HOME

Orquesta Típica Carlos Di Sarli

*07.01.1903 +12.01.1960

Status

El Señor del Tango

Recordings

393

To buy

The sextet's recordings, titles of 1939 -1948, Music Hall recordings and a selection of later recordings from the 1950s can be found in Golden Ear quality on www.tangotunes.com

To read:

Michael Lavocah "Tango Masters - Carlos Di Sarli"

Corazón - 1939 - Rufino

Discography

A good discography is offered by La Milonga di Alvin

Typical

- walking/pushing base
- dominant strings
- Di Sarlis' dark piano roll
- Di Sarlis' sparkling fills
- Pizzicati

Style

- romantic, dominated by strings
- energy waves

Biggest hits

- Corazón (1939/Rufino)
- Al compás del corazón (1942/Podestá)
- Organito de la tarde (1954)
- Bahía blanca (1957/1958)

Important singers

- Roberto Rufino (1939-1944)

- Alberto Podestá (1942 -1948)

- Jorge Durán (1944 - 1956)

- Óscar Serpa (1948-1955)

- Mario Pomar (1951-1955)

- Roberto Florio (1955 – 1956)

Important musicians

- Piano: Carlos Di Sarli
- Violine: Roberto Guisado, Bernardo Weber

- Bandoneon: Felix Verdi, Federico Scorticati, Ángel Ramos

Richard informs on Di Sarli

Di Sarlis' 3 Versions of La Cumparsita

Di Sarli is one of the Big Four of the Tango argentino. He was the only one who was not a true porteño. He came from the provincial town of Bahía Blanca (white beach).

For over 30 years, he helped to shape the development of Tango music and thrilled his fans with the powerfully restrained pushing beat so typical of him, in which his magical left hand on the piano plays a large part. Here it rumbles, here it is jazzy, here it rages, only superficially obscured by the violin melodies that unfold above. He is neither one of the rhythm-oriented traditionalists nor one of the avant-gardists in the tradition of Julio de Caro, but rather, influenced by Osvaldo Fresedo, he developed his own romantic style, which he didn't change throughout his life and which both beginners and experienced dancers can enjoy.

... from Bahía Blanca

He was born in the port city of Bahía Blanca, 600 km south of Buenos Aires, in 1903 as the eighth son of an Italian-roted family.

His mother, a pianist herself, discovered his talent early and laid the foundation for Di Sarli's classical piano play. Chopin, Liszt, Bach and Beethoven were among the teenager's repertoire. At the beginning of the 20th century, tango was still considered the music of the street, and even more so here in the provinces. The teenager made his way as a pianist, partly alone, partly with a trio. in cafés, bars and silent movie theaters, often enough in remote provincial nooks and crannies, far from his parents' home for months at a time, and finally founded his first orchestra. Tango played only a marginal role.

... to Buenos Aires

In 1923, tired of the dull provincial life and with a few tangos in his repertoire, the twenty year old got on the train and sought his fortune in Buenos Aires. It was not until 1926, after three years of hard work in different not very important combos, he made his breakthrough: Osvaldo Fresedo, Star of the upper class, was enthusiastic about Di Sarli's sweet and at the same time powerful piano playing. Di Sarli was able to lead the most important of the orchestras of successful Fresedo in the famous Cabaret Abdullah. Di Sarlis' admiration for Fresedo was reflected in his composition Milonguero Viejo. (recorded 1940)

After a couple of short engagements in different groups, Di Sarli finally established his successful first sextet in 1928.

Since Osvaldo Fresedo, the previous star of the Victor record company, had gone to Europe with his musicians and disbanded his numerous orchestras (there were as many as five), the very similar-sounding Di Sarli was able to take advantage of this gap and even secure a recording contract with RCA Victor in November 1928. 48 recordings were made until 1931. Even today they inspire dancers with Di Sarlis' recognizable characteristic sound of the right and left hand and the pushing bass. (Lavocah assumes that the bass range is emphasized even more by the positioning of the only microphone near the bass and piano.)

Ernesto Famá, who had just returned from Europe with Fresedo, lent his voice as estrebillista to the strongest pieces like Chau Pinela (1930) or Maldita (1931) f, Santiago Devincenci sings Cicatrices (1930).

Flora - 1930 - Ernesto Famá

Five Versions of Cicatrices

Cicatrices (Scars), composed in 1925 for Carlos Gardel, talks about the blissful wounds left by life and love.
Carlos Gardel's version (1925), accompanied by guitars, presents the entire text and is a classic example of tango canción.
Carlos Di Sarli spices up his Estribillista version of Cicatrices (1930) with a refrain sung by Santiago Devin.
The Cantor de Orquesta in the classical style of Epoqua de Oro, singing verse and refrain as part of the ensemble, is found in the versions of Rodolfo Biagi (1940 with Andrés Falgás) and Juan D'Arienzo (1942 with Hector Mauré)

The crisis of the sextets 1930-1932

From 1930 on, not only the consequences of Black Friday darkened the situation of tango musicians.
With the flourishing of the talking movies tango sextets lost an essential source of income: accompanying silent films. At the same time the soundtracks of imported films popularized international music. Colombia withdrew from Argentina, smaller record labels such as Electra (1930) and Brunswick (1932) crashed, and the majority of musicians were left without a contract or employment, running up and down Avenida Corrientes in search of work. Di Sarli and his musicians survived rather badly, Ernesto Famá switched to Canaro-Orchestre.
After the crisis, RCA and ODEON dominated the market as a duo-pole, only after 1950 numerous new labels emerged (TK, Music Hall, ...).

Chau pinela - 1930 - Ernesto Famá

Lorena Tarantino - Gianpiero Galdi

1934 - Di Sarli withdraws

For unknown reasons, Di Sarli withdrew to Rosario after the 1934 carnival. His musicians continued to perform under his name, Ricardo Cannataro, who almost equaled Di Sarli, took over the piano. Roberto Guisado, Di Sarli's lifelong violin sidekick, led the orchestra. In between, Di Sarli helped out his old combo for a few months and played in one or another formation or tried his luck as a film musician for the tango comedy Lindo Loco.

Star orchestra with singing stars in D'Arienzo's slipstream

By the end of the 1930s, the economic situation had stabilized again. And thanks to D'Arienzo's nervous, energetic new style, Buenos Aires was in a dance fever and Di Sarli was also getting involved again.

He formed a large Orquesta Típica from former musicians in late 1938. Performances at the newly opened Cabaret Moulin Rouge and on Radio El Mundo secured its existence.

This music is fast, snappy, nervous. It sounds far more like D'Arienzo than Di Sarli. And so Di Sarli elicits from the keyboard D'Arienzo-typical airy-nervous piano fills. And even singing violins can be found in the arrangements as in Racing Club (1940) .

El Marianito - 1941 - Instrumental

Pablo Inza y Sofia Saborido - Buenos Aires - 2020

Typical for Di Sarli, however, and he will always remain true to himself, is the musical swell and decay in small and large waves and the extensive renunciation of solos, with the exception of the keyboard tricks of the master himself, which he elicits from the piano in really all registers.

He never wrote down notes, nobody should be able to copy him. He often turned the piano in a way that his hands were hidden.

Troilo commented on the work of the stubborn man with the sunglasses in retrospect with the words:
He took the secret of his music to the grave.

But to become part of the first league of Orchestres, really convincing singers were still missing.

Roberto Rufino - the immature teenage superstar (1939-1943)

The solution was a teenager of 17 years, who had been thrilling audiences since the age of 14, and at the age of 16 was performing in marathon sessionson stage at the prestigious Cafe National with a wide variety of bands. His powerful, expressive and, despite youth, mature voice overwhelmed Di Sarli in a way that he abandoned the audition after a few bars. The fact that his mother had to sign the contract was still the smallest problem the orchestra had with this young star.

The minor had to hide on stage during police checks or didn't appear at all because he was forbidden to enter cabarets. Di Sarli finally had him dressed by a famous tailor and obtained an exemption from a judge to allow the minor to perform.

The breakthrough came in 1939 with Di Sarli's outstanding composition Corazón.

Corazón - 1939 - Rufino

Matteo Panero & Patricia Hilliges - Warschau - 2008

Rufino sings this first recording of the new orchestra with impressive passion and maturity, just as if he had already experienced all the heartbreak himself. Now the little guy was a big star, was as rich as he was immature, and threw himself into the wild nightlife alongside his hard work.

Di Sarli tried to accompany him in a fatherly way. He dressed him up, tried to protect him, but sometimes he had to pick him up from the soccer game in the street so that he wouldn't miss rehearsals.

Di Sarli and Rufino were now among the greats. The press proclaimed Di Sarli the king of tango, the most important orchestra leader of the year. In the following years he received the highest-paying contracts in the carnival, and his popularity was now so great that he became the regular orchestra of the Marabú, one of the great legendary cabarets.

To the orchestra's chagrin, however, the teen star Rufino repeatedly was absence for month, whether because he toured Chile for months with a mediocre orchestra, preferred to sing for lesser-known orchestras because working with Di Sarli was too strenuous for him, and finally because the twenty-year-old was also drafted into the military.

Di Sarli's other singers, Antonio Rodríguez Lesende or Carlos Acuña, are already strong, but could not reach the class of Rufino. The orchestra urgently needed a second voice, reliable as well as brilliant, and all the more so because since 1940 singers have become increasingly important both within the tango arrangements and in the favor of the audience.

Alma mía - 1939 - Vals - Rufino

Eleonora Kalganova and Michael Nadtochi - Halle - 2017

Ausenencia - 1940 - Augustin Volpe - Vals

It's worth listening to di Sarli's piano playing. In the valses and milongas of the 40s, he often goes wild.

Alberto Podestá (1942-1944)

Alejandro Washington Alé, as he was baptized, also started his tango career as a youngster.

Hailing from the provinces, he tried his luck as a child star in the capital until Miguel Caló discovered the seventeen-year-old in 1939. With five times his fee and the fame his orchestra had by then, Di Sarli won over the budding star in late 1941 and gave him the name he would use on stage as one of tango's most famous singers until his death in 2012: Alberto Podestá.

And Alberto Podestá, with his more romantic, calmer voice, met exactly the taste of the times, which were steadily changing in the early 1940s: D'Arienzo's nervousness was passé, most orchestras were arranging increasingly romantic, subtle and complex music, and playing more slowly.

Entre pitada y pitada - 1942 - Podestá

Singer diva war

On the one hand, Podestá experienced his great time with Di Sarli. The master tickled everything out of his singers, wanted them to sing with heart and soul, just like the idol Gardel.

Podestá became rich, he achieved great hits like Al compás del corazón (1943).

On the other hand, the years at the side of the immature singer-diva Rufino were anything but carefree, because he did not tolerate another star next to him and made life difficult for his singer colleague wherever he could. For example he secured the best numbers or exposed Podestá on stage. Di Sarli succeeded only to a limited extent in taming the catfight between the two.

After 1944 Podestá tried his luck in the newly founded orchestra of Enrique Francini and Armando Pontier, but again he had to share the stage with Rufino and returned to the Señor del Tango for two years in 1947.

Al compás del corazón - 1942 - Podestá

Feet: Eleonora Kalgarova - 2015

Di Sarlis other singers

Jorge Durán (1945-1947)

His voice surprises by its position. His baritone spreads more tranquility than the voices of the tenors , but it fits well with the quieter more romantic pieces of the second half of the 1940s, such as Porteño y Bailarín, La vida me engañó or Tu íntimo secreto (1945). Durán also returned to the orchestra in the 1950s. In keeping with the fashion of the time his singing is now full of schmaltz, pathos and romance, just like that of the other great singers of the late period like Mario Pomar, Óscar Serpa and Roberto Florio.

1947: Carnival in Montevideo

Since 1943, the authoritarian regime had already been constricting cultural life; in particular, the ban on lunfardo, the Argentine tango and rogue language, hindered both lyricists and performances.
Di Sarli therefore spent the Carnival of 1947 in Montevideo, and was able to engage Alberto Podestá for these concerts, in addition to Duran, and to shine with him on the other side of the Río de la Plata. While Durán left the orchestra, we hear Podestá at least on the studio recordings, while only Oscar Serpa became the new singer.

Vieja Luna - 1945 - Duran

Michelle und Murat - Holland - 2008

Dinero - Dinero - 1947 - Podestá

The most important musicians

Roberto Guisado - Violin (19.11.1909 - 4.8.1975)

The perfectly trained and already experienced violinist made his debut in Di Sarli's sextet in November 1929 and, apart from a few interruptions, was to play first violin alongside Di Sarli until 1958. He was without a doubt the most important piece within the string-heavy sound concept of the sound tinkerer. Still in the sixties and seventies he enriched orchestras of Fresedo, Enrique Alessio or Mario Demarco with his precise and warm tone. And it was certainly he who elicited the bird twittering in the tango El Amanecer from his violin.

Bernardo Weber violin(20.03.1913 - 11.6.1990)

The restless soul played in such diverse formations as Juan Maglio, Francisco Canaro, Àngel D'Agostino or Julio de Caro, finally becoming part of Di Sarli's new orchestra in 1951 until 1956. Then, like most, he went his own way with the Señores de Tango. Later we find him with D'Arienzo, Racciatti - and with different formations a total of nine times in Japan. As a very unstady living bachelor, traveling seems to have appealed to him.

Félix Verdi (30.04.1909 - 29.05.2003)

He led the bandoneon section for many years. Even though he completely identified himself with Di Sarli's style, he separated from the master several times. But he was also the one who could best deal with Di Sarli's extreme demands and harsh outbursts of rage, because they both understood each other as friends after all. Nevertheless, he left Di Sarli in 1956 with most of the other musicians and successfully joined the Señores del Tango.

The musician Di Sarli

While Di Sarli's famous left hand defines the pulse of the orchestra with a rumbling shove, his right fills gaps in all registers of the keyboard with fresh, sparkling, romantic or jazzy fills. And every note, every phrase seems to inspire us dancers.
Actually, only Di Sarli's piano has freedom, he sets syncopations and accents, the other musicians create the framework.

Mufa

In Argentina, a mufa is someone who brings bad luck. And Di Sarli was considered a mufa by many.

The sunglasses

The very fact that he always wore sunglasses in public furthered his reputation as a somewhat difficult lonesome loner. The sunglasses, however, resulted form an eye injury that the teenager sustained in 1916 in a traumatic accident in his father's armory: An accidentally triggered shot had destroyed his right eye.

Actually, the Señor del Compás was a kind-hearted man. He treated his young singers like a father, he loved his two daughters above all else and, according to Michael Lavocah, donated a quarter of his income to needy minors.

A difficult personality?

But at the same time, his uncompromising nature often rubbed him the wrong way. During the often relentless rehearsals, he often lost his patience, broke out in fits of rage and showed little understanding for the problems of his musicians.

And the tango community resented his refusal in 1944, out of excessive pride, to participate in a benefit concert for a terrible earthquake that killed 10,000 people.

Shitstorm against Di Sarli

Far more damaging to his reputation was, that Di Sarli fell out with his stage announcer in 1948.

Julio Jorge Nelson was a popular radio host who had laid the foundation for Gardel's saint-like veneration with his radio show, in which he played only tangos by Gardel. In revenge, after the break Nelson spread everywhere that Di Sarli was a mufa, he branded Di Sarli's name as unpronounceable, called him only the Blind Man, convinced film producers not to work with Di Sarli and, because Di Sarli's reputation was not the best anyway, was quite successful with his bullying.

Second Diving Station 1949 - 1951

After Di Sarli's musicians, motivated by new pro-worker laws launched by Peron, demanded better working conditions, Di Sarli was deeply annoyed and disbanded his orchestra after the 1949 carnival. He retired and intensified his second professional mainstay, real estate brokerage.

Comeback - the mature Di Sarli

In January 1951, the director of Radio El Mundo succeeded in luring the maestro back to the stage.
After a great comeback concert at Radio El Mundo, the orchestra, once again filled with outstanding musicians, now including five bandoneons and six violins, again filled radio shows, cafes and cabarets.

Singing frontmen were Óscar Serpa and Mario Pomar. In the following years, Di Sarli re-recorded many of his old hits on various record labels. His popularity was unbroken. Organito de la Tarde, recorded in August 1954, sold over two million copies!, classics such as El ingeniero or Bahía Blanca, composed by Di Sarli and considered the essence of his work, inspire dancers to step elegantly and accompanied generations of tango students in learning the basic steps.

El Señor del Tango

It was only during these years, in 1953, that Di Sarli acquired his nickname. Antonio Cantó, who announced Di Sarli's performances, introduced the characteristic title El Señor del Tango, capturing very aptly the maturity and elegance of the late Di Sarli's music.

The last orchestra

In 1956, shortly before the carnival season, almost all the musicians left Di Sarli and went their own ways as Los Señores del Tango - with almost the same sound.

Di Sarli started from scratch, but commented on the radio with the words: Where is the problem, there is still the pianist.
His musicians should play what was written, and he would then create the style.

With the violin legend Elvino Vardaro as well as musicians from the symphony orchestra and later stars of the tango scene such as José Libertella (later Sexteto Mayor), Julián Plazá or Alfredo Marcucci, who could still be heard at many festivals in Europe after 2000, he put together his last, once again outstanding orchestra within a few weeks. With its seven violins it spread an incomparably radiant sound and was named tango orchestra of the year by the magazine Cantando in 1957. Singers, as a transition, were first Rodolfo Galé and Argentino Ledesma, until Jorge Dúran and Roberto Florio established themselves in 1956 as the convincing pair of singers of the last two years.

The End

Di Sarli's last months were marked by a painful cancer. And yet, with his characteristic discipline, he fulfilled all remaining performance contracts, even if his body almost failed in the process.

Di Sarli for dancers - from big and small waves

Di Sarli's recording career spans three decades from 1927 to 1958.
The amazing thing: Almost everything is danceable, and almost everything from the very first recording sounds like Di Sarli.

The sextet's recordings, titles from the years 1939-1948, the Music Hall recordings, and a selection of later recordings from the 1950s can be found exemplarily restored in Golden Ear quality on www.tangotunes.com

The first sextet 1927 -1931

These 48 titles impress to this day, you can still hear them at milongas.

Even the wonderful Soy un Arlequín (1929), but also Añorandote (1930) or Cicatrices (Santiago Devincenzi, 1930) impress with a pushing, rhythmic rumble of the piano in the lower registers, which Di Sarli's famous left hand coaxes out of the keys with powerful strokes, creating a sound that almost somewhat anticipates Pugliese's yumba rhythm. Even then, solos are rare; even then, the violins dominate.

Soy un arlequin - 1929 - Intrumental

Tzu-Han Kyoko - Tokyo - 2021

Rosamel - 1930 - Santiago Devincenzi -Vals

Murat Erdemsel and Mariana Galassi - New York - 2005

Maldita - 1931 - Ernesto Famá

Snappy tangos, valses and milongas 1939 - 1941

Instrumental

Fast-paced instrumental numbers like El Retirao (1939), Catamarca or Shusheta (both 1940) motivate dancers with staccato and legato phrases each played by entire instrumental groups in tutti. Ant in between we find Di Sarlis powerful and pushing piano playing.

Tempo tango with Rufino

Similarly fast-paced Rufino's vocals such as Corazón (1939), Lo pasado, pasó, Volver a soñar (1940) Cascabelito or Charlemos (1941) convince full of rhythmic finesse and dynamics over the characteristically pushing bass.

Ta Trilla

Andres Sautel e Celeste Medina - Padua - 2017

Elegant and energetic they transform Di Sarli's force into a choreography that brings the power of this music to life.

Catamarca

Eleonora Kalganova and Michael Nadtochi – Berlin 2018

Lo pasado, pasó - 1940 - Rufino

Fernando Sanchez & Ariadna Naveira - Lyon - 2019

Volver a sonar - 1940 - Rufino

Fausto Carpino et Stephanie Fesneau - Montreal - 2012

Cascabelito - 1941 - Rufino

Javier Rodriguez - Noelia Barsi - 2022

Javier Rodriguez - Noelia Barsi

Vals carousels

But even the Vals hits of these years, such as Alma mía (1940), Cortando Camino (1941) or Ausencia (1941), the only recording with singer Agustín Volpe, sound more like D'Arienzo than Di Sarli. Subsequently, Di Sarli recorded hardly any valses - and the few that he did are as slow as Canaro's sneaks, with a tempo usually around 60bpm, though they radiate with much more energy, mainly because of Di Sarli's extraordinary keyboard theater. Milongas also disappear almost completely from the repertoire after 1943.

Alma Mia

– Nadtochi – Halle 2017

Cortando camíno, 1941 - Roberto Rufino

Estampa federal - 1942 - Alberto Podestá

... and milongas

This also applies to the uptempo milongas Milonga del Centenario (1940), Zorzal and Pena mulata (1941), or the Milonga del Sentimiento (1940). Here Di Sarli gives his musical temperament unrestrained free rein and elicits firework-like exploding keyboard salvos from the piano. Ingenious, but not easy to dance. Entre pitada y pitada (1942) is also very nice.

Zorzal

Celeste Medina and Andres Sautel – Berlin 2018

Pena Mulata

Oscar Beltran & Victoria Laverde - 2019

La mulateada -

Corina Herrera and Pablo Rodriguez – La mulateada

Romantic from the golden years of the tango 1942 - 1944

While the preceding years were characterized by an orientation to rhythm, and the music of the years after 1945 sometimes gives dancers somewhat little support, the hits of these few years have the perfect balance between the steadily increasing musical complexity and finesse and the predictable beat necessary for dancers.

Nada - 1942 - Podestá

Cecilia Piccinni and Ricardo Biggeri - 2015 - Prag

Romantic tangoas with Cantor de orquesta

Alberto Podestá shaped class hits like Al Compás del Corazón (1942), Junto a tu corazón (1942) or Nido Gaucho (1942) with more romantic phrasing, but also in Rufino's quieter hits like Zorro plateado, Verdemar or Todo (1943) refinement has now replaced the nervousness of the earlier years.

In 1947 Podestá goes once again to the studio with Di Sarli, beautiful results are Déjame, Dinero ... Dinero and Soy aquel viajero.

Much strength and schmaltz combine the tangos with Jorge Duran such as Porteño y bailarín, Hoy al recordarla and La vida me engano.

Instrumental

Some of the instrumentals of these years, especially the wonderful Ensueños (1943), already contain all the musical elements that Di Sarli would gradually refine until the end of his career: the all-dominant violins, together swelling and subsiding, modulating melody and rhythm in long and short waves, supported by very restrained bandoneons, while Di Sarli's piano playing sometimes rumbles underneath, sometimes in between, or softly pearls between the phrases.

Ensueños - 1943 - Instrumental

Janina Sprenger & Thomas Patrick - Berlin - 2020

La capilla blanca

Stephanie Fesneau and Fausto Carpino

Junto a tu corazón

ERICA BOAGLIO & ADRIAN ARAGON - Catania 2020

Tu, El Cielo y Tu - 1944 - Podestá

Berk Uka & Gözdenur Çavuş - Türkei - 2019

The late work

There is a lot of energy in the recordings on the Music Hall Label (1951-1954).

In 1951 Di Sarli returned to the tango world. Lured by the possibility of producing LPs and being more successful internationally, he re-recorded mainly instrumental hits of the forties.
The instrumental recordings from 1951 to 1954 on the Argentine record label Music Hall are pure Di Sarli, more polished than the material of the 40s, but more lively and inspiring for dancers than the sonically accomplished classics full of subtle magic that were produced at RCA Victor after Di Sarli returned to his old label in 1954 for reasons of quality and distribution.

El Recodo

El Amanecer - 1951

The one with the birds chirping

The essence of Di Sarli's music: Bahia Blanca

Bahia Blanca, Di Sarli's hometown, is located by the sea. He grew up with the waves. This music flows and floods in great waves. The strings in particular intonate these waves, creating at the same time, with pizziccati, precise rhythmic patterns that the bandoneons, in other orchestras the center of the beat, only support instead of generating energy themselves with arrastres.

Bahía Blanca - 1958 - Instrumental

Mariano "Chicho" Frúmboli y Juana Sepúlveda - Brüssel - 2016

Der späte Stil

Di Sarli recorded many of his classic instrumentals over and over again some even within a few months, as he moved from Music Hall back to RCA Victor in mid-1954 (El Amanecer, Germaine, A la gran Muñeca, Don Juan, El Ingeniero, Viviani)

The sound, the texture becomes even more polished, fuller, brighter, but also smoother. At least for dancers earlier versions might be of greater appeal.

Rodriguez Peña - 1956 Instrumental

Michael 'El Gato' Nadtochi & Elvira Lambo - Moskau - 2022

El Ingeniero - 1955 - Instrumental

Vanesa Villalba and Facundo Pinero - Lissabon 2022

Cara Sucia (1952) und Corazón (1955, Mario Pomar) are mor pushing and have more energy.

Cara Sucia (=Drecksvisage) - 1954 - Instrumental

Murat and Michelle - Austin - 2012

Organito de la Tarde (1956), recorded with the new combo full of terrific musicians, advanced to a superhit with over 2 million shellacs sold.

In the second half of the fifties, the style became even more brilliant, mature. In 1958 Di Sarli once again recorded 14 tangos for Philipps, after he, because of a dispute with a sound engineer, had fallen out with RCA Victor.

Organito de la Tarde - 1954

Eleonora Kalganova brilliert !! mit Michael Nadtochi - Griechenland - 2017

Soaring violin carpets and drawn-out tenor tirades (1954-1958)

The very sloppy and very slow vocal tangos of these years rarely sweeten a milonga, except for classics like No me Pregunten Porque (1955, Mario Pomar), Y todavia te quiero, or Novia Provinciana (1956, Argentino Ledesma). Fumando Espero was such a big hit that Di Sarli recorded it twice (Feb 1956: Argentino Ledesma; April 1956: Roberto Florio)