Repeating orchestras

Brett Jordan

In the local city milonga there has been a DJ for some years now who can play classic tracks, quite often three or four in a row with the same feel. The problem was it was erratic but more particularly it was deafeningly loud. So it was with trepidation I returned after a long absence. Delightfully, it was not too loud.  It was even too quiet sometimes, or variable, but it was a vast improvement. I remember a Rodriguez tanda with two good tracks plus Horas, which I used to think was lugubrious but tolerate better now. The last track was Marinero where those triples from the start are annoying. Neither are top flight Rodriguez tracks. 

Then there was a tanda with Tigre Viejo, something from OTV and Malerba’s Sollozos.  I seem to remember all the tracks were good and that’s what I most care about, as long as we don't veer wildly between the eras of an orchestra or flail between the mood of a track by one orchestra and a different mood by another orchestra in the same tanda. That join should be more or less invisible to the dancers.   But I blinked in disbelief. There is so much good Fresedo to make a tanda with Tigre Viejo.

Chris's Setblog

Still, I went back when there was some live music and the same DJ playing either side. There was an OTV tanda before the live music.  OTV is fine, a creditable orchestra, some nice tangos, some lovely vals. I went to see what the DJ was planning after the live music.  OTV, he said.  Again?!, I said, the surprise doing a number on my manners.

He looked characteristically put out. Why not? It’s like saying "Don’t play Di Sarli twice in an evening".

I said nothing.

But the point is this: Pet favourites of the DJ’s apart (which should not count), In a short set of two or three hours.  D’Arienzo is the only orchestra that really bears repeating.  Why repeat an orchestra at the expense of one we haven’t heard from yet? If I was feeling generous I might say Di Sarli is another possible exception. Di Sarli is not my own favourite but that orchestra does have three completely different styles - the four good tracks from the sextet, the rhythmic tracks e.g. Catamarca and the more romantic tracks, often with the singers Podestà or Durán, numbers heavy on the violins like Vamos .  

So did I mention, Why repeat an orchestra at the expense....?