Gitana rusa

This is a different sort of tango. Although the themes of love and loss are familiar, the Slavic style and setting are unusual, and the narrator's relationship to the woman he addresses is enigmatic. The music and the lyrics have a murky provenance; the song may originally have been composed under the title Tus ojos ("Your Eyes") by Severio Sadán in Ukraine in honor of his unseen daughter-in-law in Buenos Aires, then modified by orquesta leader Juan Sánchez Gorio, who registered it in his name and asked Horacio Sanguimetti to write the words with which we are familiar. More of this tenuous history may be read here. In the event, Renée and José Luis Lavayen taught the pre-milonga class, and live music was enjoyed from Maricio Najt (piano) and Javier Sánchez (bandoneón).

Gitana rusa (1942) Letra de Horacio Sanguimetti Música de Juan Sánchez Gorio	Russian Gypsy (1942) Lyrics by Horacio Sanguimetti, trans. J. Osburn Music by Juan Sánchez Gorio
Pintó tus ojos El azabache de una pena. Gitana buena, Yo vi tus lágrimas de amor. Caminos blancos, Fueron pañuelo de tu llanto Y acongojaron Tu corazón.	It brushed your eyelids With the black shadow of an affliction. Good gypsy woman, I saw you cry salty tears of love. And bleached white highways Became the kerchief of your wailing And your grieving heart Was torn apart.
Gitana rusa, No lo hallarás por las tabernas, Ni en las estepas Ni en las calles del dolor. Gitana triste, Serás más triste cuando sepas Que tu gitano se arrojó una noche al Don...	O Russian gypsy, Don’t go seeking him in the ale houses, Nor the high plains grasses Nor in the byways of your pain. O tear stained gypsy, What you find out will be the saddest: To the dark depths of the river Don he gave himself that night…
Las balalaicas Buscaron música en tus trenzas, Y los cosacos Cantaron a tu soledad. Tus ojos negros Estaban lejos de la vida Ya no querían Volver a amar.* *Final stanza not sung in most versions.	The balalaikas Sought their sad music in your tresses, Meanwhile the Cossacks Of your loneliness they sang. Your deep black sockets, The eyes that sank away from living, No longer wanted To come back to love.

The broodingly intense Orlando Medina-Ricardo Malerba version is probably the most frequently played in milongas:

Luis Mendoza, singing with the credited composer Sánchez Gorio's orchestra, enunciates the lyrics sharply and dramatically:

Notes

In this translation, I continue to give greater attention to how the lines scan with the original, not merely in length and rhyme but how they might fit with the music. This layers a tonal effect onto the literal meaning, accentuating the romantic folk tragedy of the lyric. To be sure, Gitana rusa could be critiqued as orientalist or exoticizing; the article linked in the heading (above) goes so far as to describe it as kitsch. The words gitana/o and gypsy may feed into that impression; both are misnomers based on the false belief that the Romani people were from Egypt. Roma or Romani are the preferred terms in most usages today. The former would scan but be less true to the period, as well as raising some difficulties in terms of number and gender.

—John Osburn