Biography

Born in the working‑class barrio of Villa Crespo on 2 December 1905, Osvaldo Pugliese grew up in a musical home. He first followed his brothers in playing the violin, but Osvaldo soon traded in his bow for a piano.

He left school early and supported himself shining shoes and selling newspapers while studying piano at the Conservatorio Odeón. Pugliese accompanied the pioneering bandoneonist Paquita Bernardo in the early 1920s, and later joined Pedro Maffia’s sextet in 1926. In 1929 he co-led the Vardaro-Pugliese sextet with violinist Elvino Vardaro, whose lineup included a young Aníbal Troilo and Alfredo Gobbi. He later worked in Pedro Laurenz’s sextet in 1934 and played piano for Miguel Caló in 1936. Quite a list of musicians to begin a career with!

Pugliese joined the communist party in 1936, bringing his ideals of social equality into how he approached his music and orchestra. His socialist convictions led Pugliese to help create Argentina’s first musicians’ union, but he sadly had to spent time behind bars under multiple governments for his beliefs. A piece of true tango lore is that when he was imprisoned, instead of finding a replacement pianist his bandmates would place a single red carnation on the piano to symbolize his absence.

In August 1939, just after leaving jail for the first of several times, he founded his cooperative orchestra. Pugliese built on the legacy of Julio De Caro: rich harmonies and layered melodies supported by a strong beat. He made rubato part of the dance, stretching and compressing time.

The orchestra became a fixture on Radio El Mundo and at Café Nacional, despite periods of censorship and jail. And in his later years Pugliese was hailed at the Teatro Colón and toured Europe and Asia.

Argentine musicians today invoke “San Pugliese” for good luck, an affectionate nod to the maestro who fused artistry, activism and respect for the dancers.

Listen for how the orchestra explains itself through this chart. The piano sets a low ostinato with Aniceto Rossi’s bass marking a steady compás. Bandoneones lean into each downbeat with a growling arrastre that swells into the accent. The strings sing long lines, then the mood pivots in the trio where the bandoneones trade bright variations. Pugliese shapes time with rubato, adding pauses that breathe and then slotting the beat back under the dancers’ feet.

By early 1944 the core of his orchestra included Enrique Camerano as first violin and a bandoneón team led on paper by Enrique Alessio with Osvaldo Ruggiero prominent on solos, while Roberto Chanel had become the orchestra’s main singer in this period.

“Recuerdo” makes that emerging identity unmistakable and sets the stage for Pugliese to take his chair on the table of the big four.

“Recuerdo” from March 1944:

Coda on December 26, 1985, the orchestra of Osvaldo Pugliese performed live at the Teatro Colón. Even today it is considered an exquisite representation of tango artistry and musicianship. You can watch live performance of Recuerdo below. 

Negratcha – 1948

During the previous post we explored how the young pianist-composer from Villa Crespo dusted off his teenage composition “Recuerdo” and used it to introduce his cooperative orchestra and style.

Over the next years he honed what critics later called a trilogy of modern tangos: La yumba, Negracha and Malandraca. He developed them in parallel across the mid-1940s and later said they shared the same concept or fisonomía. La yumba began in 1943 and debuted in 1946. Negracha and Malandraca matured over the same years and reached disc in 1948 and 1949.

Let’s have a look at the most complex piece first: Negracha. It was recorded in June 1948 and issued coupled with “Boedo”.

The best-supported origin story for the title points to a women’s cohort of devoted followers around the orchestra, known as ‘Las Negras,’ after whom Pugliese most likely named the tango and to whom he dedicated it.

Ruggiero’s fiery first-bandoneón lines and Camerano’s elegant first violin carry the solos, while Pugliese’s piano binds the texture with left-hand ostinati and expressive rubato. Very early, the beat lurches forward: dragging arrastre accents anchor the downbeats and sudden silences stretch time.

Instead of the straight marcato of earlier orchestras, Pugliese stacks cross-accents: strings and bandoneons work a 3-3-2 rhythm against steady compás. In the B section, the violins sing cantando over a rumbling bass; a bright variación passes through the bandoneons; the piece settles in a concise piano-led coda. The beat never disappears for dancers; it keeps resurfacing beneath the modernist surface.

“Negracha” from June 1948:

Malandraca – 1949

In Argentine lunfardo, “Malandraca” denotes a criminal or hoodlum—essentially a low-life crook. Musically, “Malandraca” rides a similar dramatic arc we heard in “Negracha” but with a menace that justifies its title.

By 1949, the band was a tight collective: Osvaldo Ruggiero, Jorge Caldara, Esteban Gilardi and Oscar Castagniaro on bandoneons, Enrique Camerano, Oscar Herrero, Emilio Balcarce and Julio Carrasco on violins, and Aniceto Rossi on bass. Singer Roberto Chanel had just left the orchestra, but Jorge Vidal, and increasingly Alberto Morán’s romantic tone, handled vocals. The closely synced orchestra, with years of practicing and performing together, give Malandraca its tight punch.

The opening bars lean almost immediatly hard into the yumba accent (a rhythmic tool developed by Pugliese’s orchestra which we will discuss in detail next week).

Against this heavy pulse the bandoneons and strings stack cross‑accents and off‑beat figures. Throughout, dynamic swells surge and recede like ocean waves—a “marejada orquestal” whose crests and troughs heighten tension.

Put on Odeón 30604 B and feel 2:52 minutes of pure excitement!

“Malandraca” from May 1949:

La Yumba – 1952

The previous posts have taken us from a legendary teenage composition to the danceable edge of avant‑garde energy.

Now we go back to the piece we so brazenly skipped.

La yumba.

Yumba is an onomatopoea for the sound that became synonymous with Pugliese’s style.

The piano and bass mark the YUM with a dragging arrastre to accent the first and third beats, which is answered with a crisp BA by the bandoneons and violins on the 2 and 4. Arrastre is Spanish for “drag” and denotes the dragging sound leading into a note.

Several writers relay Pugliese’s own comment that the unrelenting “yumba” pulse was modeled on the racket of metalworking—an image that has become part of the piece’s lore.

That industrial echo also fits Pugliese’s memory of where the orchestra first caught fire: he says their crowds formed across the “cinturón fabril” (factory belt) from Avellaneda and Gerli down toward La Plata.

The orchestra first released “La yumba” in 1946 and then revisited it six years later.

When the orchestra returned to the studio in late 1952, they were not merely revisiting a hit but reaffirming the sound they had crafted over a decade and adapting it to a richer sonic palette.

The 1952 remake continues the yumba design and forms part of Pugliese’s first tape-based sessions at Odeon in late 1952—a shift that delivered greater fidelity and dovetailed with the label’s early LP reissues.

The early 1950s were marked by strikes and censorship, but the band was in full stride. “La yumba” had become the orchestra’s signature tune and a dancer favorite.

“La Yumba” from November 1952:

Pugliese’s Bandoneonist: A Living Legacy  (Guest Post by Heyni Solera)

A legacy is the enduring impact a person, event, or organization leaves behind. I think it’s fair to say most people engaged within tango would consider Pugliese a legend, considering how he pushed the boundaries of the genre within his arrangements, compositions, the running of a collective orchestra, and most importantly insisting on tango being a social, popular movement. However, I really want to focus on the enduring impact a legacy creates, since in order to be considered “enduring” that implies that Pugliese’s influence remains and continues to shape the contemporary tango scene.

These bandoneonists went on to play an even more important role in teaching the new generation of tango musicians and bandoneonists, particularly in the tango orchestra schools that began in the early 2000s, e.g. La Orquesta de Emilio Balcarce, La Escuela Orlando Goñi. Without this intergenerational exchange, important information about tango technique and musicality would have been lost, and these schools have played a vital role in the revival of live tango music within the concert halls and milongas. This exchange has continued Pugliese’s legacy through the creation of groups and compositions directly influenced by his orchestra. It’s important to note, however, that these musicians who are a continuation of Pugliese’s legacy are not merely copying the iconic orchestra’s sound, but instead are continuing the tradition of pushing the boundaries of tango. I wish to now highlight three contemporary composers who have directly learned from tango’s past in order to create something new.

As a long-time fan of Pugliese, the composer/pianist Julian Peralta has spent considerable amounts of time transcribing countless scores of Pugliese’s orchestra and teaching his style in La Escuela Orlando Goñi. As a result, he acknowledges that the sound of his sextet Astillero incorporates elements of Pugliese, but more importantly to Peralta, “was [Pugliese’s] philosophical impact of it being our music, of it serving as an act of cultural resistance, of rebellion against what was established at that time.” Astillero is celebrating 20 years of music making this year, and this is one out of fourteen albums where you can experience their music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0khSBSKQEPg

Julian Peralta

Osvaldo Ruggiero, like many tango musicians of the golden era, was afraid that when they died, tango and the art of the bandoneon would disappear. Through the efforts of many musicians, that fear no longer exists, and there is no one more dedicated to continuing Ruggiero’s legacy than his own son, composer, and bandoneonist Daniel Ruggiero. Three years ago, Daniel started the Festival de Bandoneón Osvaldo Ruggiero, which takes place on the weekend of his father’s birthday, September 19-21st, in Buenos Aires. In 2022, Daniel released the album Rompelo Tano where he commissioned ten contemporary bandoneonists to rearrange his father’s compositions drawing on inspiration from Pugliese’s orchestra. It could be heard here.

As Notas de Oro continues its journey into the great tango orchestra of the Golden Era, I encourage everyone to look into how today’s tango musicians engage with these greats. Not only by recreating the past, but also by bringing new ideas into the genre which will continue the great legacy this artform has created. Thank you for having me as your guest for this month. I look forward to continuing this journey with you.