Overview

• July 11 has been observed since 2005 as the Día Nacional del Bandoneón by Law 26.035, commemorating the 1914 birth of tango maestro Aníbal “Pichuco” Troilo.
• Musicians and dancers are staging concerts, demonstrations and radio specials across Buenos Aires and provinces to celebrate the bandoneón’s central role in Argentine tango.
• Cultural centers and public plazas are hosting hands-on exhibitions that showcase the instrument’s button-operated, bellows-driven design and acromatic tuning favored by tango players.
• The national observance was propelled by Francisco Torné and poet Horacio Ferrer to enshrine the bandoneón as a patrimony of national identity.
• The bandoneón’s origins remain debated among 19th-century German inventors Heinrich Band, Cyrill Demian and Carl Friedrich Uhlig.