The Song Tells Its Story Explained

The Tango Tells Its Story
Native Name:
Director:	Fernando Ayala Héctor Olivera
Country:	Argentina
Language:	Spanish

The Song Tells Its Story (Spanish; Castilian: El canto cuenta su historia), sometimes The Tango Tells Its Story, is a 1976 Argentine musical film directed by Fernando Ayala and Héctor Olivera. The film tells the history of song in Argentina, with a particular history of tango.^[1]

The film was made during the period of the Argentine military dictatorship. The censorship of the regime forced Olivera and Ayala to cut scenes featuring the banned and exiled singer Mercedes Sosa.^[2]

The film should not be confused with The Tango Tells its Story, (Spanish; Castilian: El tango cuenta su historia) released in 1914, a documentary history of the tango.^[3]

Cast

Musical performers

Musicians performing in the film are:^[4]

• Cayetano Daglio
• Ángel Villoldo
• Francisco Canaro
• Carlos Gardel
• Rosita Quiroga
• Ignacio Corsini
• Ada Falcón
• Agustín Magaldi and Pedro Noda
• Marta de los Ríos
• Margarita Palacios
• Eduardo Falú
• Los Cantores de Quilla Huasi
• Jorge Cafrune
• Amelita Baltar
• Los Hermanos Abalos

Some of these performances are archive footage from other films of notable singers.^[5]

Notes and References

1. Marilyn G. Miller, Tango Lessons: Movement, Sound, Image, and Text in Contemporary Practice, p. 29, Duke University Press, 2014 .
2. Jean Graham Jones, "Héctor Olivera", pp. 1764–1767 in, Derek Jones (ed), Censorship: A World Encyclopedia, Routledge, 2001 .
3. Alfred Charles Richard, Contemporary Hollywood's Negative Hispanic Image, p. 280, Greenwood Press, 1994 .
4. Jeff Todd Titon, Timothy J. Cooley, David Locke, David P. McAllester, Anne K. Rasmussen, David B. Reck, John M. Schechter, Jonathon P.J. Stock, R. Anderson Sutton, Worlds of Music: An Introduction to the Music of the World's Peoples, p. 402, Cengage Learning, 2009 .
5. Armando Rapallo, Fernando Ayala, p. 28, Centro Editor de America Latina, 1993 (in Spanish) .