FreeTango

Sergio Gruz (piano) and Olivier Manoury (bandoneon) share a long history connected to Tango.

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Sergio Gruz played in Buenos Aires for many years with various Tango ensembles, and it was with one of them, the Sexteto Sur, that he first came to Paris to accompany Adriana Varela at the famous ”Trottoirs de Buenos Aires” on Rue des Lombards.

Olivier Manoury (bandoneon), by virtue of his instrument, has always played Tango, first by accompanying many singers at the same ”Trottoirs de Buenos Aires” and participating in numerous dance shows and revues. 

Later, he formed his own groups: first Tangonéon, a pioneering contemporary Tango ensemble; then Tempo di Tango, a duo with Uruguayan pianist Enrique Pascual and finally, the Olivier Manoury Quartet, which blends Tango with Funk and Latin-Jazz and finally Olivier Manoury Quintet a tango/jazz fusion band.

Their first meeting as a duo revealed what their musical languages had in common: the harmonic and melodic heritage of Tango, improvisational technique, and the inventiveness and freedom of Jazz. While many experiments have attempted to fuse Tango and Jazz since Astor Piazzolla, none have truly been rooted in improvisation. Yet, that is precisely what this project is about—free improvisation, without written themes, predetermined tonality, or harmony, yet still unmistakably Tango. There’s also the freedom to evoke fragments of existing themes and return to the tonal language of Tango, the more modal sounds of Argentine folk music, and the rhythms of Uruguayan Candombe. The FreeTango duo has toured Latin America (Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil, Bolivia, El Salvador, Panama, Argentina, Uruguay), performing at major festivals such as the Medellín Tango Festival and *Buenos Aires Tango*, the most important Tango festivals in the world.