The Charm of Chamamé

BIOGRAPHY Spasiuk was born in 1968 in Misiones, a small province near the brazilian border. Its society is the product of a complex process of fusion and interaction between the disparate elements of its population: the original native communities (Mbya-Guaraní), the Creoles, and the foreign settlers who established themselves at the beginning of the 20th century. Among the latter were Ukranians, to whom Chango Spasiuk is intimately linked by virtue of his two Ukranian grandparents. Chango Spasiuk spent his childhood in a highly stimulating milieu. His childhood was centered around the carpenter's shop managed by Lucas, his violinist father, and Marcos, an uncle who sang. The singing duos playing in red earth patios, the unrelenting subtropical climate, a terrain of jungle and wide rivers, of labourers working with hoes and machetes on the yerba mate plantations - this is the world that underlies the powerful texture and mysticism of his music. He plays with a memory of the informal rural polkas, performed by the whole familiy, that were such a special feature of his home in Misiones. However, it is specifically with Chamamé, that Spasiuk achieves his greatest interpretative and creative virtuosity, taking up the legacy of such well-known figures as Cocomarola, Abitbol, Montiel and Martínez Riera, amongst others. With absolute openess and lack of prejudice, he produces a rich mix of contemporary sound and tradition, where one can also find Schotis, rural Polkas, Rancheras and Rasguidos Dobles. It is legacy and synthesis.