From the Argentinean Magazine Elixir:

The title: “Prophets on Other Lands” by Julia Gomez

Otros Aires, the electro tango orchestra that started in Barcelona and plays classic tangos from the 30’s, keeps surprising Europe and the rest of the world.

Otros Aires (Miguel Di Genova):  I was fascinated by (Astor) Piazzolla and his music.  I started to play and mix tango songs about 20 years ago, but at that time I did not have the required musical knowledge and furthermore people did not accept the mixes of the traditional tango with the ‘new’ or electronic sequences.  I always liked the fusion of the different rhythms and styles of tango music.  I was looking for a ‘new’ sound, explains Miguel Di Genova (singer, guitar player, and sequences), the creator of Otros Aires, an electronic tango orchestra that with their new CD: Otros Aires DOS have become very popular in Europe and are in tour jumping from city to city all year long.

Otros Aires started as Miguel DiGevova’s individual project when he lived in Barcelona. He started in 1999 with a ‘remix’ (Hora Cero de Piazzolla) that he brought from his hometown city Buenos Aires.  He felt very curios about that piece of music but he couldn’t figure out what it was that created such an enigma in him.  When he started to play in bars and night clubs in Barcelona, the idea started to take shape.  Then he returned to Buenos Aires, his home town, where he finished developing Otros Aires which became an orchestra.  Tango with a new flair was born.

What makes this group unique is that along with Emanuel Mayol (drums), Omar Massa (bandoneon) and Diego Ramos (piano), they recreate the old tangos from the 30’s and 40’s incorporating them to the ‘new tango’ that started Piazzolla.

In the first CD, we recorded songs with samples from Carlos Gardel, using his own –old-versions of traditional tango, such as ‘Milonga Sentimental” and ‘Aquel Muchacho Triste’. 

Elixir: How do you live all that popularity in Europe?

Otros Aires (MDG-Miguel DiGenova): What happens with the Tango and electro tango outside of Argentina is something that it is hard to believe for the locals in Argentina.  It is a very popular type of music, especially in Europe.  Inside the tango circles everyone knows who we are, what is an amazing phenomenon is that outside of Argentina, our fans come from both the Tango world and also regular people that love our music, and do not necessarily have an understanding of Tango.

Elixir: Why did you choose classic tangos to fuse with the ‘new’ tango?

Otros Aires (MDG):  The traditional tangos that we play in our first CD illustrate the origins of tango, the ones that are played at the milonga. On our second CD we did not use as many samples of the –old- tangos (Gardel, D’Arienzo) as we did on our first CD.  Our second CD is a fusion between the old and the new, the past and the present; we also started to incorporate our own style.  That idea took shape because Diego, the pianist, has a solid tango background, he composed lyrics for “Orquesta Escuela de Tango” and for the “Café De Los Maestros”, and in this second CD the lyrics have a reference to our history.  We took samples from Piazzolla, like many electro tango orchestras, but we did not stop there, we wanted to include a lot more.

Elixir: Why did you do the ‘Milonga Sentimental’ video with a series of old fashion cartoons?

Otros Aires (MDG):  The lyrics of ‘Milonga Sentimental’ show a ‘macho’ side of the milonga, but in a way that is funny.  It was a song that I really liked because Tango song writer like Homero Manzi [one of the pioneers of tango song writers from the 1930], laughed about their very own ‘machismo’.  Therefore, at the beginning of the lyrics that irony was spoken and I liked it.  The idea of using cartoons from the 1930s matches with the golden times of tango.  I like to use the audiovisuals because they are a reference of that time period and although the cartoons are not made in Argentina, they make a great reference to the 30’s and 40’s which we focused on the first CD.

To view a trailer of the upcoming documentary on Otros Aires click here.

See Calendar for schedule