One of the few tangos to present race as a theme is this gem of a song by Horacio Sanguinetti, whose lyrics portrayed the black experience in Buenos Aires alongside his other preferred themes, the sea (“Tristeza marina”) and Paris (“Ivón.”) As in many milonga-candombes, which perhaps allegorize race as a blending of musics, the subject here is a mulatta, whose parents disappear from the song as soon as they’re mentioned. In fact, as in many tangos of the ’40s, everything seems to be disappearing, and the dominant mood is nostalgia.
For her part, “Copper Penny” seems like an amalgam of various tango femmes—we get a glimpse of her life onstage, in the past, but in the present she is dispossessed and rootless. For all that, her creation was undoubtedly inspired, at least in part, by the legendary vedette and dancer Josephine Baker, the most famous star of the Folies Bergere in Paris, whose name and electrifying stage presence defined the Jazz Age of the 1920s. She herself was alive and well in the midst of her long career, but the ’20s were long gone, and their passing received a fine tribute in this absolutely gorgeous song.
Copper Penny
(Tr. Jake Spatz)
YouTube: Alberto Castillo | Raúl Berón
Your dad was a blond guy, a drunk and a rowdy,
Your black mother’s lips were geranium red.
You came out mulatta with eyes blue as heaven,
And waves in the sooty black hair on your head.
You grew up a poor girl until you turned twenty,
And left the mud streets for the bright cabaret.
Now everyone calls you the old copper penny,
Since older and sadder, your worth’s gone away.
You old copper penny,
I know the beauty you vaunted;
I saw the pink wings you flaunted,
The butterfly we all wanted,
Till you fell from out the air…
Mud penny, you sank so…
How well you once danced the tango!
How pretty you were before us,
The bronze queen of the chorus
Up in the old Folies Berger.
That shabby old barrio of mud and tin houses,
The same as your life, disappeared and moved on…
Two decades have gone by, beloved mulatta,
Your parents are gone, the old lamp-post is gone.
Perhaps you get lost at the corner you’re turning
To look for the house where they gave birth to you;
Keep on, don’t you give up, don’t show that you’re hurting…
Don’t cry now, mulatta, what good would it do!
Moneda de cobre (1942)
Music: Carlos Viván
Lyrics: Horacio Sanguinetti
Tu padre era rubio, borracho y malevo,
tu madre era negra con labios malvón.
Mulata naciste con ojos de cielo
y mota en el pelo de negro carbón.
Creciste entre el lodo de un barrio muy pobre,
cumpliste veinte años en un cabaret.
Y ahora te llaman moneda de cobre
porque vieja y triste muy poco valés.
Moneda de cobre,
yo sé que ayer fuiste hermosa;
yo con tus alas de rosa
te vi volar mariposa
y después te vi caer…
Moneda de fango,
¡Qué bien bailabas el tango!…
Qué linda estabas entonces,
como una reina de bronce,
allá en el "Folies Berger".
Aquel barrio triste de barro y de latas
igual que tu vida desapareció…
Pasaron veinte años, querida mulata,
no existen tus padres, no existe el farol.
Quizás en la esquina te quedes perdida
buscando la casa que te vio nacer;
seguí, no te pares, no muestres la herida…
No llores mulata, total, ¡para qué!