Carlos GardelPrint Page

The portrait bust commemorates Argentine actor and singer, Carlos Gardel.

Carlos Gardel, (born December 11, 1890,  in Toulouse, France and died June 24, 1935, in Medellin, Colombia), was an Argentine singer and actor, celebrated throughout Latin America for his espousal of tango music.  Some uncertainty exists concerning Gardel’s early life. While most sources indicate that he was born in France, Gardel occasionally cited Tacuarembó, Uruguay, as his birthplace.  At the age of three, Gardel and his mother moved to Buenos Aires. Gardel spent his early childhood in poverty; he would roam the streets and the local marketplace in his free time. At the age of sixteen, Gardel dropped out of public school and found interest in singing. At this time, he was being mentored by José Betinotti, who was a folk song expert. 

His first formal acting roles were at the Nacional Corrientes Theatre, which also listed Don José Razzano, with whom Gardel formed a duo for many years. They played in various theatre companies, touring Argentina and other Latin American countries and Spain.

Gardel’s huge popularity as an interpreter of the melancholy ballads of the tango was confirmed in the 1920s and ’30s in nightclubs and motion pictures. One early picture, Luces de Buenos Aires (1931; “Lights of Buenos Aires”), was filmed in Paris, but later ones were made by Paramount Pictures for the Spanish-speaking market. They include Espérame (1933; “Wait for Me”), La Casa es seria (1933; “The House Is Somber”), Melodia de Arrabal (1933; “Melody of Arrabal”), Cuesta abajo (1934; “Downhill”), El Tango en Broadway (1934; “The Tango on Broadway”), Tango-Bar (1935), El Día que me quieras (1935; “The Day That You Love Me”), and Cazadores de estrellas (1935; “Hunters of Stars”).

Gardel died in a plane crash while on tour in Columbia.  His plane crashed during takeoff and everyone on board was killed. In Buenos Aires his funeral and funeral procession in a horse-drawn carriage were witnessed by tens of thousands of Argentines, all of whom had gathered to farewell the “The King of Tango”.  His tomb became an object of popular pilgrimage.

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