envenenao. Literally, "poisoned." The word has varied connotations including intoxicated, embittered, sour, confused, embroiled, tangled, or even "infected with a venereal disease." Our rendering of the phrase yields a conundrum typical of Discépolo: "...if I think of it, I end up getting (drunk)... Tonight I'll get drunk... so as not to think." 

Tormenta: Lost in the storm of my endless night...

"If infamy leads the way and love kills in your name that which you have blessed—God!...to obey you is to give quarter to evil, and to love you is to yield to it."

Tango Decoder's guest translator for Enrique Santos Discépolo's 1939 tango TORMENTA (Storm) is La Sonia, one of our good friends at Tango Lyrics & Translations. Secondary translation, "polishing," and notes by Tango Decoder. Thanks and un abrazo to La Sonia!

Tormenta (Storm)
tango 1939
Composer and lyricist: Enrique Santos Discépolo

Selected recordings: Di Sarli/Pomar (1954); Canaro/Famá and Lomuto/Omar (both 1939).
Song data at tango.info.

¡Aullando entre relámpagos, perdido en la tormenta de mi noche interminable, ¡Dios! busco tu nombre… No quiero que tu rayo me enceguezca entre el horror, porque preciso luz para seguir… ¿Lo que aprendí de tu mano no sirve para vivir? Yo siento que mi fe se tambalea, que la gente mala, vive ¡Dios! mejor que yo… Si la vida es el infierno y el honrao vive entre lágrimas, ¿cuál es el bien… del que lucha en nombre tuyo, limpio, puro?… ¿para qué?… Si hoy la infamia da el sendero y el amor mata en tu nombre, ¡Dios!, lo que has besao… El seguirte es dar ventaja y el amarte sucumbir al mal. No quiero abandonarte, yo, demuestra una vez sola que el traidor no vive impune, ¡Dios! para besarte… Enséñame una flor que haya nacido del esfuerzo de seguirte, ¡Dios! Para no odiar: al mundo que me desprecia, porque no aprendo a robar… Y entonces de rodillas, hecho sangre en los guijarros moriré con vos, ¡feliz, Señor!

Howling* between lightning flashes, lost in the storm  of my endless night, God! I'm searching for your name.... I hope your lightning won’t strike me blind amidst this horror, because I need a guiding light to carry on. What I’ve learned from your hand, does it not help me to live? I feel that my faith wavers  because evil people, God!—live better than I. If life is hell and the virtuous live in tears, what’s the good...? of one who fights in your name, clean and pure? What for...? If infamy leads the way and love kills, in your name, that which you have blessed*—God!....  To obey you is to give quarter to evil, and to love you is to yield to it. I don’t want to abandon you; show just one time that the betrayer doesn’t live with impunity, God!—so that I may adore* you... Show me a flower that has been born of the effort of following you, God!—So I won’t hate: a world that despises me for not learning to steal.... And then, on my knees, bleeding on the cobblestones I’ll die with you—happy, Lord!

NOTES:

*Howling: aullando, from aullar, "to howl," with a secondary meaning of "to cry out." An alternative version of this line might be: "Crying out between lightning flashes."

*blessed: besao, "kissed." (See following note.)

* to adore you: besarte, literally "to kiss you." This kind of paradoxical word-play is typical of Descepólo. In the previous stanza, the speaker accused God of "kissing" infamy, that is, blessing it. Here the speaker proposes to "kiss" God. But a mortal cannot bless God—for God is the source of all blessings. When a mortal "kisses" God, he is loving or adoring Him. Discépolo uses the same verb to denote two different actions, one divine, and one mortal. (See previous note.)

Fun fact: When this cry of torment was recorded by Francisco Lomuto with Jorge Omar, the B-side was the light-hearted foxtrot, "A-tisket a-tasket." Canaro's version with Enrique Famá on Odeon was backed by the romantic vals, "Noche de estrellas." That's balance, folks!—TD

A Cadicamo word-cloud

Tres Esquinas, Nostalgias, Muñeca Brava, Nunca tuvo novio, Tengo mil novias, Nieblas de Riachuelo, Compadrón, Madame Ivonne, Llorar por una mujer, Garúa, Si la llegaran a ver, No vendrá....

Do any of these song titles ring a bell? Well, the lyrics for these and 131 other tangos, valses, and milongas were all penned by one man, Enrique Cadícamo (1900-1999). There's lots of info about Cadícamo on the web, so anything I'd write about would probably be redundant—other than my own deep personal admiration for his oevre. But search as I might, nowhere do I find an Enrique Cadícamo word-cloud! So, in tribute to this great poet of the tango, I give you the top 100 words appearing in Cadicamo's 143 lyrics, neatly arranged and brightly colored. Have a look, and feel free to make your own interpretations!

[Click on the word-cloud to view the full-size image in a new window. Much more legible!] See also Tango Decoder's Enrique Santos Discépolo word-cloud. Compare and contrast....

Many thanks to Jonathan Feinberg, creator of Wordle, for making this word-cloud possible.