The
great
Argentinian
writer
Jorge
Luis
Borges
was
a
tango
enthusiast
and
something
of a
historian
of
the
music.
"My
informants
all
agree
on
one
fact,"
he
wrote,
"the
Tango
was
born
in
the
brothels."
Borges's
informants
were
a
little
presumptuous,
perhaps,
for
nobody
can
exactly
pinpoint
tango's
birthplace,
but
it
certainly
developed
amongst
the
Porteños
-
the
people
of
the
port
area
of
Buenos
Aires
-
and
its
bordellos
and
bars.
It
was
a
definitively
urban
music:
a
product
of
the
melting
pot
of
European
immigrants,
criollos,
blacks
and
natives,
drawn
together
when
the
city
became
the
capital
of
Argentina
in
1880.
Tango
was
thus
forged
from
a
range
of
musical
influences
that
included
Andalucían
flamenco,
southern
Italian
melodies,
Cuban
habanera,
African
candombé
and
percussion,
European
polkas
and
mazurkas,
Spanish
contradanse,
and,
closer
to
home,
the
milonga
-
the
rural
song
of
the
Argentine
gaucho.
It
was
a
music
imbued
with
immigrant
history.
In
this
early
form,
tango
became
associated
with
the
bohemian
life
of
bordello
brawls
and
compadritos
-
knife-wielding,
womanizing
thugs.
By
1914
there
were
over
100,000
more
men
than
women
in
Buenos
Aires,
thus
the
high
incidence
of
prostitution
and
the
strong
culture
of
bar-brothels.
Machismo
and
violence
were
part
of
the
culture
and
men
would
dance
together
in
the
low-life
cafés
and
corner
bars
practising
new
steps
and
keeping
in
shape
while
waiting
for
their
women,
the
minas
of
the
bordellos.
Their
dances
tended
to
have
a
showy
yet
threatening,
predatory
quality,
often
revolving
around
a
possessive
relationship
between
two
men
and
one
woman.
In
such
a
culture,
the
compadrito
danced
the
tango
into
existence.
The
original
tango
ensembles
were
trios
of
violin,
guitar
and
flute,
but
around
the
end
of
the
nineteenth
century
the
bandoneón
,
the
tango
accordion,
arrived
from
Germany,
and
the
classic
tango
orchestra
was
born.
The
box-shaped
button
accordion,
which
is
now
inextricably
linked
with
Argentine
tango,
was
invented
around
1860
in
Germany
to
play
religious
music
in
organless
churches.
One
Heinrich
Band
reworked
an
older
portable
instrument
nicknamed
the
"asthmatic
worm",
which
was
used
for
funeral
processions
as
well
as
lively
regional
dances,
and
gave
his
new
instrument
the
name
"Band-Union",
a
combination
of
his
and
his
company's
names.
Mispronounced
as
it
travelled
the
world,
it
became
the
bandoneón.
In
Argentina,
an
early
pioneer
of
the
instrument
was
Eduardo
Arolas
- a
man
remembered
as
the
"Tiger
of
the
Bandoneón".
He
recognized
its
immediate
affinity
with
the
tango
-
indeed,
he
claimed
it
was
an
instrument
made
to
play
tango,
with
its
deep
melancholy
feeling
which
suited
the
immigrants
who
enjoyed
a
sentimental
tinge
in
their
hard
lives.
It
is
not,
however,
an
easy
instrument,
demanding
a
great
deal
of
skill,
with
its
seventy-odd
buttons
each
producing
one
of
two
notes
depending
on
whether
the
bellows
are
being
compressed
or
expanded.
Vicente
Greco
(1888-1924)
is
credited
as
the
first
bandleader
to
standardize
the
form
of a
tango
group,
with
his
Orquesta
Típica
Criolla
of
two
violins
and
two
bandoneóns.
There
were
some
larger
bands
but
basically
the
instrumentation
remained
virtually
unchanged
until
the
1940.
