Carlos, Tango and the Bandoneon

Met up with Carlos Viggiano today. This guy is a bandoneon teacher and I asked him questions about Tango and the bandoneon. In fact I recorded a 20 minute interview with him in Spanish. Quite daunting stuff but I think it will be easier next time. In the audio clip he is playing Decarisimo by Astor Piazzolla. He told me some interesting things about how the bandoneon was invented in Holland as a portable replacement for the church organ. As if to demonstrate this he picks it up and plays a few bars of "organ music". Throughout the interview we dunk bread in strong coffee. He is an expressive guy and gets his point across with drawings, a few chords on the bandoneon or with gesticulation but generally speaks slow enough for me to catch the drift. He seems to me a bit like an Italian. More about this at a later date I think. But it was pretty cool. Unfortunately I could not have a bash at playing the thing because it is too precious and my hands are probably too weak. Shame.