Quite a few tango musicians and singers spent some years touring Latin America, the United States or several European countries. Some major names, like Rafael Canaro, brother of the more famous Francisco, decided to stay overseas and left us some recordings that have a much different, ”European” sound than the more conventional orchestras back in Argentina.

Another name that might sound familiar is Manuel Pizarro, who like Rafael travelled through Europe and decided to stay in France. There are a few recordings that remind me very much of Rafael’s playful, yet somewhat sterile, old-fashioned sound. Like other Argentine musicians (but not all, for all the wrong reasons), Pizarro fled France before the war would engulf him. The following image is a proof of his return, and apparently he teamed up with singer-boxer Hugo Gutiérrez to continue his work for Argentine audiences. Five years after the war ended, Pizarro (left, on the picture below) returned to France and stayed until his eventual death in the city of Nice, in 1982.