e was born in Buenos Aires downtown, but soon his parents, Gino and Teresa Burri, moved to the south of the country. When he reached school age they decided to send him back to the capital, to the home of a relative, in the neighborhood of Palermo.

In his adolescence he had lung problems and he moved, with his family, to the city of Cosquín in the province of Córdoba. It turned out a lucky drawback because it was there where his singing vocation woke up. During that period he got in touch with musicians and guitarists. He was good-looking and possessed a good voice so he began to appear rather successfully at the venues of the region. Furthermore, he worked with his father, who was in charge of an orchard, delivering vegetables and manure on a cart.

In 1933 he returned to Buenos Aires and, according to the copy of the magazine Radiolandia published on September 18, 1937, he got a job at the Teatro Nacional as member of the choir in the play De Gabino a Gardel.

In the above mentioned magazine he made the following narration: «At the end of the season I joined the Juan Canaro Orchestra in which I worked for a year as a singer. Later, eight months with Pedrito Maffia and again with Juan Canaro. Intimate reasons forced me to quit singing for some time and when I returned I joined the orchestra led by Roberto Zerrillo, but for a short time, because of the same personal circumstances mentioned. And a few monthds ago I reappeared as soloist accompanied by a tango trio on Radio Ultra. Now, I have just made my debut on the first day of this month on Radio Belgrano with the Elvino Vardaro’s orchestra. I’m very happy to be with him because he together with Maffia are the highest peaks of our popular music. My favorite singer?... Gardel, I have doubts that if any other at any time could have sung or would sing like him. A memory?... When an unknown listener sent me a tiepin, a fine jewel, with a writing attached in which she said to me that she had wept when she heard my rendition of the tango “Qué pena señor” composed by Rodolfo Biagi.

«An anecdote? Yes, it occurred to me in Cosquín in the early times of that festival and it was customary that you were invited to sing a serenade. On a Saturday evening I was already in bed when two friends insisted in my singing to a girl, the fiancée of one of them. Finally they persuaded me, I went and then I returned to sleep. The next day, on Sunday, I was at a cinema theater when two policemen unpleasantly took me to the police station. I arrived there, battered. The chief of police was waiting for me there and, finally, I came to know that because of a joke I had sung for the fiancée of the chief of police who did not like the joke at all».

He also sang in several orchestras: with the one led by Horacio Pettorossi on Radio Prieto along with the female singer Susana Ortiz, with Ricardo Malerba’s and with Federico Scorticati with whom he made a tour of Brazil.

In 1938 he traveled to France with Rafael Canaro. The other vocalist was Alberto Tagle. Rafael was who chose his nom de plume.

In 1939 he joined the Radio El Mundo’s staff and appeared for several years accompanied by guitars, generally those headed by Edmundo Zaldívar and as well by the staff orchestra of the radio station. There he stayed until he was summoned by Astor Piazzolla together with the singer Héctor Insúa.

In 1948 he split with the Astor’s orchestra and began a new stage. In 1952 he made his debut as soloist in the radio program Patio de tango on Radio El Mundo.

Along these years he alternated his show business activity with other jobs. In 1958 he was invited to join the Mariano Mores company for the musical Luces de mi ciudad. The following year, with the orchestra led by Mores, he went on a tour of Venezuela.

He wrote the music and the lyric of the tango “Che Marieta”.