The tango “Gricel” is a snapshot of a love affair which was to take over the life and career of José María Contursi, whose passion for the young Susana Gricel Viganó gave voice to many other tangos that share the imagery and longing of this one… among them such well known tunes as “Cristal,” “En esta tarde gris,” “Toda mi vida,” “Garras,” “Más allá,” “Como dos extraños,” “Y no puede ser,” “Tabaco,” and “Quiero verte una vez más.”
Contursi, known by the nickname Katunga to his friends, had first met Gricel at a radio station, when she visited her native Buenos Aires with some friends. She was then on a trip there from Córdoba, where her family had relocated for her father’s health—and where Katunga was soon to travel on his own doctor’s orders. The lyricist was then married, but pursued a brief love affair with the young girl, which was to dominate his mind for the rest of his life, leading to verses of longing, of broken hopes, of the imagined call of his beloved, as she speaks to him like a ghost in his songs. The conventions of tango lyrics proved an effective mask for this poet’s grief over lost love, and he bent its boundaries to make room for her voice.
Decades later, when Contursi was a widower and drinking himself into depression, and with Gricel left single by her own husband’s abandonment, the two were fated to meet again. The story is that in 1962, bandoneonist Ciriaco Ortiz was traveling to his native Córdoba, and sought out Gricel to convey the news about Contursi. She took a bus to Buenos Aires to meet him, in the first of many such trips; and within a few years, their reunion led to a second marriage for them both. Contursi enjoyed the last years of his life with her after moving to Córdoba, and leaving the bottle behind.
Gricel
(Tr. Jake Spatz)
YouTube: Aníbal Troilo with Francisco Fiorentino
Never should I once have thought
That I could have won your heart…
And still I sought you all the same,
Until I chanced on you one day,
And left you smitten by a kiss
Without a thought about your virtue!
All your hopes were crystal glass,
And shattered as I left you then,
To never, ever come again…
What bitter aching hurt you!
“Don’t you stop thinking of me,
Of your Gricel,”
You implored me as you kissed
Your cross farewell—
And now I’m living driven crazy
Because I can’t let you go…
And you don’t remember me,
Gricel, Gricel!
Soon I came to miss your voice
And the warmth within your eyes…
And looked for you as in a craze,
But never found you in my days,
And smitten by another’s kiss…
Went living all my life untruly!
What shall come, Gricel, of me?
The laws of God were carried out,
Because I now have paid the cost
Of treating you so cruelly…
Gricel (1942)
Lyrics: José María Contursi
Music: Mariano Mores
No debi pensar jamás
en lograr tu corazón
y sin embargo te busqué
hasta que un día te encontré,
y con mis besos te aturdí
sin importarme que eras buena…
Tu ilusión fue de cristal,
se rompió cuando partí,
pues nunca, nunca más volví…
¡Que amarga fue tu pena!
“No te olvides de mi,
de tu Gricel,”
me dijiste al besar
el Cristo aquel,
y hoy que vivo enloquecido
porque no te olvidé
ni te acuerdas de mi,
¡Gricel, Gricel!
Me faltó después tu voz
y el calor de tu mirar
y como un loco te busqué
pero ya nunca te encontré
y en otros besos me aturdí...
¡Mi vida toda fue un engaño!
¿Que será, Gricel, de mi?
Se cumplió la ley de Dios,
porque sus culpas ya pagó
quien te hizo tanto daño.