Orquesta Típica Victor
The Orquesta Típica Victor was the house band of the Victor record label. In those days, all tango musicians were contracted to one of a very small number of record labels. As time went on, the smaller ones such as Colombia, Brunswick, Pampa and Electra either went bust or were acquired by one of the big two: RCA Victor and Max Glucksmann's Odeón. Odeón never had a house band, but then they had Canaro : )
The story of the Típica Victor begins in 1925 when the pianist Adolfo Carabelli, artistic director of the Victor company in Argentina, decided to form the orchestra to plug the gap left by the defection of Osvaldo Fresedo to the Brunswick label. His first line-up included some great names including Ciríaco Ortíz and Luis Petrucelli on bandoneón, the latter being given the job of orchestra leader. The directorship passed to the bandoneonista Federico Scorticati in 1936 and then briefly to the pianist Mario Maurano in 1943, before the orchestra was disbanded in 1944.
During these years the orchestra more than 445 recordings - the exact number is hard to determine, because often they were backing a singer and appeared under that singer's name.
The Típica Victor never appeared in public, being created exclusively for recording purposes, but they had a highly danceable style which also displayed the brilliance of its soloists - something of especial significance in the late 1920s and early 1930s when Julio De Caro had lost his way.
Recommended CDs
This section is, I'm afraid, mostly a story of CDs which are no longer available.
The first cd of the Típica Victor was on the ground-breaking Japanese label Disco Latina in 1991.
These were always hard to find outside Japan, and have been deleted for about a decade now.
CDs of the Típica Victor first appeared in Europe in 1994 with releases from Harlequin (HQCD-90) and a really splendid one from
El Bandoneón, EBCD-41.
This was a fine cd, and it's now out-of-print.
Subsequent releases from El Bandoneón (EBCD-85, 1996; EBCD-140 2001) and Harlequin (HQCD155, 2000) were not as strong.
2001 was also the year that RCA-Victor in Argentina produced their series commemorating 100 years of recording, RCA Victor 100 Ańos.
They produced an excellent Típica Victor cd in that series - it's also out-of-print, but we have a few copies remaining.
With so many good CDs no longer available, we turn to the new kids on the block, Euro Records. They have two Típica Victor cds and they are both wonderful.
The first release, EU 17014, has some similarities to the RCA Victor 100 Ańos cd it effectively replaces,
including the unique, must have version of El porteńito in 4x4 time (rather than the 2x4 versions of D'Arienzo, Firpo and even D'Agostino).
It also has three wonderful tracks with the singer Angel Vargas.
The second release, EU 17021, contains their uniquely charming version of Recuerdo
and many other excellent tracks.
We aim to stock both these cds, priced Ł11 each + p & p.
Where next...
- Back to our building a library
- Milonga home page