Argentine singer and actor, celebrated throughout Latin America for his espousal of tango music.

By different accounts Gardel was the illegitimate son of a Frenchwoman or a native of Uruguay, but he was certainly in Buenos Aires by the age of six. His first formal acting roles were at the Nacional Corrientes Theatre, which also listed Don José Razzano, with whom Gardel formed a duo for many years. They played in various theatre companies, touring Argentina and other Latin-American countries and Spain. Gardel's huge popularity as an interpreter of the melancholy ballads of the tango was confirmed in the 1920s and '30s in nightclubs and motion pictures. One early picture, Luces de Buenos Aires (1931; “Lights of Buenos Aires”), was filmed in Paris; but later ones were made by Paramount Pictures for the Spanish-speaking market. They include Esperame (1933; “Wait for Me”), La Casa es seria (1933; “The House Is Somber”), Melodia de Arrabal (1933; “Melody of Arrabal”), Cuesta abajo (1934; “Downhill”), El Tango en Broadway (1934; “The Tango on Broadway”), Tango-Bar (1935), El Día que me quieras (1935; “The Day That You Love Me”), and Cazadores de estrellas (1935; “Hunters of Stars”).

Gardel died in a plane crash while on tour. In Buenos Aires his funeral and funeral procession in a horse-drawn carriage were witnessed by tens of thousands of Argentines. Like Rudolf Valentino's, his tomb became an object of popular pilgrimage.