Coordinates	37°46′45.48″N122°25′9.12″N
Name	Tango
Bgcolor	maroon
Color	white
Stylistic origins	European styles including polka, habanera, flamenco, mazurka, and contradanse; Candombe, vals criollo, milonga.
Cultural origins	Argentina and Uruguay
Instruments	Violin, piano, guitar, flute and bandoneon
Popularity	Major, became a craze in Europe and North America in 1930s and 40s
Subgenrelist	List of tango genres
Subgenres	Neotango – Tango-canción
Fusiongenres	Tango-rock
Regional scenes	Dodompa (Japanese tango) – Easter Island
Other topics	Dance – Maxixe (Brazilian tango) Record labels A Bandoneon popular in Argentina and Uruguay. }}

Tango is a style of ballroom dance music in 2/4 or 4/4 time that originated among European immigrant populations of Argentina and Uruguay (collectively, the "Rioplatenses"). It is traditionally played by a sextet, known as the ''orquesta típica'', which includes two violins, piano, double bass, and two bandoneons. Earlier forms of this ensemble sometimes included flute, clarinet and guitar. Tango may be purely instrumental or may include a vocalist. Tango is well-known across much of the world, along with the associated tango dance.

Origins

Even though the present forms developed in Argentina and Uruguay from the mid 19th century, there are records of 18th and early 19th century Tango styles in Cuba and Spain, while there is a flamenco Tangos dance that may share a common ancestor in a minuet-style European dance. All sources stress the influence of the African communities and their rhythms, while the instruments and techniques brought in by European immigrants in the 20th century played a major role in its final definition, relating it to the Salon music styles to which Tango would contribute back at a later stage.

The first Tango ever recorded was made by Angel Villoldo and played by the French national guard in Paris. Villoldo had to record in Paris because in Argentina at the time there was no recording studio.

Early tango was played by immigrants in Buenos Aires, where many argue the tango was born. The first generation of tango players was called "Guardia Vieja" (the Old Guard). By the end of the 19th century, this blend of salon, European and African music was heard throughout metropolitan Buenos Aires. It took time to move into wider circles: in the early 20th century it was the favorite music of thugs and gangsters who visited the brothels, in a city with 100,000 more men than women (in 1914). The complex dances that arose from such rich music reflects how the men would practice the dance in groups, demonstrating male sexuality and causing a blending of emotion and aggressiveness. The music was played on portable instruments: flute, guitar and violin trios, with bandoneón arriving at the end of the 19th century. The ''organito'', a portable player-organ, broadened the popularity of certain songs. Eduardo Arolas was the major instrument of the bandoneón's popularization, with Vicente Greco soon standardizing the tango sextet as consisting of piano, double bass, two violins and two bandoneons.

Like many forms of popular music, the tango was associated with the underclass, and the better-off Argentines tried to restrict its influence. In spite of the scorn, some, like writer Ricardo Güiraldes, were fans. Güiraldes played a part in the international popularization of the tango, which had conquered the world by the end of World War I, and wrote a poem ("Tango") which describes the music as the "all-absorbing love of a tyrant, jealously guarding his dominion, over women who have surrendered submissively, like obedient beasts".

One song that would become the most widely known of all tango melodies also dates from this time. The first two sections of ''La Cumparsita'' were composed as a march instrumental in 1916 by teen-aged Gerardo Matos Rodríguez of Uruguay.

Argentinian roots of Tango

Besides the global influences mentioned above, early Tango was locally influenced by Payada, the Milonga from Argentine Pampas, and Argentine Candombe. In Argentina there was Milonga "from the country" since the mid eighteenth century. The first "payador" remembered is Santos Vega. The origins of Milonga seem to be in the Pampa with strong African influences, especially though the local Candombe (which would be related to its contemporary Candombe in Buenos Aires). It is believed that this candombe existed and was practised in Argentina since the first slaves were brought into the country.

Although the word "tango" to describe a music/dance style had been printed as early as 1823 in Havana, Cuba, the first Argentinian written reference is from a 1866 newspaper, that quotes the song "La Coqueta" (an Argentine tango). In 1876 a tango-candombe called "El Merenguengué" became very popular, after its success in the Afro-Argentines carnival held in February of that year. It is played with guitar, violin and flute in addition to the Afro-Argentine Candombe drums ("Llamador" and "Repicador"). This has been seriously considered as one of the strong points of departure for the birth and development of the Tango.

The first "group" of tango, was composed of two Afro-Argentines, "the black" Casimiro Alcorta (violin) and "the mulatto" Sinforoso (clarinet). They did small concerts in Buenos Aires since the early 1870's until the early 1890's. "The black Casimiro" is author of "Entrada Prohibida" ("Entry Forbidden"), then signed by the brothers Teisseire, and "la yapa"; in turn, is credited with the tango "Concha sucia", which was later amended and signed by F. Canaro as "Cara sucia" ("dirty face"). It must be said, thought that this duo was the author and performer of many of the early tangos now listed as "anonymous", since at that time were not used to signing works.

Before the 1900s, the following tangos were being played: "El queco" (anonymous, attributed to clarinetist Lino Galeano in 1885), "Señora casera" (anonymous 1880), "Andate a la recoleta" (anonymous 1880), "El Porteñito" (by the Spaniard Gabriel Diez in 1880), "Tango Nº1" (Jose Machado - 1883), "Dame la lata" (Juan Perez, 1888), "Que polvo con tanto viento" (anonymous 1890), "No me tires con la tapa de la olla" (A.A. 1893), "El Talar" (Prudencio Aragon - 1895).

The first recorded musical score (though no author) is "La Canguela" (1889) and is in the Museum of the City Score Rosario. On the other hand, the first copyrighted tango score is "El entrerriano", released in 1896 and printed in 1898 - by Rosendo Mendizabal, an Afro-Argentine. As for the transition between the old "Tango criollo" (Milonga from the Pampas, evolved with touches of Afro-Argentine Candombe, and some of Habanera), and the Tango of the Old Guard, there are the next songs: Ángel Villoldo ("El choclo", 1903) ("El Pimpolla", 1904), ("La Vida del Carretero", 1905) y ("El Negro Alegre", 1907), de Gabino Ezeiza ("El Tango Patagones", 1905), y de Higinio Cazón ("El Taita", 1905). Moreover, the first tango recorded by an orchestra was "Don Juan", whose author is Ernesto Ponzio. It was recorded by the orchestra of Vicente Greco.

1920s and 1930s, Carlos Gardel

Tango soon began to gain popularity in Europe, beginning in France. Superstar Carlos Gardel soon became a sex symbol who brought the tango to new audiences, especially in the United States, due to his sensual depictions of the dance on film. In the 1920s, tango moved out of the lower-class brothels and became a more respectable form of music and dance. Bandleaders like Roberto Firpo and Francisco Canaro dropped the flute and added a double bass in its place. Lyrics were still typically macho, blaming women for countless heartaches, and the dance moves were still sexual and aggressive.

Carlos Gardel became especially associated with the transition from a lower-class "gangster" music to a respectable middle-class dance. He helped develop tango-canción in the 1920s and became one of the most popular tango artists of all time. He was also one of the precursors of the Golden Age of tango.

Gardel's death was followed by a division into movements within tango. Evolutionists like Aníbal Troilo and Carlos di Sarli were opposed to traditionalists like Rodolfo Biagi and Juan D'Arienzo.

Golden Age

The "Golden Age" of tango music and dance is generally agreed to have been the period from about 1935 to 1952, roughly contemporaneous with the big band era in the United States.

Some of the many popular and influential orchestras included the orchestras of Juan D'Arienzo, Francisco Canaro, and Aníbal Troilo. D'Arienzo was called the "Rey del compás" or "King of the beat" for the insistent, driving rhythm which can be heard on many of his recordings. "El flete" is an excellent example of D'Arienzo's approach. Canaro's early milongas are generally the slowest and easiest to dance to; and for that reason, they are the most frequently played at tango dances (milongas); "Milonga Sentimental" is a classic example.

Beginning in the Golden Age and continuing afterwards, the orchestras of Osvaldo Pugliese and Carlos di Sarli made many recordings. Di Sarli had a lush, grandiose sound, and emphasized strings and piano over the bandoneon, which is heard in "A la gran muñeca" and "Bahía Blanca" (the name of his home town).

Pugliese's first recordings were not too different from those of other dance orchestras, but he developed a complex, rich, and sometimes discordant sound, which is heard in his signature pieces, "Gallo ciego", "Emancipación", and "La yumba". Pugliese's later music was played for an audience and not intended for dancing, although it is often used for stage choreography for its dramatic potential, and sometimes played late at night at milongas.

Tango nuevo

The later age of tango has been dominated by Ástor Piazzolla, whose ''Adiós nonino'' became the most influential work of tango since Carlos Gardel's ''El día que me quieras'' was released. During the 1950s, Piazzolla consciously tried to create a more academic form with new sounds breaking the classic forms of tango, drawing the derision of purists and old-time performers. The 1970s saw Buenos Aires developing a fusion of jazz and tango. Litto Nebbia and Siglo XX were especially popular within this movement. In the 1970s and 1980s, the vocal octet Buenos Aires 8 recorded classic tangos in elaborate arrangements, with complex harmonies and jazz influence, and also recorded an album with compositions by Piazzolla.

The so-called post-Piazzolla generation (1980-) includes musicians such as Dino Saluzzi, Rodolfo Mederos, Enrique Martin Entenza, Juan María Solare and Nuevo Tango Ensamble. Piazzolla and his followers developed ''Nuevo Tango'', which incorporated jazz and classical influences into a more experimental style.

== Neo-tango ==

Tango development has not stopped here. The following examples are not filed under "Tango Nuevo" since such classification is usually done with hindsight rather than when still undergoing development. These recent trends can be described as "electro tango" or "tango fusion", where the electronic influences are available in multiple ranges: from very subtle to rather dominant.

Tanghetto and Carlos Libedinsky are good examples of the subtle use of electronic elements. The music still has its tango feeling, the complex rhythmic and melodious entanglement that makes tango so unique. Gotan Project is a group based in Paris, consisting of musicians Philippe Cohen Solal, Eduardo Makaroff and Christoph H Muller. They formed in 1999. Their releases include ''Vuelvo al Sur/El capitalismo foráneo'' (2000), ''La Revancha del Tango'' (2001), ''Inspiración Espiración'' (2004), and ''Lunático'' (2006). Their sound features electronic elements like samples, beats and sounds on top of a tango groove. Some dancers enjoy dancing to this music, although many more traditional dancers regard it as a definite break in style and tradition. Still, the rhythmic elements in Gotan Project's music are more complex than in some of the other "electro tango" songs that were created afterwards.

''Bajofondo Tango Club'' (Underground tango club) and its follow-on album "Supervielle" are examples with a stronger "electro" feeling than Gotan Project. ''Bajofondo Tango Club's'' beats are more regular, more dominant. The rhythms are less complex but the tango feeling is still there. Other examples can be found on the CDs ''Tango?'', Hybrid Tango, Tangophobia Vol. 1, ''Tango Crash'' (with a major jazz influence), ''NuTango''. ''Tango Fusion Club Vol. 1'' by the creator of the milonga called "Tango Fusion Club" in Munich, Germany, ''Felino'' by the Norwegian group Electrocutango and "Electronic Tango", a various artists' CD. In 2004, a music label, World Music Network, also released a collection under the title The Rough Guide to Tango Nuevo.

Musical impact

The tango has become part of the repertoire for great classical musicians. One of the first classical interpreters to do this "cross over" was the baritone Jorge Chaminé with his ''Tangos'' recording with bandoneonist Olivier Manoury. Since then, al Tango, Yo-Yo Ma, Martha Argerich, Daniel Barenboim, Gidon Kremer, Plácido Domingo and Marcelo Alvarez have performed and recorded Tangos.

Some classical composers have written tangos, such as Isaac Albéniz in ''España'' (1890), Erik Satie in ''Le Tango perpétuel'' (1914), Igor Stravinsky in ''Histoire du Soldat'' (1918), John Cage in ''Perpetual Tango'' (1984), John Harbison in "Tango Seen from Ground Level" (1991), and Milton Babbitt in "It Takes Twelve to Tango" (1984). The influence of Piazzolla has fallen on a number of contemporary composers. The "Tango Mortale" in ''Arcadiana'' by Thomas Adès is a striking example as is the orchestral Totentango by Matthew King.

Many popular songs in the United States have borrowed melodies from tango: the earliest published tango, ''El Choclo'', lent its melody to the fifties hit ''Kiss of Fire''. Similarly ''Adiós Muchachos'' became ''I Get Ideas'', and ''Strange Sensation'' was based on ''La Cumparsita''.

See also

History of Tango

Finnish tango

List of tango music labels

Music of Argentina

Argentine tango

Music of Uruguay

Uruguayan tango

Vals (dance)

References

Category:Tango Category:Southern cone music Category:Dance music Category:Dance forms in classical music

de:Tango (Musikrichtung) eu:Tango fr:Tango (genre musical) lb:Tango (Musek) nl:Tango (muziek) sl:Tango (glasba) sv:Tango (musik)

Coordinates	37°46′45.48″N122°25′9.12″N
name	Mike Figgis
birth name	Michael Figgis
birth date	February 28, 1948
birth place	Carlisle, Cumberland, England, UK
spouse	}}

Michael "Mike" Figgis (born 28 February 1948) is an English film director, writer, and composer.

Personal life

Figgis was born in Carlisle, England and grew up in Africa. Figgis for several years had a relationship with the actress Saffron Burrows and cast her in several films. He is cousin to Irish filmmakers Jonathan Figgis and Jason Figgis who run the award-winning film production company October Eleven Pictures in Ireland. His sons Arlen Figgis and Louis Figgis have also followed their father in to the film industry, as editor and producer respectively.

Career

Figgis's early interest was in music and he played keyboards for Bryan Ferry's first band. In 1983 he directed a theatre play, produced in Theatre Gerard-Philipe (Saint-Denis, Paris, France). This play performed with great success at Festival de Grenada and in Theater der Welt (Munich, Germany).

After working in theatre (he was a musician and performer in the experimental group People Show) he made his feature film debut with the low budget ''Stormy Monday'' in 1988. The film earned him attention as a director who could get interesting performances from established Hollywood actors. He initially made a splash in America in the 1990s with the gritty thriller ''Internal Affairs'' that helped to revive the career of Richard Gere. His next Hollywood feature ''Mr. Jones'' was misunderstood by the studio who attempted to market the downbeat story as a feelgood movie resulting in a box office flop. Figgis poured his disenchantment with the film industry into ''Leaving Las Vegas'', creating star turns for Nicolas Cage and Elisabeth Shue which earned Figgis Academy Award nominations for Best Directing and Best Screenplay. His most ambitious film to date is the low budget film The Loss of Sexual Innocence, a loosely based autobiographical movie of the director himself.

Forays into digital video technology led him to conceive of and direct ''Timecode'', which took advantage of the technology to create an ensemble film shot simultaneously with four cameras all in one take and also presented simultaneously and uncut, dividing the screen into four quarters. Since then, his work output has almost exclusively been on the cutting edge of creative digital filmmaking, with the exception of star-laden ''Cold Creek Manor''. He returned to the ''Timecode'' quad-screen approach for his section of ''Ten Minutes Older'', but has also worked on documentary pieces including a segment of ''The Blues (called Red, White, and Blues)'' and a short piece on flamenco. His curiosity with the cinematic use of time has led him to cite Robert Enrico's film version of ''An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge'' as an influential film for him. Figgis has a well-documented love-hate relationship with the Hollywood system which leads him to often be an outspoken critic of the system while also despairing the lack of a better alternative, in his mind, at the moment. At an appearance at Camerimage in 2005, he expressed the view that filmmaking had become "boring and perhaps need[ed] to become even worse before anything better can emerge" successfully at least in reaction.

He was the founding patron of the independent filmmakers online community Shooting People. At one of their events in 2005 he said that filmmaking with a small digital camera made the experience more like painting or novel writing than the movie industry. His fascination with camera technology has also led him to create a camera stabilization rig for smaller video cameras, called the Fig Rig which places the camera on a platform held within a steering wheel-like system and has since been released by Manfrotto Group.

In 2007, Figgis shot his newest feature "Love Live Long" set between Istanbul and Bratislava on the infamous Gumball 3000 Rally, starring Sophie Winkleman and Daniel Lapaine.

Since 2008 Mike Figgis is professor of film studies at the European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland, where he conducts intensive summer seminars.

In 2008, Figgis was called upon by Transport for London to help shoot a PIF entitled ''A Little Thought From Each of Us, A Big Difference For Everyone'', encouraging more considerate behaviour on London's public transport systems, which was then shown in London cinemas. The ad comprised the screen split into four sections, each section showing one of four scenarios all on the same double-decker bus. At the end of the ad, the friction-creating scenarios were resolved and the ad ended on "A little thought from each of us. A big difference for everyone."

To promote a new camera phone, Sony Ericsson commissioned Mike Figgis to create ''Life Captured'' - a short film made out of mobile phone snapshots taken by fourteen people from Europe, the Middle East and Africa, who were selected to submit a series of photos after winning the global ''Life captured'' competition.

Filmography

''The House'' (1984)

''Stormy Monday'' (1988)

''Internal Affairs'' (1990)

''Women & Men 2: In Love There Are No Rules'' (1991)

''Liebestraum'' (1991)

''Mr. Jones'' (1993)

''The Browning Version'' (1994)

''Leaving Las Vegas'' (1995)

''Flamenco Women'' (1997)

''One Night Stand'' (1997)

''The Loss of Sexual Innocence'' (1999)

''Miss Julie'' (1999)

''Timecode'' (2000)

''Hotel'' (2001)

''The Battle of Orgreave'' (2001)

''Ten Minutes Older: The Cello'' (2002) Segment: ''About Time 2''

''The Blues'' (2003) - Episode: ''Red, White, And Blues''

''Cold Creek Manor'' (2003)

''The Sopranos'' - Episode: ''Cold Cuts'' (2004)

''Co/Ma'' (2004)

''Love Live Long'' (2008)

''The Co(te)lette Film'' (2010)

Bibliography

Mike Figgis: Collected Screenplays 1 –– Stormy Monday, Liebestraum, Leaving Las Vegas (2002)

Digital Filmmaking (2007)

References

External links

Wellcome Trust oral-history interview from July 2009

Mike Figgis Faculty page at European Graduate School (Includes biography, filmography, photos and video lectures)

Digital Filmmaking book

A short film for Agent Provocateur

Interview

Mike Figgis judged the Film of the Month competition in January 2009 on the independent filmmakers networking site Shooting People.

Category:1948 births Category:Alumni of Middlesex University Category:English composers Category:English film directors Category:English screenwriters Category:European Graduate School faculty Category:Living people Category:People from Carlisle, Cumbria

cs:Mike Figgis de:Mike Figgis es:Mike Figgis fr:Mike Figgis it:Mike Figgis ja:マイク・フィギス pl:Mike Figgis pt:Mike Figgis ru:Фиггис, Майк fi:Mike Figgis

Coordinates	37°46′45.48″N122°25′9.12″N
Name	Ástor Piazzolla
Background	non_vocal_instrumentalist
Birth name	Ástor Pantaleón Piazzolla
Born	March 11, 1921 Mar del Plata, Argentina
Died	July 04, 1992 Buenos Aires, Argentina
Genre	Nuevo tango
Occupation	Composer, Bandoneón player
Instrument	}}

Ástor Pantaleón Piazzolla (March 11, 1921 – July 4, 1992) was an Argentine tango composer and bandoneón player. His oeuvre revolutionized the traditional tango into a new style termed ''nuevo tango'', incorporating elements from jazz and classical music. A virtuoso bandoneónist, he regularly performed his own compositions with different ensembles.

Biography

Piazzolla was born in Mar del Plata, Argentina, in 1921 to Italian parents, Vicente "Nonino" Piazzolla and Asunta Manetti. His grandfather, a sailor and fisherman named Pantaleone Piazzolla, had immigrated to Mar del Plata from Trani, a seaport town in the southeastern Italian region of Apulia, at the end of the 19th century. Ástor Piazzolla spent most of his childhood with his family in New York City, where he was exposed to both jazz and the music of J. S. Bach at an early age. While there, he acquired fluency in four languages: Spanish, English, French, and Italian. He began to play the bandoneon after his father, nostalgic for his homeland, spotted one in a New York pawn shop. At the age of 13, he met Carlos Gardel, another great figure of tango, who invited the young prodigy to join him on his current tour. Much to his dismay, Piazzolla's father deemed that he was not old enough to go along. While he did play a young paper boy in Gardel’s movie ''El día que me quieras'' , this early disappointment of being kept from the tour proved to be a blessing in disguise, as it was on this tour that Gardel and his entire band perished in a plane crash. In later years, Piazzolla made light of this near miss, joking that had his father not been so careful, he wouldn't be playing the bandoneon—he'd be playing the harp.

He returned to Argentina in 1937, where strictly traditional tango still reigned, and played in night clubs with a series of groups including the orchestra of Anibal Troilo, then considered the top bandoneon player and bandleader in Buenos Aires. The pianist Arthur Rubinstein—then living in Buenos Aires—advised him to study with the Argentine composer Alberto Ginastera. Delving into scores of Stravinsky, Bartók, Ravel, and others, he rose early each morning to hear the Teatro Colón orchestra rehearse while continuing a gruelling performing schedule in the tango clubs at night. In 1950 he composed the soundtrack to the film ''Bólidos de acero''.

At Ginastera's urging, in 1953 Piazzolla entered his ''Buenos Aires'' Symphony in a composition contest, and won a grant from the French government to study in Paris with the legendary French composition teacher Nadia Boulanger. In 1954 he and his first wife, the artist Dedé Wolff, left Buenos Aires and their two children (Diana aged 11 and Daniel aged 10) behind and travelled to Paris. The insightful Boulanger turned Piazzolla's life around in a day, as he related in his own words:

Piazzolla returned from New York to Argentina in 1955, formed the Octeto Buenos Aires with Enrico Mario Francini and Hugo Baralis on violins, Atilio Stampone on piano, Leopoldo Federico as second bandoneon, Horacio Malvicino on electric guitar, José Bragato on cello and Juan Vasallo on double bass to play tangos, and never looked back.

Upon introducing his new approach to the tango ''(nuevo tango)'', he became a controversial figure among Argentines both musically and politically. The Argentine saying "in Argentina everything may change – except the tango" suggests some of the resistance he found in his native land. However, his music gained acceptance in Europe and North America, and his reworking of the tango was embraced by some liberal segments of Argentine society, who were pushing for political changes in parallel to his musical revolution.

During the period of Argentine military dictatorship from 1976 to 1983, Piazzolla lived in Italy, but returned many times to Argentina, recorded there, and on at least one occasion had lunch with the dictator Jorge Rafael Videla. However, his relationship with the dictator might have been less than friendly, as recounted in ''Ástor Piazzolla, A manera de memorias'' (a comprehensive collection of interviews, constituting a memoir):

In 1990 he suffered thrombosis in Paris, and died two years later in Buenos Aires.

Among his followers, his own protégé Marcelo Nisinman is the best known innovator of the tango music of the new millennium, while Pablo Ziegler, pianist with Piazzolla's second quintet, has assumed the role of principal custodian of nuevo tango, extending the jazz influence in the style. The Brazilian guitarist Sergio Assad has also experimented with folk-derived, complex virtuoso compositions that show Piazzolla's structural influence while steering clear of tango sounds; and Osvaldo Golijov has acknowledged Piazzolla as perhaps the greatest influence on his globally oriented, eclectic compositions for classical and klezmer performers.

Musical style

Piazzolla's ''nuevo tango'' was distinct from the traditional tango in its incorporation of elements of jazz, its use of extended harmonies and dissonance, its use of counterpoint, and its ventures into extended compositional forms. As Argentine psychoanalyst Carlos Kuri has pointed out, Piazzolla's fusion of tango with this wide range of other recognizable Western musical elements was so successful that it produced a new individual style transcending these influences. It is precisely this success, and individuality, that makes it hard to pin down where particular influences reside in his compositions, but some aspects are clear. The use of the passacaglia technique of a circulating bass line and harmonic sequence, invented and much used in 17th and 18th century baroque music but also central to the idea of jazz "changes", predominates in most of Piazzolla's mature compositions. Another clear reference to the baroque is the often complex and virtuosic counterpoint that sometimes follows strict fugal behavior but more often simply allows each performer in the group to assert his voice. A further technique that emphasises this sense of democracy and freedom among the musicians is improvisation that is borrowed from jazz in concept, but in practice involves a different vocabulary of scales and rhythms that stay within the parameters of the established tango sound-world. Pablo Ziegler has been particularly responsible for developing this aspect of the style both within Piazzolla's groups and since the composer's death.

With the composition of ''Adiós Nonino'' in 1959, Piazzolla established a standard structural pattern for his compositions, involving a formal pattern of fast-slow-fast-slow-coda, with the fast sections emphasizing gritty tango rhythms and harsh, angular melodic figures, and the slower sections usually making use of the string instrument in the group and/or Piazzolla's own bandoneón as lyrical soloists. The piano tends to be used throughout as a percussive rhythmic backbone, while the electric guitar either joins in this role or spins filigree improvisations; the double bass parts are usually of little interest, but provide an indispensable rugged thickness to the sound of the ensemble. The quintet of bandoneon, violin, piano, electric guitar and double bass was Piazzolla's preferred setup on two extended occasions during his career, and most critics consider it to be the most successful instrumentation for his works. This is due partly to its great efficiency in terms of sound – it covers or imitates most sections of a symphony orchestra, including the percussion which is improvised by all players on the bodies of their instruments – and the strong expressive identity it permits each individual musician. With a style that is both rugged and intricate, such a setup augments the compositions' inherent characteristics.

Despite the prevalence of the quintet formation and the ABABC compositional structure, Piazzolla consistently experimented with other musical forms and instrumental combinations. In 1965 an album was released containing collaborations between Piazzolla and Jorge Luis Borges where Borges's poetry was narrated over very avant-garde music by Piazzolla including the use of dodecaphonic (twelve-tone) rows, free non-melodic improvisation on all instruments, and modal harmonies and scales. In 1968 Piazzolla wrote and produced an "operita", ''María de Buenos Aires'', that employed a larger ensemble including flute, percussion, multiple strings and three vocalists, and juxtaposed movements in Piazzolla's own style with several pastiche numbers ranging from waltz and hurdy-gurdy to a piano/narrator bar-room ''scena'' straight out of ''Casablanca''.

By the 1970s Piazzolla was living in Rome, managed by the Italian agent Aldo Pagani, and exploring a leaner, more fluid musical style drawing on more jazz influence, and with simpler, more continuous forms. Pieces that exemplify this new direction include ''Libertango'' and most of the ''Suite Troileana'', written in memory of the late Anibal Troilo. In the 1980s Piazzolla was rich enough, for the first time, to become relatively autonomous artistically, and wrote some of his most ambitious multi-movement works. These included ''Tango Suite'' for the virtuoso guitar duo Sergio and Odair Assad; ''Histoire du Tango'', where a flutist and guitarist tell the history of tango in four chunks of music styled at thirty-year intervals; and ''La Camorra'', a suite in three ten minute movements, inspired by the Neapolitan crime family and exploring symphonic concepts of large-scale form, thematic development, contrasts of texture and massive accumulations of ensemble sound. After making three albums in New York with the second quintet and producer Kip Hanrahan, two of which he described on separate occasions as "the greatest thing I've done", he disbanded the quintet, formed a sextet with an extra bandoneon, cello, bass, electric guitar, and piano, and wrote music for this ensemble that was even more adventurous harmonically and structurally than any of his previous works (''Preludio y Fuga; Sex-tet''). Had he not suffered an incapacitating stroke on the way to Notre Dame mass in 1990, it is likely that he would have continued to use his popularity as a performer of his own works to experiment in relative safety with even more audacious musical techniques, while possibly responding to the surging popularity of non-Western musics by finding ways to incorporate new styles into his own. In his musical professionalism and open-minded attitude to existing styles he held the mindset of an 18th century composing performer such as Handel or Mozart, who were anxious to assimilate all national "flavors" of their day into their own compositions, and who always wrote with both first-hand performing experience and a sense of direct social relationship with their audiences. This may have resulted in a backlash amongst conservative tango aficionados in Argentina, but in the rest of the West it was the key to his extremely sympathetic reception among classical and jazz musicians, both seeing some of the best aspects of their musical practices reflected in his work.

Musical career

Piazzolla, after leaving Troilo's orchestra in the 1940s, led numerous ensembles beginning with the 1946 Orchestra, the 1955 Octeto Buenos Aires, the 1960 "First Quintet", the 1971 Conjunto 9 ("Noneto"), the 1978 "Second Quintet" and the 1989 New Tango Sextet. As well as providing original compositions and arrangements, he was the director and Bandoneon player in all of them. He also recorded the album ''Summit'' with jazz baritone saxophonist Gerry Mulligan. His numerous compositions include orchestral work such as the "Concierto para bandoneón, orquesta, cuerdas y percusión", "Doble concierto para bandoneón y guitarra", "Tres tangos sinfónicos" and "Concierto de Nácar para 9 tanguistas y orquesta", pieces for the solo classical guitar—the ''Cinco Piezas'' (1980), as well as song-form compositions that still today are well known by the general public in his country, like "Balada para un loco" (Ballad for a madman) and ''Adiós Nonino'' (dedicated to his father) which he recorded many times with different musicians and ensembles. Biographers estimate that Piazzolla wrote around 3,000 pieces and recorded around 500.

In the summer of 1985 he appeared with his Quinteto Tango Nuevo at the Almeida Theatre in London for a week-long engagement. On September 6, 1987, his quintet gave a concert in New York's Central Park, which was recorded and, in 1994, released in compact disk format as ''The Central Park Concert.''

Discography

''Two Argentinians in Paris'' (with Lalo Schifrin, 1955)

''Sinfonía de Tango'' (Orquesta de Cuerdas, 1955)

''Adiós Nonino'' (1960)

''Piazzolla Interpreta A Piazzolla'' (Quinteto, 1961)

''Piazzolla … O No?'' (canta Nelly Vazquez, Quinteto, 1961)

''Nuestro Tiempo'' (canta Hector de Rosas, Quinteto, 1962)

''Tango Contemporáneo'' (Nuevo Octeto, 1963)

''Tango Para Una Cuidad'' (canta Héctor De Rosas, Quinteto, 1963)

''Concierto en el Philharmonic Hall de New York'' (Quinteto, 1965)

''El Tango. Jorge Luis Borges – Ástor Piazzolla'' (Orquesta and Quinteto, 1965)

''La Guardia Vieja'' (1966)

''La Historia del Tango. La Guardia Vieja'' (Orquesta, 1967)

''La Historia del Tango''. Época Romántica (Orquesta, 1967)

''ION Studios'' (1968)

''María de Buenos Aires'' (Orquesta, 1968)

''Piazzolla En El Regina'' (Quinteto, 1970)

''Original Tangos from Argentina Vol. 1 & 2'' (solo bandeneon, 1970)

''Pulsación'' (Orquesta, 1970)

''Piazzolla-Troilo'' (Dúo de Bandoneones, 1970)

''Concerto Para Quinteto'' (Quinteto, 1971)

''La Bicicleta Blanca'', (Amelita Baltar y Orquesta, 1971)

''En Persona'' (recita Horacio Ferrer, Ástor Piazzolla, 1971)

''Música Popular Contemporánea de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires. Vol.1 & 2'' (Conjunto 9, 1972)

''Roma'' (Conjunto 9, 1972)

''Libertango'' (Orquesta, 1974)

''Piazzolla and Amelita Baltar'' (1974)

''Summit (Reunión Cumbre) with Gerry Mulligan'' (Orquesta, 1974)

''Suite Troileana-Lumiere'' (Orquesta, 1975)

''Buenos Aires'' (1976)

''Il Pleut Sur Santiago'' (Orquesta, 1976)

''Piazzolla & El Conjunto Electrónico'' (Conjunto Electrónico, 1976)

''Piazzolla en el Olimpia de Paris'' (Conjunto Electrónico, 1977)

''Lo Que Vendrá'' (Orquesta de Cuerdas and Quinteto Nuevo Tiempo, 1979)

''Piazzolla-Goyeneche En Vivo, Teatro Regina'' (Quinteto Tango Nuevo, 1982)

''Oblivion'' (Orquesta, 1982)

''Suite Punta Del Este'' (Quinteto, 1982)

''Live in Lugano'' (Quinteto, 1983)

''SWF Rundfunkorchester'' (1983)

''Concierto de Nácar – Piazzolla en el Teatro Colón'' (Conjunto 9 y Orquesta Filarmónica del Teatro Colón, 1983)

''Live in Colonia'' (Quinteto Tango Nuevo, 1984)

''Montreal Jazz Festival'' (Quinteto Tango Nuevo, 1984)

''Live in Wien Vol.1'' (Quinteto Tango Nuevo, 1984)

''Enrico IV'' (sound track of film ''Enrico IV (film)Enrico IV'', 1984)

''Green Studio'' (1984)

''Teatro Nazionale di Milano'' (1984)

''El Nuevo Tango. Piazzolla y Gary Burton'' (Quinteto, 1986)

''El Exilio de Gardel'' (soundtrack of film El Exilio de Gardel, Quinteto, 1986)

''Tango: Zero Hour'' (Quinteto Tango Nuevo, 1986)

''Central Park Concert'' (Quinteto, 1987)

''Concierto para Bandoneón – Tres Tangos'' with the Orchestra of St. Luke's, Lalo Schifrin (conductor), Princeton University (1987)

''Sur'' (soundtrack of film Sur, Quinteto, 1988)

''Luna. Live in Amsterdam'' (Quinteto Tango Nuevo, 1989)

''Lausanne Concert'' (Sexteto, 1989)

''Live at the BBC'' (1989)

''La Camorra'' (Quinteto Tango Nuevo, 1989)

''Hommage a Liege: Concierto para bandoneón y guitarra/Historia del Tango'' (1988) with Liège Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Leo Brouwer. The concerto was performed by Piazzolla with Cacho Tirao, the ''Historia'' by Guy Lukowski and Marc Grawels.

''Bandoneón Sinfónico'' (1990)

''The Rough Dancer and the Cyclical Night (Tango apasionado)'' (1991)

''Five Tango Sensations'' (Ástor Piazzolla and Kronos Quartet, 1991)

''Original Tangos from Argentina'' (1992)

''Lausanne Concert'' (Sexteto, 1993)

''Central Park Concert 1987'' (Quinteto, 1994)

''El Nuevo Tango de Buenos Aires'' (Quinteto, 1995)

''57 Minutos con la Realidad'' (Sexteto, 1996)

''Tres Minutos con la Realidad'' (Sexteto, 1997)

See also

''María de Buenos Aires'', a tango opera by Piazzolla

''Estaciones Porteñas'', Piazzolla’s 4 Seasons

''12 Monkeys'', a movie whose soundtrack is derived and excerpted from Piazzolla's Suite Punta del Este

Ave Maria

References

External links

[ Ástor Piazzolla] in Allmusic

Piazzolla discography

Piazzolla.Org founded by John Buckman

Todo tango:Piazzolla Piazzolla Revolucionario Querido Ástor Piazzollazzo.com.ar E-Astoria.be (Ensemble Astoria). Astorpia.com (Astorpia Tango Quintet).

Piazzolla Sheet Music For Accordion

Ástor Piazzolla biography and discography at World Music Central

see also "Tangata" – the music of Astor Piazzolla...the Manny Bobenrieth Ensemble, R&L; Records ;Video recordings

''Fuga Y Misterio'' Played by Classical Jam

''Fracanapa'' Played by Classical Jam

''Maria de Buenos Aires'' Played by Astorpia Tango Quintet.

''Libertango'' Original version by Astor Piazzolla

''Libertango'' Played by Néstor Marconi and Yo-Yo Ma.

''Oblivion'' Played by Cellistanbul and Julian Lloyd Webber

''Decarisimo'' Played by Nuevo Tango Ensamble

Performance of Oblivion http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WAclIk8Bho

Libertango Played by Glass Duo

Fugata Played by Nuevo Tango Ensamble

La muerte del angel Played by Nuevo Tango Ensamble

Category:1921 births Category:1992 deaths Category:Argentine musicians Category:Argentine people of Italian descent Category:Argentine songwriters Category:Argentine bandoneonists Category:Bandoneonists Category:Argentine classical bandoneonists Category:Argentine composers Category:Argentine film score composers Category:People from Mar del Plata Category:20th-century classical composers Category:Tango musicians

af:Astor Piazzolla an:Astor Piazzolla be:Астар П'яцола bg:Астор Пиацола ca:Ástor Piazzolla ceb:Astor Piazzolla da:Astor Piazzolla de:Astor Piazzolla et:Astor Piazzolla el:Άστορ Πιατσόλα es:Astor Piazzolla eo:Ástor Piazzolla eu:Astor Piazzolla fa:آستور پیاتزولا fr:Astor Piazzolla gl:Astor Piazzolla ko:아스토르 피아소야 io:Ástor Piazzolla it:Astor Piazzolla he:אסטור פיאצולה ka:ასტორ პიაცოლა lb:Astor Piazzolla lt:Ástor Piazzolla lij:Astor Piazzolla hu:Astor Piazzolla nl:Ástor Piazzolla ja:アストル・ピアソラ no:Astor Piazzolla oc:Ástor Piazzolla pl:Astor Piazzolla pt:Astor Piazzolla ro:Astor Piazzolla ru:Пьяццолла, Астор sc:Astor Piazzolla simple:Ástor Piazzolla sk:Ástor Piazzolla sl:Astor Piazzolla fi:Astor Piazzolla sv:Ástor Piazzolla tr:Astor Piazzolla uk:Астор П'яццола war:Astor Piazzolla zh:阿斯托尔·皮亚佐拉

Coordinates	37°46′45.48″N122°25′9.12″N
birth date	February 21, 1946
birth place	Hammersmith, London, England
birth name	Alan Sidney Patrick Rickman
occupation	Actor (stage, screen)
years active	1978–present
partner	Rima Horton (1965–present) }}

Alan Sidney Patrick Rickman (born 21 February 1946) is an English actor of the stage and screen. He is a renowned stage actor in modern and classical productions and a former member of the Royal Shakespeare Company. His breakout performance was as the Vicomte de Valmont in ''Les Liaisons Dangereuses'', for which he was nominated for a Tony Award. Rickman is known for his film performances as Hans Gruber in ''Die Hard'', Severus Snape in the ''Harry Potter'' film series, Eamon de Valera in ''Michael Collins'', and Metatron in ''Dogma''.

Rickman has also had a number of other notable film roles such as the Sheriff of Nottingham in ''Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves'', Jamie in ''Truly, Madly, Deeply'', P.L. O'Hara in ''An Awfully Big Adventure'' and Colonel Brandon in Ang Lee's 1995 film ''Sense and Sensibility''. More recently, he played Judge Turpin in the film adaptation of Stephen Sondheim's musical of ''Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street''.

Early life

Rickman was born in South Hammersmith, London, to a working class family, the son of Margaret Doreen Rose (née Bartlett), a housewife, and Bernard Rickman, a factory worker. Rickman's mother was from Wales and a Methodist, and his father was of Irish Catholic background. He has one elder brother, David (b. 1944), a graphic designer, a younger brother, Michael (b. 1947), a tennis coach, and a younger sister, Sheila (b. 1949). Rickman attended Derwentwater Primary School, in Acton, a school that followed the Montessori method of education.

When he was eight, his father died, leaving his mother to bring up four children mostly alone. She married again, but divorced his stepfather after three years. "There was one love in her life," Rickman later said. Rickman excelled at calligraphy and watercolour painting, and from Derwentwater Junior School he won a scholarship to Latymer Upper School in London, where he started getting involved in drama. After leaving Latymer, Rickman attended Chelsea College of Art and Design and then the Royal College of Art. This education allowed him to work as a graphic designer for the radical newspaper the ''Notting Hill Herald'', which he considered a more stable occupation than acting. "Drama school wasn't considered the sensible thing to do at 18," he said.

After graduation, Rickman and several friends opened a graphic design studio called Graphiti, but after three years of successful business, he decided that if he were to ever explore acting professionally, it was now or never. This led him to write a letter to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) requesting an audition and was awarded a place in RADA which he attended from 1972–74. While there, he studied Shakespeare's works and supported himself by working as a dresser for Sir Nigel Hawthorne and Sir Ralph Richardson, and left after winning several prizes, including the Emile Littler Prize, the Forbes Robertson Prize, and the Bancroft Gold Medal.

Career

After graduating from RADA, Rickman worked extensively with various British repertory and experimental theatre groups on productions including ''The Seagull'' and Snoo Wilson's ''The Grass Widow'' at the Royal Court Theatre, and has appeared three times at the Edinburgh International Festival. In 1978, he played with the Court Drama Group, performing in several plays, most notably ''Romeo And Juliet'' and ''A View from the Bridge''. While working with the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) he starred in, among other things, ''As You Like It''.

In 1982, British television audiences came to know Alan Rickman as the Reverend Obadiah Slope in the BBC's adaptation of ''Barchester Towers'' known as The Barchester Chronicles. In 1985, Rickman was given the male lead, the Vicomte de Valmont, in the Royal Shakespeare Company's production of Christopher Hampton's ''Les Liaisons Dangereuses'', directed by Howard Davies. When the show went to Broadway in 1987, Rickman earned both a Tony Award nomination and a Drama Desk Award nomination for his performance.

Rickman's career has been filled with a wide variety of roles. He has played romantic leads like Colonel Brandon in ''Sense and Sensibility'', and Jamie in ''Truly, Madly, Deeply'', as well as numerous villains in Hollywood big budget films: German terrorist Hans Gruber in ''Die Hard'' (1988), the Sheriff of Nottingham in ''Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves'' (1991), and most recently Severus Snape, the potions master in the ''Harry Potter'' series (2001–2011). In 1995, Rickman turned down the role of Alec Trevelyan in the James Bond film ''GoldenEye''.

His role in ''Die Hard'' earned him a spot on the AFI's 100 years...100 Heroes & Villains as the 46th best villain in film history. His performance as the Sheriff of Nottingham in ''Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves'' also made him known as one of the best actors to portray a villain in films. He has taken issue with being typecast as a "villain actor", citing the fact that he has not portrayed a stock villain character since the Sheriff of Nottingham in 1991.

During his long career Rickman has also played a number of comedic roles, sending up classically trained British actors who take on "lesser roles" as the character Sir Alexander Dane/Dr. Lazarus in the science fiction spoof ''Galaxy Quest'', portraying the angel Metatron, the voice of God, in ''Dogma'', appearing as Emma Thompson's foolish husband Harry in ''Love Actually'', providing the voice of Marvin the Paranoid Android in ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'', and the egotistical, Nobel Prize-winning father in ''Nobel Son''.

Rickman has also received acclaim for two biographical pieces he did for HBO. He won a Golden Globe and an ''Emmy'' for his performance as ''Rasputin: Dark Servant of Destiny'' in 1996, and was also nominated for an Emmy for his work as Dr. Alfred Blalock in 2004's ''Something the Lord Made''. He also starred in the independent film ''Snow Cake'' (with Sigourney Weaver and Carrie-Anne Moss) which had its debut at the Berlinale, and also ''Perfume: The Story of a Murderer'' (with Dustin Hoffman), directed by Tom Tykwer.

In 2007, Rickman appeared in the critically acclaimed ''Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street'' directed by Tim Burton, alongside ''Harry Potter'' co-stars Helena Bonham Carter and Timothy Spall; he played antagonist Judge Turpin. Rickman also appeared as Absolem the Caterpillar in Burton's 2010 film ''Alice in Wonderland''.

Rickman has performed on stage in Noël Coward's romantic comedy ''Private Lives'', which transferred to Broadway after its successful run in London at the Albery Theatre and ended in September 2002. Rickman had reunited with his ''Les Liaisons Dangereuses'' co-star Lindsay Duncan and director Howard Davies for this Tony Award-winning production.

His previous stage performance was as Mark Antony, opposite Helen Mirren as Cleopatra, in the Royal National Theatre's production of ''Antony and Cleopatra'' at the Olivier Theatre in London, which ran from 20 October to 3 December 1998. Before that, he performed in Yukio Ninagawa's ''Tango at the End of Winter'' in London's West End and the Riverside Studio production of ''Hamlet'' in 1991, directed by Robert Sturua.

Rickman had also directed ''The Winter Guest'' at London's Almeida Theatre in 1995 and the film version of the same play in 1996 starring Emma Thompson and her real life mother Phyllida Law. He also compiled (with Katharine Viner) and directed the play ''My Name Is Rachel Corrie'' in April 2005 at the Royal Court Theatre, London, and won the Theatre Goers' Choice Awards for best director. In May 2010, he finished directing Strindberg's play ''Creditors'' at the Brooklyn Academy of Music Harvey Theatre after its previous run at London's Donmar Warehouse in 2008.

In 2009 Rickman was given the James Joyce Award by University College Dublin’s Literary and Historical Society.

In October and November 2010, Rickman starred in the eponymous role in Henrik Ibsen's ''John Gabriel Borkman'' at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin alongside Lindsay Duncan and Fiona Shaw. The ''Irish Independent'' called Rickman's performance breathtaking. This production subsequently travelled to the Brooklyn Academy of Music for performances in January and February 2011.

In 2011, Rickman again appeared as Severus Snape in the final instalment in the ''Harry Potter'' series, ''Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2''. Kenneth Turan of ''The Los Angeles Times'' said Rickman "as always, makes the most lasting impression," while Peter Travers of ''Rolling Stone'' called Rickman "sublime at giving us a glimpse at last into the secret nurturing heart that [...] Snape masks with a sneer." Media coverage characterized Rickman's performance as worthy of an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor nomination. He earned his first award nominations for his role as Snape at the 2011 Alliance of Women Film Journalists Awards, 2011 Scream Awards and 2011 St. Louis Gateway Film Critics Association Awards in the Best Supporting Actor category.

On 21 November 2011, Rickman opened in ''Seminar'', a new play by Theresa Rebeck, at the John Golden Theatre on Broadway. He is to star with Colin Firth and Cameron Diaz in a remake of 1966's ''Gambit'' by the Coen brothers.

In the media

Rickman was chosen by ''Empire'' as one of the 100 Sexiest Stars in film history (No 34) in 1995 and ranked No 59 in ''Empire'''s "The Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time" list in October 1997. In 2009 and 2010 Rickman ranked once again as one of the 100 Sexiest Stars by ''Empire'', both times Rickman was placed 8th out of the 50 actors chosen. Rickman became Vice-Chairman of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) in 2003. He was voted No 19 in ''Empire'' magazine's Greatest Living Movie Stars over the age of 50 and was twice nominated for Broadway's Tony Award as Best Actor (Play): in 1987 for ''Les Liaisons Dangereuses'', and in 2002 for a revival of Noel Coward's ''Private Lives''. ''The Guardian'' named Rickman as an "honourable mention" in a list of the best actors never to have received an Academy Award nomination.

Two researchers, a linguist and a sound engineer, found "the perfect [male] voice" to be a combination of Rickman's and Jeremy Irons's voices based on a sample of 50 voices. Coincidentally, the two actors played brothers in the ''Die Hard'' series of films.

Rickman has also been featured in several musical works – most notably in a song composed by the English songwriter Adam Leonard entitled "Not Alan Rickman". Moreover, the actor played a "Master of Ceremonies" part in announcing the various instruments in Mike Oldfield's ''Tubular Bells II'' on the track ''The Bell''. Rickman was one of the many artists who recited Shakespearian sonnets on the 2002 album'' When Love Speaks'', and is also featured prominently in a music video by the band Texas entitled "In Demand", which premiered on Europe MTV in August 2000. In the video, lead singer Sharleen Spiteri danced the tango with Rickman: the clip was nominated for Best British Video at the Brit Awards.

Personal life

In 1965, at the age of 19, Rickman met his partner Rima Horton, a Labour party councillor on Kensington and Chelsea London Borough Council 1986-2006. They began living together in 1977.

Filmography

! Year	! Title	! Role	Notes
1978		Tybalt	BBC Television Shakespeare
		1980	''Thérèse Raquin''	Vidal	BBC Miniseries
1980		Clive	Episode #1.7
1982	''Busted''	Simon	BBC TV Movie
1982	''Smiley's People''	Mr. Brownlow	Episode #1.2
1982	''''	The Rev. Obadiah Slope	BBC Miniseries
1985	''Return of the Native''	Narrator	British Audiobook Publishing Association's "Talkie Award" for Best Unabridged Classic Recording
1985	''Summer Season''	Croop	BBC TV Series
1985	''Girls On Top''	Dimitri / Voice of RADA	CIT TV Series
1988	''Die Hard''	Hans Gruber
1989	''Revolutionary Witness''	Jacques Roux	BBC TV Short
1989	''''	Ed, the painter
1989	''Screenplay''	Israel Yates	BBC TV Series
1990	''Quigley Down Under''	Elliot Marston
1991	''Truly, Madly, Deeply''	Jamie	Evening Standard British Film Awards#1991 Winners
1991	''[[Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves''	Sheriff of Nottingham	BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting RoleEvening Standard British Film Awards#1991 Winners
1991		Sinclair Bryant	[[Evening Standard British Film Awards#1991 Winners
1991	''[[Closet Land''	The Interrogator
1992	''Bob Roberts''	Lukas Hart III
1993		Dwight Billings	Propaganda Films TV Series
1994		Franz Anton Mesmer	Montreal World Film Festival for Best Actor
1995	''''	P.L. O'Hara
1995		Colonel Brandon	Nominated — BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting RoleNominated — Chlotrudis Award for Best Supporting ActorNominated — Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture
1996	''Rasputin: Dark Servant of Destiny''	Grigori Rasputin	Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor - Miniseries or a MovieGolden Globe Award for Best Actor - Miniseries or Television FilmSatellite Award for Best Actor – Miniseries or Television FilmScreen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Miniseries or Television Movie
1996		Éamon de Valera	Nominated — BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role
1996	''Castle Ghosts of Ireland''	Living Tyde	Documentary
1997	''''	Man in street (uncredited)	Also director and co-writerBrussels International Fantastic Film Festival: Audience AwardChicago International Film Festival: Gold Hugo Award for Best FilmVenice Film Festival: 'CinemAvvenire' Award and OCIC AwardNominated — Chlotrudis Award for Best DirectorNominated — Czech Lion Award for Best Foreign Language FilmNominated — Golden Lion Award
1998		Detective David Friedman
1998	''Dark Harbor''	David Weinberg
1999		The Metatron
1999	''Galaxy Quest''	Alexander Dane/Dr. Lazarus	Nominated — Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actor
2000	''Help! I'm a Fish''	Joe	Voice
2001		Man
2001	''Blow Dry''	Phil Allen
2001	''''	John Gissing
2001		Severus Snape	Known as ''Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone'' in the United States
2002		Severus Snape	Nominated — Phoenix Film Critics Society Award for Best Cast
2002	''King of the Hill''	King Philip	Voice
2003	''Love Actually''	Harry	Washington D.C. Area Film Critics Association Award for Best EnsembleNominated — Phoenix Film Critics Society Award for Best Cast
2004	''Something the Lord Made''		Nominated — Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor - Miniseries or a MovieNominated — Satellite Award for Best Actor – Miniseries or Television Film
2004		Severus Snape
2005		Severus Snape
2005	''''	Marvin the Paranoid Android	Voice
2006		Antoine Richis
2006	''Snow Cake''	Alex Hughes
2007	''Nobel Son''	Eli Michaelson
2007		Severus Snape
2007		Judge Turpin	Nominated — Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best CastNominated — Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actor
2008	''Bottle Shock''		Seattle International Film Festival: Golden Space Needle Award for Best Actor
2009		Severus Snape	Scream Award for Best Ensemble
2010			Voice
2010	''Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1''	Severus Snape
2010	''''	Noel Odell	National Geographic documentaryVoice
2010	''''	He	''BBC Drama Production''
2011	''Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2''	Severus Snape	MTV World Cup Award for Favorite Harry Potter Character PortrayalPeople's Choice Award for Favorite Ensemble Movie CastSan Diego Film Critics Society Award for Best Performance by an EnsembleNominated — Alliance of Women Film Journalists Award for Best Actor in a Supporting RoleNominated — IGN Movie Award for Best Ensemble CastNominated — Scream Award for Best Supporting ActorNominated — Scream Award for Best EnsembleNominated — St. Louis Gateway Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting ActorNominated — Washington D.C. Area Film Critics Association Award for Best Cast
2011	''The Boy in the Bubble''	Narrator	Animated short film
2012		Lord Shahbandar	Post Production

References

External links

Alan Rickman at Emmys.com

Category:1946 births Category:BAFTA winners (people) Category:Best Supporting Actor BAFTA Award winners Category:Best Miniseries or Television Movie Actor Golden Globe winners Category:Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Miniseries or Television Movie Screen Actors Guild Award winners Category:Emmy Award winners Category:English film actors Category:English stage actors Category:English television actors Category:English voice actors Category:English theatre directors Category:Living people Category:Old Latymerians Category:People from Hammersmith Category:English people of Irish descent Category:English people of Welsh descent Category:Royal National Theatre Company members Category:Royal Shakespeare Company members Category:Alumni of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art Category:Alumni of the University of the Arts Category:Alumni of Chelsea College of Art & Design

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Coordinates	37°46′45.48″N122°25′9.12″N
name	Carlos Gardel
background	solo_singer
born	December 11, 1890
birth place	Toulouse, France
death date	June 24, 1935
death place	Medellín, Colombia
genre	Tango
years active	1917–1935
website	}}

Carlos Gardel (11 December 1890 – 24 June 1935) was a singer, songwriter and actor, and is perhaps the most prominent figure in the history of tango. He was born in Toulouse, France, although he never acknowledged his birthplace publicly, and there are still claims of his birth in Uruguay. (See below.) He lived in Argentina from the age of two and acquired Argentine citizenship in 1923. He grew up in the Abasto neighborhood of Buenos Aires. He attended Pio IX Industrial high-school located in the Almagro neighborhood of Buenos Aires. He died in an airplane crash at the height of his career, becoming an archetypal tragic hero mourned throughout Latin America. For many, Gardel embodies the soul of the tango style. He is commonly referred to as "Carlitos", "El Zorzal" (The Song Thrush), "The King of Tango", "El Mago" (The Magician) and "El Mudo" (The Mute).

The unerring musicality of Gardel's baritone voice and the dramatic phrasing of his lyrics made miniature masterpieces of his hundreds of three-minute tango recordings. Together with lyricist and long-time collaborator Alfredo Le Pera, Gardel wrote several classic tangos, most notably: ''Mi Buenos Aires querido, Cuesta abajo, Amores de estudiante, Soledad, Volver, Por una cabeza'' and ''El día que me quieras.''

Career

Gardel began his singing career in bars and at private parties. He also sang with Francisco Martino and later in a trio with Martino and José Razzano. Gardel created the ''tango-canción'' in 1917 with his rendition of Pascual Contursi and Samuel Castriota's ''Mi Noche Triste''. The recording sold 10,000 copies and was a hit throughout Latin America. Gardel went on tour through Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, Brazil, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Colombia, and also made appearances in Paris, New York, Barcelona and Madrid. He sold 70,000 records in the first three months of a 1928 visit to Paris. As his popularity grew, he made a number of films for Paramount in France and the U.S. While sentimental films such as ''El día que me quieras'' and ''Cuesta abajo'' lack lasting dramatic value, they were outstanding showcases of his tremendous singing talents and movie star looks.

In 1915 Gardel was supposedly wounded after being shot by Che Guevara's father, Ernesto Guevara Lynch, as a result of a bar room brawl in the belle epoque ''Palais de Glace'' in the Recoleta district of Buenos Aires, although different versions assert that he was shot in the chest or in the leg. Yet another variation holds that it was not Che's father but rather Roberto Guevara, an upper-class boy often involved in quarrels, who shot him.

Death and ongoing profile

{|align=right | |} Gardel died in 1935 in an airplane crash in Medellín, Colombia. Le Pera, two of their guitarists (Guillermo Desiderio Barbieri and Ángel Domingo Riverol) and several business associates and friends of the group died in the crash as well. It is believed that a third guitarist, José María Aguilar, died a few days after the crash.

Millions of his fans throughout Latin America went into mourning. Hordes came to pay their respects as his body was taken from Colombia through New York City and Rio de Janeiro. Thousands rendered homage during the two days he lay in state in Montevideo, the city in which his mother lived at the time. Gardel's body was laid to rest in La Chacarita Cemetery in Buenos Aires. In the neighborhood of Abasto, Buenos Aires, Gardel's childhood home, the Carlos Gardel Museum opened in 2003.

Gardel is still revered from Tokyo to Buenos Aires. A popular saying in Latin America, which serves as a testimony to his long-lived popularity, claims, "Gardel sings better every day." The fingers of his life-sized tuxedo-clad statue on his tomb nearly always hold a burning cigarette left by an admirer. Another commonly used phrase in Latin America, which asserts that ''Veinte años no es nada'' (''Twenty years is nothing''), comes from his song ''Volver''. It is also common in Argentina, the phrase ''sos/soy Gardel y Le Pera'' (''I'm/You are Gardel and Le Pera'') referring to the greatness of both; used when somebody excels at something.

Statues in Scotland

During 2009/2010 statues depicting Gardel are scheduled to be erected temporarily throughout twenty-five small villages and towns of Scotland, commemorating his tour of 1930 where the singer used funds from his well-paid appearances in Glasgow and Edinburgh to subsidize small unannounced concerts in rural venues. These impromptu (and free) appearances endeared him to the working population of Scotland and his legacy of passion and art endure through regular commemorative concerts and amateur productions.

Birthplace controversy

The place of Gardel's birth is a matter of considerable controversy that still provokes passionate debate in Uruguay and Argentina.

After his death, his legal representative, Armando Defino, produced a handwritten will, which he assured was written by Gardel himself, claiming he was born in Toulouse, France, to Berthe Gardès (1865–1943), and baptized with the name of Charles Romuald Gardes. It is not known who Gardel's father was. There is an original birth certificate of a child, Charles Romuald Gardes, born in Toulouse to Berthe Gardès on December 11, 1890. On 14 April 1937, the government of Uruguay declared Berthe Gardès to be Gardel's sole heir.

Reporters often wrote that Gardel was Uruguayan, born in Tacuarembó. In the newspaper ''El Telégrafo'' (Paysandú, Uruguay, October 25, 1933), Gardel was reported as saying, "I'm Uruguayan, born in Tacuarembó" ["soy uruguayo, nacido en Tacuarembó"]. In the June 1935 issue of ''Caretas'' magazine of Antioquia, Colombia, Gardel was reported as saying, "My heart is Argentinian, but my soul is Uruguayan, because that is where I was born" ["Mi corazón es argentino, pero mi alma es uruguaya, porque allí nací"].

Legacy

In literature

Gabriel García Márquez mentions Gardel in his novel, ''Love in the Time of Cholera''. When Florentino Ariza and doctor Juvenal Urbino meet at the former's office in the Caribbean Fluvial Company, doctor Urbino unexpectedly asks Ariza, "Do you like music?". After seriously thinking the issue, Ariza answers, "I like Gardel."

Jorge Luis Borges, Julio Cortázar, Ernesto Sábato and Jimmy Buffett also mention Gardel in their works. Gardel appears as a fictionalized character in the 1979 play, "El día que me quieras," by the Venezuelan writer José Ignacio Cabrujas.

In film

There are two films about Gardel, both in production as of March 2009: ''Gardel 2008'' (July 2009), starring Gael García Bernal as Gardel, and ''Dare to Love Me'' (2010).

''Dare To Love Me''

In July 2003 Warner Brothers announced that they were working on a film version of Gardel's biography, ''The Vision of Love'' (the original cast included Jessica Alba, Ricardo Chavira and Halle Berry), but production was postponed in spring 2005 until early 2006, by that time both Alba and Chavira had backed out of the film. In 2007, Lindsay Lohan and Raoul Bova were cast in the lead roles of Gardel and La Ritana. It was left unknown when production would begin up until autumn 2008, when it was officially announced that production is set to begin on the film on 18 May 2009 and it will be released in late 2010. This was again postponed and no further news is available at this time.

In postage stamps

On March 16, 2011, the United States Postal Service issued a set of five "Latin Music Legends" stamps including one picturing Carlos Gardel. In the News Release announcing the U.S. Postage Commemorative Forever stamps, the Postal Service said "A superb and evocative singer, Carlos Gardel (1890?-1935) was one of the most celebrated tango artists of all time. Raised in Argentina, Gardel helped popularize the tango in the United States, Europe and throughout Latin America through his performances and recordings. Known as 'the man with the tear in his voice,' he also achieved fame as one of the stars of Spanish-language cinema."

Filmography

''Flor de Durazno'' (1917) (silent). This was Gardel's first film and was directed by Francisco Defilippis Novoa and was made in collaboration with Celestino Petray.

''Luces de Buenos Aires'' (1931) (filmed in Paris)

''Esperame'' (1932)

''La Casa es seria'' (1932)

''Melodía de Arrabal'' (1932)

''Cuesta abajo'' (1934)

''El Tango en Broadway'' (1934)

''El Día que me quieras'' (1935)

''Cazadores de estrellas'' (1935)

''Tango Bar'' (1935)

References

http://www.montevideo-tango.com/mvdt/Gardel.htm

External links

''www.gardelbiografia.com.ar''

Chronicles

Gardel Web Documents of Carlos Gardel

Category:1890 births Category:1935 deaths Category:Argentine actors Category:Argentine film actors Category:Argentine male singers Category:French male singers Category:Uruguayan male singers Category:People with acquired Argentine citizenship Category:Spanish-language singers Category:Tango musicians Category:Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in Colombia

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