The Tango Argentino Chemnitz 2025 festival honours the inventor of the concertina, Carl Friedrich Uhlig, who first presented this instrument with five heads on each side on the left and right in Chemnitz in 1834 and whose origins can be found in the workshop/manufactory at the time, around 40 metres from today's Karl Marx Monument. Carl Friedrich Uhlig and his apprentices - including Carl Friedrich Zimmermann - continued to develop the concertina. A wider range of tones with multiple rows of buttons and registers enabled a more extensive musical repertoire. The aim of providing an inexpensive instrument that could be played by everyone remained the same. Saxony, especially Carlsfeld, became a centre of instrument manufacture and since Heinrich Band in Krefeld gave his name to the concertina, the instrument spread as the bandonion. The bandoneón made by Alfred Arnold as the "AA" from Carlsfeld is world-famous and associated with the Argentine tango, and its sound continues to fascinate and inspire to this day. The Uhlig core zone of the button/tone arrangement has remained unchanged to this day. This is why we are inviting you to Chemnitz - the cradle of the bandoneon - with our festival as part of our Capital of Culture project "Moving Sounds - Concertina & Bandoneon".
Our book with accompanying audio CD "Von der Concertina zum Bandoneón / Chemnitz - die Wiege des Bandoneóns" by Jürgen Karthe tells the story of the instrument and is available here: www.auris-subtilis.de
Selected DJs will give the festival's milongas that special feeling: Ximena from Mulhouse/Fr
