Gold dust

Velia Oliva Federico was born on October 23, 1951 at 10:30 in the morning in the Berisso hospital. A wonderful son. He was not very demonstrative, but he was deeply affectionate. In addition to music, he was fond of painting, cinema, he was fascinated by art in general. I played the piano we had at home, and when Federico was four years old he sat down to play with me, four hands.

Daniel Sbarra We were classmates at the Annex School. I met him in the assembly hall because we sang together in the choir when national holidays were organized. We also stomped the malambo together. At the age of 12 we had the idea of ​​putting together a group with Creole guitars for the first time.

Roberto Estenssoro He was very low profile. He had a tic: taking his hair to the left side. And another thing he did was knead the Jockey Club cigarettes, he took out the filter and kneaded them until they were very fine and then he would just light them.

Graciela Calandra I was a professor of Art History and Aesthetics. I had it in sixth year. El Nacional was a school that had a very high level, you could talk one-on-one with the students. There were many who were very devoted to the political and ideological part, guys with many ideals. And there were others, like Federico, who sought to inquire about new experiences.

Juan Mendy I met Federico at the National College. At one time, when spring began, we'd get together with him and Willy Randrup and we'd go sailing in regattas.

Willy Randrup We knew each other from the Regatta Club, when our families went there on weekends. Then we had the same division in the first year of the National College. We also went to Montevideo to see Estudiantes emerge as American champions and we toured playing rugby.

Julio Moura He was a skilled left-hander, he played soccer very well. But he was so fast that he wanted to do everything before. My older brother [Jorge] would tell him: "Don't hit him so hard." And he would reply: “I don't hit him hard, I hit him lightly”. With time I understood that he was right. When you hit him dry, the ball goes light.

Juan Carlos Di Tomasso We played rugby between the ages of 14 and 19 with his two best friends: Juan Mendy and Willy Randrup.

Raúl Barandiaran I started playing rugby in 1963 and Federico a year later. He played 9, scrum half.

Alex Ginzburg Federico was small, but playing rugby he was very skilled.

Rodolfo Cosentino I played rugby at Los Tilos, which is the opposite of La Plata Rugby where Federico, Juan Mendy, Barandiaran played, among many other boys. In the 6th year of high school we were classmates and once or twice a year we made the National College rugby team and went to play somewhere. I remember going to Mar del Plata and three years in a row we went to play at the Naval Lyceum. We were almost dressed up, long hair, beards and flowered shirts as if to mark the contrast with those from the Liceo, who were all waiting for us impeccable with short hair.

DENSE REALITY

Daniel Sbarra The one who invited me to play Dulcemembriyo was Luis Canosa in the year 67, they were already formed some time ago. Luis was wonderful at singing. The most important performance was at the Jockey Club [in Punta Lara]. We did a cover of Palito Ortega, “I am a friend of flowers”, in an ironic tone. At first we did songs by Bee Gees and The Beatles. Only at the end did some of our compositions emerge that we did with Federico.

Javier Canosa My dad [Luis Canosa] spoke very good English and played the guitar, he would bring out songs by Elvis, Bee Gees. He met Federico at the National College, but my dad was a year younger, 1952. Luis's great-aunt made pastafrola with quince paste: that's where the name came from.

Laura Fernández Lahera The members of Dulcemembriyo were Federico Moura [bass], Daniel Sbarra [guitar], Pinfo Garriga [guitar], Diego Rodríguez [drums] and Luis María Canosa [singer]. In 1971 they invited me to sing.

Topo D’aloisio Federico was a very good bass player, in the style of John Entwistle of The Who. Although he liked Bill Wyman better. He had incredible rhythmic precision. I met him and the Dulcemembriyo at the Faculty of Architecture. They played a lot of songs by The Who, Rolling Stones, Santana and the Bee Gees.

Juan Mendy When he played medium, he kind of hid behind the bass and it was hard for him to get his voice out to do a chorus.

Pablo Tapia With Quique Mugetti and Julio Moura we went to the National College, in the same division. I remember seeing Dulcemembriyo at the Punta Lara Jockey. In addition to playing songs by the Bee Gees, they did a version of "Ana does not sleep." At that time parties were held in villas and Skay Beilinson, Pancho Luna, Federico were there. At those parties we sang with Julio and Federico songs by Caetano and Ney Matogrosso.

Patricia Orione The guys from Dulcemembriyo played a lot at the Jockey, at [the Teatro] El Siglo and at my wedding with Jorge [Moura], on October 15, 1970. That day he didn't sing Luis Canosa but Carlos Calandra and among the songs they played, they did “Muchacha de luna”, by Palito Ortega.

Juan Mendy When we finished high school we took the graduating trip by boat to Europe. We were seven. We set sail on December 27, 1970. The ship was called Enrico C. Skay Beilinson was traveling on that same ship, but on his side.

Rodolfo Cosentino We all arrived in Portugal together and then we parted ways. They hitchhiked to London and got jobs and settled, Federico even sang in some bars.

Juan Mendy A few weeks later I ran into them again in London and one day on Federico street he recognized the drummer of The Who. We were all half Who fans, but the one who recognized Keith Moon was Federico. We greeted him and he invited us to a rehearsal they were doing in a very small theater, for 60 or 70 people.

Rodolfo Cosentino We were staying in the house they had rented. We returned to Argentina after three months, but Federico stayed a few more months.

Topo D’aloisio In the carnival of 72 they called me to go with Dulcemembriyo to play in Bolivia. I played in a band with Skay Beilinson called Diplodocum Red & Brown. The tour producer said they had to play Andean music. Luis Canosa, the singer, caught the flu on the third day and with Federico and Daniel Sbarra the three of us sang in the following shows. Federico had extremely long hair, past his shoulders, and he swept the Bolivians away with his looks and style. For those shows Federico played a red bass that was mine, a Framus Lancer of German origin. Sbarra used a Vox Laud guitar and I used a Gretsch that Skay lent me for the occasion. We stayed for a month and seven days and we came back. At the time in La Plata the nightclubs were being decimated by Onganía's policy, it was not possible to rehearse either. Federico decided to leave and the drummer Diego Rodríguez emigrated to France, and together with Sbarra and Pinfo they recorded the album Et nada with Miguel Abuelo.

Javier Canosa On the trip to Bolivia they made twine. They charged ten thousand dollars each. And with that money my old man and Federico went to Europe, my old man by plane and Federico by boat. They met in London. In Amsterdam, Luis bought a Fender Jumbo guitar. With that guitar he went to bars and sang. It was going very well. That guitar is the only thing I have left of him. I would have liked to meet him, when he died I was very young.

Marcela Pascual Luis María loved us singing in Dulcemembriyo, she had the face of a strange angel, her beautiful long blond hair and the magic of those light nights at the Jockey, in the river. .. his death was an incomprehensible blow. For me he represents that wonderful and light era of rock and freedom. However, that beautiful and free being, imprisoned by two joints and killed by the demonic and growing torrent of the relentless right, is not forgotten.

I TAKE WHAT I FIND

Cecilia García I began studying architecture in 1968 and there I met Mario Lavalle and Jorge Moura. The three of us put together El Rancho. In the year 70 Augusto González appears and the next year Federico, who was also studying Architecture and began to go.

Augusto González El Rancho was located on calle 47 between 9 and diagonal 74, in a rationalist house. It was almost a cultural center: there was music, design, avant-garde projects, etc.

Juan Risuleo I met Federico through Carlos Rivadulla. Carlos was the fashionable glass window maker in Buenos Aires. I had a magnificent atelier on Calle Venezuela, where I worked before setting up my store: Ropas Argentinas.

Cecilia García During one summer the Moura family rented a house in Mar del Plata, and they invited Mario [Lavalle] and me to spend a few days. One of those days, walking along the beach with Federico and Mario, Pico [the Mouras' father] told us that he had some commercial premises and he wanted to ask Federico to rent one. That's where Limbo was born.

Juan Risuleo Federico was interested in men's clothing and that's how he introduced me to Pico, his father, who owned stores in Galería Jardín. There he began the parallel story of Limbo and Ropas Argentinas.

Julio Moura In Limbo there were very pinched clothes, satin garments, military pants, things you couldn't find anywhere else... There were voile shirts with bibs, similar tailcoat shirts and mao collars . The clothes were new and the clientele small. Many artists and writers attended, like the journalist Felisa Pinto who later became a lyricist for our song "I'm modern, I don't smoke," as well as many foreigners.

Felisa Pinto Federico was a great friend whom I met via Juan Risuleo. He was someone of enormous sensitivity and we shared a passion for good sewing.

Oscar López I've known him since before Limbo opened, we already knew we were going to work together. He had an artist profile, he was one degree above everything. His personality was amazing. He was walking down the street and everyone was looking at him. It was a timeless image.

Renata Schussheim I was walking through Florida, I passed by Galería Jardín and I saw Federico inside the store. I was so impressed by his face, he was like a character from a drawing of mine. I thought he was an incredibly interesting and beautiful guy, within a beauty canon that I use, who is that type of face that is so sensitive and so intelligent. There I sat at a table in a nearby bar and directly confronted him, I told him that I wanted to be friends with him. And he accepted this strange siege from a stranger. We had a coffee and started to chat.

Juan Risuleo Charly García once bought a business in Limbo [at the time of La Máquina de Hacer Pájaros] under the influence of Tiki García Estévez, the best fashion editorialist at the time. She was director of the Claudia magazine of Editorial Abril and later director of the Argentine edition of Vogue. She loved Limbo. What I remember is that Charly García wore a butter-colored natural silk Mongolian shirt with old mother-of-pearl buttons. Federico was very proud that his clothes were on the rock stage. His clothes were casual but refined, like himself.

Eduardo Costa Limbo was a fashion forward place, but by then Federico had already discovered the discreet charm of the bourgeoisie and that showed in his designs. They were aimed at their cultural and social milieu, an educated middle class.

Pancho Luna With Julio [Moura] we made belts for Federico to sell in Limbo. We cut magazines and sewed them between leather and plastic or between two plastics. Many were with drawings of superheroes.

Fernando Bouille I was dating Susana Romero and Federico made my suit when I married her. Federico marked an era in clothing at that time in Buenos Aires that was incredible: the thick cloths, the jackets.

Ginette Reynal I used to participate in the fashion shows they did. There was a big difference between the two in terms of the design of the clothing they made. Juan was sooo avant-garde and Federico was more new romantic.

Fernando Bouille With Federico and Dani Nijenshon we always went to a nightclub that was on Calle Carlos Pellegrini and Santa Fe: Experiment. Sometimes Susú Pecoraro and Miguel Ángel Solá were also with us.

Julio Moura The idea of ​​making clothes as a source of income to dedicate ourselves to music came from Federico. He drew very well and was involved in the entire clothing design process, from the patterns to going to the Once neighborhood to find the fabrics...

Roberto Jacoby I met Federico in 1972 or 1973. Long before he designed and sold clothes. He knew him from the contemporary art environment. He liked avant-garde art and was very cholulo of Di Tella.

Alberto Magnasco I was a close friend of Daniel Melgarejo. He introduced me to Juan Risuleo and Juan to Federico, it would be the year 1973. Federico had the rare ability to be able to get involved in what was happening... I remember situations like being in New York, talking frivolities and going to the Museum of Art together. Modern and become an art critic, fierce and cold. He was very intense with his own activity and that of others, he never lost his balance. We could be talking about the most incredible frivolity and he would suddenly make a comment with incredible intensity. He suffered from the lack of seriousness with which things were taken.

Juan Risuleo Mario Lavalle and Cecilia García opened up from Limbo very early on. All the work and responsibility fell on Federico. And he did it very well, with talent and grace. He also took care of the music that was played, although there was always a DJ, [Dany] Nijensohn. But Federico directed everything.

Daniel Nijensohn I worked at the El Agujerito record store, in the Galería del Este, a few blocks from Galería Jardín. We had many friends in common with Federico, including the photographer Alejandro Kuropatwa. I remember buying him super tight red pants, and when I got married he helped me choose the clothes.

Juan Risuleo Pink Floyd and Emerson, Lake & Palmer sounded all the time in Limbo. In Ropas Argentinas Billy Holliday, Janis Joplin and especially Maria Callas sounded.

Beatriz Muicey I did the press for Ropas Argentinas and wrote in the fashion section of the newspaper La Opinión. The first cargo pants I wore were Federico's. Organizing the parades with Juan and Federico was very easy because they were wonderful. Federico was unusually beautiful, he was a fairytale prince.

Hugo Rapicavoli I came to Limbo as a customer and talking to him he gave me a job as a salesman. We did not have a lot of inventory since the pieces were very particular, unique. Those clothes were spectacular. At that time he lived in Haedo and to get to Florida street he had to take the train and subway. People looked at me as if to say “what is this crazy man wearing”.

Juan Risuleo At that time the police would stop you and ask for your documents, often in an intimidating way. Federico's parents had an apartment on Arroyo and Suipacha and he sometimes lived there. We also live together in an art deco apartment on Tucumán and Paseo Colón. He was very skinny. But with a lot of energy. Very seductive. He seduced without doing anything, just being. And when he intentionally set out to do it, he was overwhelming, just devastating. He was also very meticulous with money, both in business and in his personal life. As for his sentimental life, he was very private.

Hugo Rapicavoli A great guy, a very special person. He had incredible inner peace. Always in a good mood and willing to help you. But I think it was more for the music than for the clothes.

Cecilia García She ended up selling and with the money she made she went to Europe for a year.

Charlie Thornton We had mutual friends with Federico and we used the same aesthetic when it came to dressing. With my partner Claudio Martínez, we bought Limbo and established the brand in the 80s and 90s with an underground style, refined and exclusive for those who dared and had a free spirit. In those times, just for driving around, they took you to prison. Federico dreamed of walking down Florida Street without being told something offensive.

Cecilia García When she returned from Europe, she put Mambo, in the same gallery [Jardín] but in the shop right across the street, where Ropas Argentinas, by Juan Risuleo, used to work.

Marcelo Moura In Mambo he maintained the style of Limbo, although he had advanced in the audacity of the clothes and had already done some shows. I remember several fashion shows in which Federico shared the catwalk at the Claridge Hotel with Juan Risuleo. The models were known at the time, usually glamorous, and in the past there was always music by Bryan Ferry.

Roberto Blanco Pazos I was a client of Federico's even before he set up his business, he made my shirts. In 1978 I only wore Mambo clothes, I didn't buy any other clothes that weren't his.

Laura Fernández Lahera One afternoon in 1976, leaving a rehearsal near Recoleta, I ran into Federico Moura and Mario Lavalle. I remember the emotion when we hugged. He had never been demonstrative, we hadn't been very friends either, but that day when we saw each other we gave each other a deep hug and a smile from the time of roses that had been left behind, as if knowing that seeing each other was seeing each other alive. I didn't ask them where they lived or what they did. At that time such questions were prohibited. We hugged and each one went their way.

Fernando Bustillo Not many of that division [of the National College] remained, because of the way they risked their lives.

Juan Risuleo We talked a lot with Federico about Jorge's kidnapping at the City Bell house. Jorge was very reserved, very soft, with charming ways, very polite, formal and with a lot of sadness in his eyes. He inspired respect and established a distance that was not contempt, but later I thought that he would look at our occupations in a way that I did not know how to define them at the time; let's say a little frivolous, considering their commitment and such respectable ideals.

Alberto Magnasco After a summer vacation I ran into him in a bus at the height of the Vicente López square. He told me: “I had a very difficult summer, I had a very strong crisis. I'm going to throw my clothes to hell and I'm going to dedicate myself to music”.

I CAN PROGRAM

Pablo Tapia With Julio we put together Marabunta and Federico was already playing with Mario Serra in Las Violetas. In Marabunta there were compositions by Julio, also by Quique [Mugetti]. I did some lyrics and vocal melodies. We also did covers of Latin American songs: “Boneca cobiçada” by Ney Matogrosso. Las Violetas was a more intellectual rock.

Néstor Madrid I was in the first formation of Los Redondos and in 1977 Mario Serra came looking for me to propose that I go play with him, who was putting together a group with Federico. We would rehearse at Mario's or Federico's house in City Bell and later in a delicatessen in Chascomús called Las Violetas, that's where the name came from.

Ricardo Serra I met Federico in the early 70s, he played in Dulcemembriyo and I in a group with classmates from primary school called Watts. Las Violetas didn't last long, they weren't a group that worked seriously.

Ricardo Rodrigo I played rugby for two years when I was ten or eleven and I was Marcelo's teammate. I played in the first formation of Los Redonditos de Ricota. In Pasaje Rodrigo, Bernardo Rubaja had set up a studio where they were going to record the music for the film by Guillermo Beilinson, Skay's brother, whose script Indio Solari had written. In that same studio Federico recorded two songs with Julio, one was called “Dos gatos”. It was Federico's first recording as a singer. I went to Salta with the Redonditos in December 1977 and when I returned I joined Marabunta. Federico sang in Las Violetas and at that moment the date arose together in a cinema in Pinamar.

Sirso Iseas The repertoire of Las Violetas were all their own songs, compositions by me and Federico, we were the only ones who composed. We recorded two songs that are my music and Federico's lyrics: “I like to play rock” and “Don't make foolishness”. At one point Jorge Álvarez called us. He had listened to that demo and he liked it, but he offered us to settle in Europe, I couldn't leave everything and go.

Ricardo Rodrigo There, in Pinamar, the two gangs dissolved and Federico went to live in Brazil.

Mario Serra After the recital in Pinamar between Marabunta and Las Violetas, Federico and I discussed the idea of ​​going to Spain to make music, but he went to Brazil first and ended up staying for a while long. I didn't go to Spain, but I started to get together with Julio [Moura] and Duro ended up building, the germ of what was to come.

Enrique Mugetti We rehearsed with Duro at my paternal grandparents' house, which was located in Los Hornos, there we recorded a demo. The singer was Laura Gallegos.

Alberto Magnasco In Brazil, with Eduardo Costa, they had designed lamps with black rubber and sold them. They were divine.

Eduardo Costa I never settled in Brazil, although I did buy an apartment there on Bernadote street. We lived there with Federico for about a year and we partnered to make and sell handicrafts. I always remember Federico listening to María Bethânia in Rio and saying to myself “I don't know how anyone can not like this deep and authentic voice”

Enrique Mugetti When he came back from Brazil, we erased Laura's voice on that Duro demo and he sang over that already recorded music. Later he was accommodating the letters and doing some with Roberto Jacoby. It was very funny how they did them, because there they would throw themselves on the floor belly up, like boys and say nonsense. They were looking for the best phrases, but Federico ended up closing them, as he was the one who had to say them. Everything he said was believed. The pranks or the jokes or the deep thing. Federico was quite real and honest in that sense.

Laura Gallegos I sang with Luis Canosa in some pubs in La Plata and I got together with many musicians who put together zapadas. Ricardo Serra was the one who invited me to sing in a project that he was putting together with his brother Mario. In Duro's time I already had children and I could not fully commit myself to the project. But there were already very good songs, which even remained in what they did later with Federico. He had incredible brilliance and it was natural that they wanted him to sing, because the boys were very involved in that story of dedicating themselves to music.

Juan Risuleo I left Argentina in December 1979 and saw him again in Buenos Aires in a concert in December 1982 at the Teatro Coliseo. After the recital we went to eat pizza at El Cuartito. I remember that there was a very young boy who was a big fan, he told me that he always followed him. Federico invited him to eat with us. The kid was excited, very innocent and sincere. Federico very natural, as if they were lifelong friends.

Margarita Venturini When she went to New York for the second time, in 1977, she met a psychic who told her that she would end up playing the piano in a morondanga nightclub to earn a living. He laughed about it, he never believed it. Of course, the seer was wrong.

Sin Disguise (Vedemecum) is available in bookstores from October 1st.