- From "El portal del tango"
we pay homage to the best woman singer.
- There are some women in
tango that do not fit in any place. It is similar to not
liking the ready-made clothes because they are low
cut or the sleeves are very short. For example, Sofía
Bozán: Was she a comic actress, or a singer? What she
was was unique. Another example: Tita Merello. Was she a comic actress, the biggest tragic of the national cinema,
a commentator? In only one word:
Tita. For example Tania: Was she different? Let´s see
Who was
near Discépolo? She was the one. Tania is the "vesre"
(the
other way around) for Anita, her real name. Her
artistic surname was Visdi, "vesre" for Divis, her second surname.
It was almost as if she had had
the intuition that she would come to the city where
the "vesre" is a language itself. She said that she was born on October
1st, 1908, in Toledo. Her father was a musician and
her older sister broke down her marriage because she
wanted to make her career in musical comedies. Tania
started his career using the artistic name of "Lucianito"
since her
sister, Isabel, was "the Luciano". At the
age of sixteen Tania was touring around Marruecos
which was the "off" of Spain. In was the place
where new artists performed before facing the advanced
audience of the metropolis. In Marruecos Tania met the
"Mexican" threesome and she fell in love with
Antonio Fernadez, one of the group singers. After they
got married she started to be known as Tania
Mexican. Anita, her daughter, was born and in 1925
they came to Buenos Aires. Here they formed part of
"Troupe Iberica". They performed in the Mayo
Theatre and in the Cabaret Maipu Pigall and then, in the parks of Córdoba and Montevideo,
after what they spent 15 months in Brazil. There, the Troupe
was dissolved and almost did her marriage. Tania
began a soloist career and she
had some popular tangos in her repertory. In 1927 she
came back to Buenos Aires and her husband went to Spain.
She started performing in the "Follies Bergere" and she
also sang in the Casino theatre with the Roberto
Firpo's Orchestra. She was "La
Gallega de Toledo" (The Galician of Toledo) for
everyone. His most successful song "Esta noche me
emborracho" ("Tonight I´ll get drunk) which
was written by Discépolo and first sang by Azucena
Maizani. One night Discepolo appeared at the Follies with José Razzano and José Pécora. He went
there because he wanted to see the woman from Galicia that
sang his tango. He liked it and they liked
each other. Discepolo invited her to see his
performance in Mustafá. She was horrified by the misery picture
that she associated with the the real kind of life
that he had, and she started to show him how beautiful
life could be.
They moved in together to a flat in Cangallo
street ( now Juan D. Perón). During 24 years they
were inseparable and, after their death, they are
still so. We can not write about Tania without
repeating his name. Tania made her debut in Prieto radio
station and then she appeared on Paris radio station, Belgrano radio
station and Pueblo radio station and, in 1937
she was in Municipal radio station. In 1946 she sang in El
Mundo radio with Mariano Mores Orchestra, in 1947 in
Belgrano radio she sang with Discepolo on the show called "Como nacieron mis canciones"
("How my songs were born"). She recordered
for Columbia Victor
and Odeon. Her last recordings were done in Music Hall
and Magenta. She was involved in 3 films: " El pobre
Perez" ("The poor Perez"), (1937), "Cuatro
Corazones" ("Four hearts") (1939), "Caprichosa
y millonaria" ("Stubborn and millonaire"),
the last two under the direction of Discepolo. She also made
some theatre plays with him: "La
perichona"(1932), "Wunder bar"(1933),
"Winter
garden"(1933), "Bum"(1948/50/51) and
"Las preciosas Ridículas" (1967). In 1946
she went to Chile, Perú, Bolivia, Cuba and Mexico
with Discepolo. There she sang in the cabaret "El
Patio" with Enrique, where he talked. At their
return she acted in Goyescas, after having made some
performances in Chile, Montevideo and Europe. Discepolo's death in
1951and the fall of Perón´s government in 1955
deeply infuenced her career. After his
death she went to Chile, Perú, Ecuador and Colombia.
After 1955 she went to Europe to see and act in
different shows. In 1959 she came back and performed in Deverkalt in front of San Martín park. She decided
to have her own place called "Cambalache"
like Discepolo's tango. In 1970 she made a show called
"Tania canta y cuenta" ("Tania sings and
tells") in "El Erizo Incandescente" ("The
incandescent hedgehog"). Then it was her idea to write
her memories.The book was written by Jorge Miguel
Couselo. This book tells the true stories about
Discepolo, the same stories that are
kept hidden by critics and historians that write about
the heros paying attention only to their personal
preferences, and not telling all the truth.
|
|