Tango Database Manual

1. General Information

• 1.1. This database is based on a partial export of the TANGO-DJ.AT's music archive and provides metadata information for more than 110.000 tracks.
• 1.2. It covers most Argentine tango recordings and plenty of various releases (multiple versions/releases of same recording) by official and private music labels and collectors from various mediums (CD, tape, LP, 78 RPM record, or digital origin).
• 1.3. The database focuses on Argentine tango and folklore music from 1926 to 1975, with some exceptions regarding genre and recording dates.
• 1.4. ISO-8601 format is used for dates (YYYY-MM-DD; YYYY-MM; YYYY)
• 1.5. Unicode-8 is supported, special characters of various languages should be displayed correctly.
• 1.6. By using this database you agree to following terms of usage:
  • 1.6.1. No automated / scripted use of our database
  • 1.6.2. No download / export of metadata, soundsamples or cover arts besides of regular manual search inquiries
  • 1.6.3. No deep links to soundsamples or cover arts
  • 1.6.4. This database is copyright protected under § 40f UrhG
• 1.7. Information is provided and maintained to the best of our knowledge and possibilities. Due to the amount of information provided and being work in progress there will missing information, errors and wrong information. Any feedback is very much appreciated.
• 1.8. We provide free public access to the core features of the TANGO-DJ.AT DATABASE.
• 1.9. Additional extensive features as described in chapter 3 are accessible to FULL MEMBERS and DATABASE MEMBERS only.
• 1.10. The database is published by TANGO-DJ.AT under the leadership of Bernhard Gehberger
• 1.11. BIG THANK YOU to all of our supporting members! Please consider to contribute to this project by becoming a supporting member or donator in order to support extension, maintenance and development of this database.

2. User manual

• 2.1. DB News and Function Buttons
  • 2.1.1. DB News: here you find information about latest updates and additions to the database
  • 2.1.2. Subscribing:
    In order to benefit from a unrestricted access to this database please consider to subscrib to one of our membership options. The "database membership" gives you unlimited access to the database, the "full membership" includes access to the memberhsip area and other advantages.
  • 2.1.3. Login:
    If you are a member already, but you see this login button, then you need to login first, in order to get unrestricted access. Please visit the login page and return to the database page afterwards. You then should see a button "Member" with a green light indicating that you successfully logged in. You may have to re-login after some time as the login information expires.
  • 2.1.4. Reset Page
    This buttons clears all search field inputs and resets the database webpage to it's default values.
  • 2.1.5. Feedback
    For general feedback. Find more information about your options of leaving us feedback under 2.5. Feedback
• 2.2. Search Form
  • 2.2.1. Use either the "anywhere" search field or any combination of the advanced search fields in order to search the database.
  • 2.2.2. By using the advanced search fields your search requests will be performed in the according fields / columns only. You can use various combinations of advanced search fields to narrow down your search.
  • 2.2.3. Hitting <enter> in any search field will start the search. By default a regular search is performed. More information about other search options can be found under 3.x.
  • 2.2.4. With the navigation buttons of your browser you can go back and forth through your previous search requests and navigate to a different view.
  • 2.2.5. Date field
    You can search for recordings by date in various ways by using the international date format YYYY-MM-DD or incomplete dates like: YYYY, or YYYY-MM:
    • 2.2.6.1. "1945" - year only will find all recordings of that year
    • 2.2.6.2. "1945-01" - year an month will find all recordings of that year and month
    • 2.2.6.3. "1945-01-22" - full date will find all recordings of that day
• 2.3. Search Summary
  • 2.3.1. Results: total number of search results
  • 2.3.2. Unique Titles: total number of unique titles in this search - multiple versions of the same recording from various/different sources (eg. one recording published on many CDs) are merged and count for one. This number should be close to the number of recordings listed in discographic information of a given artist.
  • 2.3.3. Albums: total number of different albums in this search
  • 2.3.4. Artists: total number of different artists or artist combinations in this search
• 2.4. Search Result Table
  • 2.4.1. Sorting:
    • 2.4.1.1. The search result will be sorted by 1. title, 2. artist, 3. recording date by default
    • 2.4.1.2. You can change the sorting of the table by clicking on the arrows of any sortable column once or twice for up and down sorting.
    • 2.4.1.3. You can use combined sorting by clicking on the arrows of an additional column and holding down the shift key. This is helpful to sort a list by album titles and then track numbers, or titles and recordings dates.
  • 2.4.2. In-table-links: You can use the links for title, artist or album to "browse" within your serach results by showing a new search result for all similar titles, or all recordings of a certain artist, or a tracklisting of a selected album. When choosing an album the new search result will be sorted by tracknumbers by default.
  • 2.4.3. Per-track-feedback: see 2.5. Feedback
  • 2.4.4. Cover art column
    Most records will feature a small front cover art picture. This shows the front cover art (CD), front album cover (LP/records), label scan (78 rpm record).
  • 2.4.5. Artist column
    The artist field holds a combined information of the artist/interpret, possible vocalist/estribillistas, chorus, conductor and orchestra arrangement. If you are looking for recordings of a certain vocalist use also this field to find those recordings. There are various formats used for presenting and "encoding" additional information into the artist field. It is not perfectly consistent across all records, but most entries conform to one of the following formats:
    • 2.4.5.1. ORQUESTA X : Instrumental version by orchestra X
    • 2.4.5.2.a ORQUESTA X CON Y : Orchestra X with vocalist: Y (different to 2.4.5.5.! Recogniseable by the late start of the vocalist - second half of the recording)
    • 2.4.5.2.b ORQUESTA X CON Y : Orchestra X with estribillo Y (different to 2.4.5.5.! Recogniseable typically by the very late start of the estribillistas - last 1/3 of the recording.)
    • 2.4.5.2.c ORQUESTA X CON ESTRIBILLO: Orchestra X with estribillo (name unknown) (different to 2.4.5.5.! Recogniseable typically by the very late start of the estribillistas - last 1/3 of the recording.)
    • 2.4.5.3. ORQUESTA X CON Y, Z y W : Orchestra X with vocalists Y, Z, W
    • 2.4.5.4. ORQUESTA X CON Y y CORO : Orchestra X with vocalist Y and chorus
    • 2.4.5.5. Y CON ACOMP. DE X : Vocalist Y recorded with accompanying orchestra X (different to 2.4.5.2.a-c! Recogniseable by the early start of the vocalist - within the first 1/3 of the recording!)
    • 2.4.5.6. Y CON ACOMP. DE GUITARRAS : Vocalist Y recorded with accompanying guitars
    • 2.4.5.7. Y y SU ORQUESTA DIR./ARR. Z : Vocalist Y recorded with his orchestra conducted/arranged/directed by Z. (example: Alberto Castillo y su orquesta dir. por Emilio Balcarce)
    • 2.4.5.8. X y Z : Interpret X y interpret Z, duo e.g. Piano and guitar
    • 2.4.5.9. X : Interpret X, e.g. Lucio Demare (Piano solo)
    • 2.4.5.10. DÚO / TRÍO / QUARTETO / QUINTETO / ORQUESTA .... : Information of arragement
• 2.5. Feedback
  • 2.5.1. You have two feedback options. The menu button is for general feedback, whereas the feedback column featuring little envelopes next to each database entry within the result table is for per track feedback.
  • 2.5.2. Use the feedback menu button if you want to leave us general feedback about the database. Any feedback helping us to improve the database is very much appreciated.
  • 2.5.3. Use the other feedback option in the result table if you want to leave us feedback regarding the details of a given recording.
  • 2.5.4. In both cases, please leave your name and e-mail address so we can get in touch with you in case we have any questions regarding your feedback.

3. Extended User Manual

Exclusive features for FULL MEMBERS and DATABASE MEMBERS only!

• 3.1. Members' access
  In order to have unlimited access to the database you need to be logged in as a member on the MY ACCOUNT PAGE . Once logged in you will be able to directly access and use the database for multiple sessions. If you are logged in successfully the first button will be "Member" showing a green light. In case you are not logged in or the login information expired, you are going to see a button "Login" instead. Please use it to re-visit the MY ACCOUNT PAGE and log in again.
• 3.2. Search options
  As a member you have two additional search options available. Default search option when pressing enter is the regular search. By using the according search button you can decide how flexible or strict your search string is processed. If you miss search results try flexible search. If you get too many search results try advanced search fields and/or strict search. Consider that a search string might be found in unexpected columns - e.g. an artist name in the column composer or album!

  • 3.2.1. Flexible search
    - any special character like !, ?, -, :, ., etc. will be removed from your search string
    - no differentiation will be made between characters like u-ú, o-ó, a-á, n-ñ and so on
    - no case sensitivity
    - word sequence does not matter
    Example: "no le hagas caso corazon..." finds: "Corazón no le hagas caso", "Corazón no le hagas caso (Remix)", "Corazón, no le hagas caso!", "Corazón... no le hagas caso"
  • 3.2.2. Regular search (default)
    - no differentiation will be made between characters like u-ú, o-ó, a-á, n-ñ and so on
    - no case sensitivity
    Example: "corazon, no le hagas caso" finds: "Corazón, no le hagas caso!", but not "Corazón no le hagas caso", "Corazón no le hagas caso (Remix)", "Corazón... no le hagas caso"
  • 3.2.3. Strict search
    - the exact search string will be used (case sensitive, word sequence and special characters matters)
    Example: "Corazón... no le hagas caso" will find "Corazón... no le hagas caso" but not "Corazón, no le hagas caso!", "Corazón no le hagas caso", "Corazón no le hagas caso (Remix)"
• 3.3. Sound samples
  There is a soundsample made available for almost all tracks in the database. You start and stop by clicking on the play button. Any running track will be automatically stopped when another track is started. If a soundsample is missing an inactive grey playbutton with a red exclamation mark and explaining tooltip is shown instead. The length of the soundsample depends on the length of the original track. In most cases (original track length >121 seconds) it is 90 seconds long and compiled from two parts in order to increases the chance to cover also the part of a vocalist. The first part is 30 seconds starting from the beginning and the second part is 60 seconds starting from the middle of the track. The soundsamples are encoded with LAME v3.99r using a variable bit rate of 192kbps in average, 44,1kHz sample rate, stereo channels and high quality encoding setting.
• 3.4. Cover art viewer
  For most tracks a cover art picture is shown. By clicking on the front cover art a full screen cover art viewer will present all available additional pictures. You can flip through all available pictures by using the left and right arrows at the side. Return to the database by closing the cover art viewer using the <X> at the top hand corner. Which pictures are available depends on the original album and medium. If no cover art picture is available a grey question mark and an explaining tooltip is shown instead.

  • 3.4.1. CDs: Front cover art, back cover art and all pages of an available booklet are scanned
  • 3.4.2. LPs: Record labels are scanned, cropped and horizontally aligned. Front and back cover art of a record album is photographed, cropped and post-processed.
  • 3.4.3. 78 RPMs: record labels are scanned, cropped and horizontally aligned.
  • 3.4.4. DG: Any available digital cover art is used.
• 3.5. Customizable table view feature
  More and more data is being added to the database, but the horizontal space to display all columns is limited. You may not be interested in all of it which is why we implemented the possibilty to customize the data shown to you. By clicking on the small <X> icon next to the columns' headings you can hide selected columns you are not interested in. The corresponding search field will be hidden in the search form as well. By doing so the remaining columns holding the information you are interested in can make best possible use of the space available. Your selection will be saved for your future visits. You can reset the table view and show all columns again any time by using the button "Reset Columns" in the button menu at the top. Some columns (cue, cover art, title, favorites, feedback) are excluded from this feature and can not be hidden. Information within hidden columns are not included in the search.
• 3.6. Recommendation Filter
  You can filter your search request by showing DJ recommendations only. This function works as being activated before your search (in which case only recommendations will be found) as well as after your search by dynamically eliminating all non-recommended entries from your search results. When using the Recommendation Filter the search results will relate more to the discographic list of recordings of a given artist by deleting all duplicate versions of them. Find out more about those recommendations under 3.12. DJ Recommendations
• 3.7. Medium Filter
  You can filter your search request by medium. If you are only interested in CDs it might be usefull to activate the medium filter for CDs, so you do not get recordings from LPs or other mediums. There are filters for CDs, LPs (long and short play records), DG (digital releases) and "Other" which covers all other mediums as 78 RPM records, cassetts, DVDs and other formats.
• 3.8. Sorting feature
  There are 4 predefined sorting options each created for a certain use case. If you use one of those predefined sorting options the sorting of the table will be encoded into the URL and can then be used as a link to re-create your search result. In addition you may still use the sorting option in the table by clicking the arrows in the corresponding columns. But this sorting is not encoded into the URL.

  • 3.8.1. Titles: Alphabetic list of titles sorted by the following order:
    • Title (A-Z) / Recording date (old-new) / Artist (A-Z) / Rating (5 stars - 0 stars)
  • 3.8.2. Album: Alphabetic list of albums sorted by the following order:
    • Medium (A-Z) / Album (A-Z) / Track (0-x)
  • 3.8.3. Artist: Alphabetic list of artists sorted by the following order:
    • Artist (A-Z) / Title (A-Z) / Recording date (old-new) / Rating (5 stars - 0 stars)
  • 3.8.4. Date: List sorted by recording date from old to new by the following order
    • Recording date (old-new) / Title (A-Z) / Artist (A-Z) / Rating (5 stars - 0 stars)
• 3.9. Favorites feature
  It's likely you come across some interesting and unknown tracks by browsing the database. In order to remember and access them easily you can mark them as your favorite by clicking on the ♥ icon in the columne of the selected track which will turn red accordingly. All selected tracks will be saved for future visits. You can show all saved favorites by clicking on the ♥ icon at the top of the search form. In order to delete a saved track from your list of favorites simply click again on the ♥ icon in the column which then turn back grey again.
• 3.10. Date period feature
  There are two date fields which you can use to narrow search results down to a given date period specified by the "from date" in the first field and the "to date" in the second field. In the international date format "YYYY-MM-DD", or "YYYY-MM", or "YYYY-MM-DD" has to be used. You may specifiy years only - from "1945" to "1946", or year/month ranges - from "1945-01" to "1946-02", or full dates - from "1945-01-05" to "1946-02-14".
• 3.11. Rating
  The rating is based on many years of experience of tango DJ-ing. The majority of the rating was done with traditional Milongas in mind. Hence ratings for some recordings (tango nuevo, etc.) might be off when considering a different type of event. In any case it has to be considered a highly subjective process. It tries to give a basic idea of the useability of given tracks for DJ-ing at a Milonga but it also takes into consideration differences in quality among various releases. This database is a unique source of information to compare different transfers or releases of the same recording enabling you to determine your preferred version and where to find it. If you prefer one or another version might also depend on the playback equipment at the location, the location itself, the event, the dancers and the tracks you want it to mix with.

  Quality differences between versions of the same recording may normally lead to 0,5 - 1,5 star differences between those versions. For example a well known recording very suitable for DJ-ing might be rated 4 stars with a deviation of 0,5 stars depending on quality differences of various sources or publications.(more or less filtering, more or less noise) But in case of a major defects of a transfer the rating for the same recording might be very different as well. If a recording would be normally rated 3 stars, but it is the only available version, very rare and hard to obtain, 0,5 stars will be added.

  • 0-2,5 stars are considered not suitable for being used to DJ a Milonga
  • 3 stars may be suitable in special situations and special reasons given
  • 3,5-4 stars are considered suitable for DJ-ing
  • 4,5 to 5 stars are considered as either the very well known and beloved tango classics, or rare and unknown, but still very good and playable recordings
• 3.12. DJ Recommendations
  The DJ column shows recommendations and should be considered as such. These recommendations are based on many years of experience, but they are still highly subjective. You may have to consider many factors as personal taste, playback equipment, location, event, attending dancers, recordings you want it to mix with, and many more. Recommendations are given mainly to identify releases you should start listening to and compare yourself with other available releases in order to identify the best one for your use case.

  • 3.12.1. In many cases it is impossible to indicate the one best version as this depends on the context how you plan to use the recording. Therefore one or more releases can feature recommendations.
  • 3.12.2. If there is only one version - it automatically receives a diamond for being a rare or hard to find track (regardless of the quality).
  • 3.12.3. Versions from different mediums may be rated independently. There can be one recommendation diamond for the best version released on CD, as well as another recommendation diamond for the best version of the same track released on LPs.
  • 3.12.4. A recommendation is also more likely to be given if the release is readily available - as it is the case with ongoing transfer projects releasing professionally produced digital transfers which are distributed via an online shop.
  • 3.12.5. Recommendations are subject to change at any time. Due to the number of releases in the database those are given after reviewing only a few seconds of the release. Therefore it is possible it does not reflect the quality of the whole transfer and might be subject to change.
• 3.13. Recordlabel
  The column "Recordlabel" lists the publisher of the given medium - not the original publisher of the recording. So this may give information about the copyright holder for the useage of the physical medium - the CD, the LP, die digital transfer, etc. - but not the copyright holder for the music itself which normally lies with the original recording company or the company who bought it and the composer(s)/author(s).
• 3.14. Published
  This identifies the release date of that CD/LP or digital file.
• 3.15. Composer / Author
  Those two columns are linked with each other. Since you most likely would be interested in both or none of it hidding one of those two columns will automatically hide also the other one and the according search field. Composer is the creator of the music, author is the creator of the song lyrics. Sometimes it is not possible to identify who exactly was in charge of what. This is also the reason why there is only one search field for both, composers and authors in the search form. This field will search for matching words in both columns, composers and authors.
• 3.16. Disc.# / Mat.#
  The column Disc.# lists the catalog or record disc numbers given on the record itself. Mat.# stands for Matriz number and is an identification number of the original unique disc the song was recorded on. Sometimes the matriz number is extended by XXXX-1, XXXX-2, and indicates various takes of the same recording. This may be graved in the 78 RPM record between the last grooves surrounding the label. Normally only one of those takes was choosen to be published on the record, but sometimes another take was used for re-prints later on. In many cases there is no documentation about this, but it may be possible to identify differences in the interpretation of the musicians..
• 3.17. Comment
  The Comment field lists additional information and may contain:
  - Information about availability - where it is possible to obtain that recording
  - Information about who provided or donated the media/recording
  - "Edit:" generally means that original meta data was changed (misprint on cover or tags, etc.)
  - "Notes:" generally lists additional information about the entry. This might list all kind of additional information about the entry
  - the use of "unidentified" usually means that the version of a given recording could not be identified (in most cases due to the lack of other versions). This is used when there is reasonable doubt that the version is actually the version it is supposed to be, but could not be identified as another one successfully.
  - the use of "unverified" usually means that some parts of meta data could not be verified, eg. recording dates in question.
  
• 3.17. Trackmodified
  This identifies when this very entry has been updated the last time. It may be helpful to understand how old, or updated a given information is.

4. Credits

• 4.1. Contributors
  About the people without their work this database would not be possible:

  • 4.1.1. For two years two persons contributed an enormous amount of hours to make this project happen. I want to say a huge THANK YOU to LIHUI ZAHO for developing the data export and processing scripts and DJ PYL (aka Carlos di Sarli) for developing the code for the database webpage! Without their help this unique source of information would not be in place like it is today!
  • 4.1.2. But also other people contributed directly and/or indirectly to this project over the years. My family and especially my father Markus Gehberger for supporting my crazy "career" decisions in so many ways. Katharina Berechowska helped us a lot with the webdesign. Theo Chatzipetros took professional care of post processing a bunch of LP covers. Without Matthias Kroug I would not have been able to complete plenty of important Japanese collections. The amazing collectors Akihito Baba , Yoshihiro Oiwa and his family , Yasuhiko Fukukawa and Shigeru Terada (Audio Park) for providing us - the tango community - with so much music from their collections. The Argentine tango clubs Buenos Aires Tango Club and Club de Tango for distributing tango music. Matthias Bellemann for ongoing support, feedback and discussions (DJ-Tango.com) and Balazs Gyenis (Argentine Tango Radio)
  • 4.1.3. I also regularly consult the important work of other collectors, organizations and experts - there are too many to list all of them, but I do want to mention a few like SADAIC, Todo Tango, Discography of American Historical Recordings (DAHR), The Internet Archive (archive.org), Christoph Lanner (Discography of Francisco Canaro), Tobias Conradi (tango.info), Gabriel Valiente (Encyclopdia of Tango), André Vagnon (Bible Tango), Lee Hocker , Ing. Rafael Abal (Sondor), Bruce Bastin (Interstate Music), Eduardo Hugo Sibilin (hermanotango.com), Johan (Tangoteca), Dave (Sound Hi Fi), Terry O'Sullivan (Loricraft Audio), Paul Hodgson (Expert stylus & Cartridge Company), Kevin (KAB Electro Acoustics), Jens-Ingo Brodesser (jens-ingo.all2all.org), Eduardo Hugo Sibilin (hermanotango), Michael Lavocah, Theresa Faus, Dora D'Istria, Serjan Pruis, Marco Sambo, Marco Morselli, Patrick Buchin, Florian&Anja, Sergej Kasparov, and everyone dedicating their time and work to contribute to Argentine tango.
  • 4.1.4. All the recent additions featuring the new digital transfers would not be possible without the cooperation of the producing projects behind them. TangoTunes (Christian Xell), Tango Time Travel (Jens-Ingo Brodesser & Béné), Crackling Tunes Tango Club (Paul Strudwick) and TangoSparks (Frank Jin)
  • 4.1.5. And of course all of our supporting members! Due to your contribution it is possible to continue, maintain, extend, add, research, collect, restore, distribute, publish, information and music to the tango community!

• 4.2. History of this tango database

  2002	Starting to work with tango music full time
  2002-2010	Publishing tango information on website gehberger.at
  2010	Launch website TANGO-DJ.AT
  2012	Development of tango database by Michael Schöner !
  2012	Registration of TANGO-DJ.AT as non-profit organization
  2013	Launch tango database based on tango music archive collected from 2002 to 2012
  2013-2015	Planning and setting up state of the art transfer studio
  2014	Starting to collect LPs on large scale
  2015	Starting to transfer records
  2016	Developing concept for new database version
  May 2016 - Feb 2017	Planning and developing data export and processing scripts by Lihui Zhao !
  May 2016 - Feb 2017	Simple photo studio for LP cover photo productions, and post processing by Theo Chatzipetros
  Feb.17	Developing the database v3 front end by DJ PYL !
  March 2017	Testimplementation of soundsamples and cover thumbnails
  Jan 2018	Database v3 early access release for members:
  	Database features 70.000+ entries, sound samples and full cover art scans/pictures
  Jan 2025	The database passed 100.000+ tango entries!
  Feb 20206	110.000+ tango entries