At a time when tango seems to have fossilized between nostalgia and tourism, a group of musicians based in Brussels once again demonstrate that the genre remains a living, complex and deeply modern form. SONICO, the ensemble founded in 2015 by the Chilean bandoneonist Lysandre Donoso, celebrates ten years of existence and celebrates the centenary of the Argentine composer Eduardo Rovira with a project that finally places him in the place he deserves within the history of contemporary tango.
His new album, ROVIRA 100is much more than a commemoration: it is a work of reconstruction and sonic reinvention. Recorded in Buenos Aires during his 2025 Latin American tour—which culminated with a historic performance at the Teatro Colón—the album revisits two of Rovira’s fundamental works: Sonic (1969) and Let them stop it (1975). Both were reassembled after a long process of archival research and reconstruction of scores, many of which were lost or deteriorated over time.
The result is a recording that sounds both like a rescue and a manifesto. SONICO understands Rovira’s music not as a relic of the past, but as an anticipation of the present: a language of frontiers that absorbed jazz, academic avant-garde and broken rhythms long before tango dared to do so.
The other revolutionary of tango
Often described as “the other Piazzolla,” Rovira was actually his most radical counterpoint. While Piazzolla took tango to the realm of lyrical melody and dramatic lyricism, Rovira explored its rhythmic, cerebral and cinematic side. In his music there are dense atmospheres, polyrhythms, asymmetric structures and a dark lyricism that anticipates modal jazz or even certain currents of progressive rock.
The magazine Gramophone he summarized that uniqueness well: “For those who enjoy Piazzolla’s music, Rovira’s should be equally gratifying, if not a revelation.” And that revelation comes now, from the hand of a European group that knew how to understand the depth of its aesthetics better than many Argentines.
A decade reviving a legacy
Since its creation, SONICO has set out to reconstruct the lost history of “new tango”. Their versions are based on historical material, but they do not look for the museum: they look for the pulse. The formation—Donoso on bandoneon, Alejandro Schwarz on electric guitar, Stephen Meyer on violin, Ariel Eberstein on double bass and Ivo De Greef on piano—achieves a fusion of technical precision and contemporary energy that makes the avant-garde spirit of the Buenos Aires sixties vibrate again.
In these ten years, SONICO has performed in some of the most prestigious venues in Europe, such as the Concertgebouw in Bruges, the Philharmonie of Luxembourg or the Heidelberger Frühling Festival. In 2026 they will debut at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg and at BOZAR Brussels together with the Brussels Philharmonic, with the monumental Tango Symphony.
A celebration in motion
The launch campaign ROVIRA 100 began on September 2 with the presentation of the cover art and will continue until the end of the year with singles, visuals and a physical collector’s edition distributed worldwide by NAXOS Deutschland. Every piece of the calendar—from Majo Majú until Ritualpassing through the visual tributes to Alfredo Gobbi and Pedro Santillán—functions as a gateway to that Rovirean universe where the melancholy of the suburb and the abstraction of contemporary music coexist.
The merit of SONICO lies not only in the impeccable execution or in the fidelity to the original, but in having returned Rovira to the cultural debate. In a panorama where tango is often reduced to a cliché, this ensemble recovers its experimental edge and its cosmopolitan vocation. ROVIRA 100 It shows that the future of tango can be born far from Buenos Aires, but always from its most Buenos Aires spirit: rebellion.
by RN
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