To think of the Argentine tango is to luxuriate in the musical embodiment of Latin-American sensuality. But for the composer Astor Piazzolla, who died in 1991, the tango was much more than the most familiar badge of Argentine identity. Using techniques learned from his classical training - he studied in Paris with the doyenne of 20th-century neoclassicism, Nadia Boulanger - he created the so-called "new tango" style. His compositions, nearly all of which use the frame of the tango's infectious rhythms and melodic immediacy, are extraordinarily various, complex and expressive.
The Quinteto Piazzolla, formed after the composer's death and comprising his colleagues and some of Argentina's most famous instrumentalists, closed the Barbican's weekend-long Argentine Music and Film Festival. At the centre of the ensemble is the most typical of Argentinian instruments, the bandoneon - a sweet-toned, small-scale accordion - played by Nester Marconi. Surrounding Marconi's beautifully crafted playing was an ensemble of violin, piano, guitar and double bass.
Many of Piazzolla's works featured each player as a soloist in extrovert, concertante passages. Fernando Suarez Paz's virtuosity on violin soared over the rest of the band, alternating fiery intensity with bravura showmanship. Nicolas Ledesma's piano playing was showcased by a solo composed in Piazzolla's most consciously "classical" idiom - a cross between the harmonies of Debussy and the tango's earthy rhythms.
Each individual number contained a cornucopia of ideas, styles and references. The second veered from a conventionally languid tango tune to mock-Baroque harmonic progressions, avant-garde instrumental effects, and a coda of effete, refined trills. Another piece was a dreamscape of cricket and bird calls - characterised by violin yelps, double bass slaps and the clacking of the bandoneon's keys - over the continuous traditional tango bassline.
The most obvious expression of Piazzolla's twin musical allegiances was a piece conceived as a tango and composed as a strict fugue. Piazzolla created a work that is both authentically a tango and an authentic fugue - a deft compositional trick. But he is not afraid, in other numbers, to indulge in the tango's sheer sensuousness. Throughout, the Quinteto Piazzolla revealed the enormous range of Piazzolla's creative universe, and his transformation of the tango into a multifaceted musical form.
