According to Francisco Garcia Jimenez, Sanders was inspired when after a night out with a group of friends in 1927 in the Buenos Aires district of Flores, one of them said goodbye with the words "Adiós, muchachos".
Sanders then developed it further with his piano and his friend Vedani adapted a "little text" to the incidentally conceived music ("afortunada música").
Me toca a mí hoy emprender la retirada, debo alejarme de mi buena muchachada.
For the tango recording by the orchestra of Enrique Rodríguez in April 1945 three changes were ordered: la barra querida (beloved gang) had to become viejos amigos (old friends), nadie la talla' (no one size fits all) became nadie batalla (no battle) and todas las farras (all those binges) became todas las fiestas (all those parties).
On May 19, 1950, Julio Martel sang the tune with the orchestra Alfredo De Angelis for Buenos Aires label Odeon 55104-B 17660.
On 8 November 1973 a recording sung by Carlos Gardel with the José Basso orchestra was produced by Buenos Aires EMI-Odeon 8015-B 41005.
[15] In the 1960 film Innocent Sorcerers, the Polish version of the song was sung as Tadeusz Łomnicki's bandmates (including Roman Polanski) were saying goodbye to him.
[16] It was included in the soundtrack of the 1992 Scent of a Woman as performed by The Tango project,[17] in the 1997 movie The Full Monty with a version credited in the trailer section as being from 1940, in the 1997 Finnish drama Vääpeli Körmy ja kahtesti laukeava performed by Jorma Aalto, Jari Lappalainen and Heikki Virtanen,[18] in the Macedonian comedy science fiction Goodbye, 20th Century (Zbogum na dvaesetiot vek 1998),[19] and the Woody Allen movie Scoop (2006 film).
[25] Louis Armstrong made his own version of the tango with the title I Get Ideas recorded on July 24, 1951, featuring Dorcas Cochran as the author of the lyrics.
[citation needed] In Italy, a version belonging to Eugenio Rondinella retained the title words in the original language, but is otherwise very different as it relates to a man who will be imprisoned for one year.
[27] Another Italian version, recorded by Milva, retained the original title words as well; the lyrics are intended to be sung by a female singer and they are the farewell of the performer to her friends before her imprisonment.