Some History of
Tango and Argentina
The Tango is a beautiful fusion dance originating from Argentina and
Uruguay. The dance developed from folkloric roots of the traditional
indigenous dancers of the tribal people of south america and blending
of the waltzes of italian immigrants and french minuets. Over time it
evolved and became the form we know today. In order to understand tango
we can understand the history of the dance and the style in its purest
form of first principles. the argentinians dance without moving their
shoulders as a elegant stride, the uraguayans choose to bounce a bit to
honour their tribal heritage.
I believe you cannot dance the Tango without the feeling that you get
from
argentinians and uruguayans. If you love tango you must love the
culture of the argentinians and uraguayans. They come part and parcel
to learning the feeling of how the Tango should be danced.
Ballroom tango was an attempt to take something
with innate beauty and constititution force and it into the
formalised
paradigm of structure and competition. The colonial interpretation of
the dance was harsh and did
the dance no justice. This became the Ballroom tango which was an
extension
of the waltzes, foxtrot and emphasised the control and power of western
powers rather than the elegance and beauty of song and music. There is
a warmth in South American culture that they only share with their
families, nationality and those who pay love and respect to their
culture .
This is the feeling of sentiment people must have when dancing
the Tango. Alot of foreigners attempt to dance Tango without respecting
this feeling and end up dancing a an arrogant way based on egotism and
lack in emotion.
When I first started tango, it sounded like haunted house music.
but eventually when you listen to the music enough, you start living
the golden age of the composers and dancers, of how they people must
have felt at the time. It is a strange feeling where the past becomes
the present. The only way i can describe it, is that a scene from a old
movie with grainy footage becomes clear and you are immersed in clarity
and enter the world behind the silver screen. The music is beautiful
and invokes happiness and melancholy. The bandeneon has a voice and a
soul as do the violins and cellos, The heart beat sits on the timing of
the music and the mode changes represent the ebb and the flow of the
emotions within the dance.
Originally tango was developed in brothels by prostitutes of the
portenas (port
city) and the cowboys
and silver miners called the gauchos. In the rural districts the women
dressed
in their long flowing
italian style dresses called the pasenas. The men would usually tell
the
quality of a woman by the intricate patterns she left in the dust as
they were still consevative the hemlines were very low on dresses.
There were very few women on the frontier and it was the prostitutes
that would take turns with many of the working men after a hard days
work. She was offered silver for dancing and her her services. the
gauchos were rough men and occassionally fights would break out
resorting to stabbings and duals. Since the men were waiting for the
women to be freed up, they danced with
each other to pass time. Argentina, was known for its silver hence the
name Argentine (Chemical element AG).
The height of tango was developed during the
Golden age
in which its development reached its apex. High class and orchestras
came in and the development of film and hollywood.
Carlos Gardel became
a
celebrity
heartthrob
that
to
this day Argentinians and Uraguayans
still constest his nationality. Unfortunately, Carlos died in a
plane crash and everyone was heartbroken.
Evita peron is
another great person they consider a national treasure as she believed
in social reform. When Maddonna played evita in the movie, that really
annoyed the argentinians.
They would organise parties called milongas in which they would dance
milonga,
tango and valse. The women would be very picky about who they
dance with and a man would have to be endorsed another man in order for
him to be accepted by the women at the milonga. Therefore a man could
not have a dance with a woman at a milonga until he mastered Tango and
was Initiated. The
men developed a tango practice night called Practicas in which
gathering of men would share their dance skills and talk politics and
self mastery and development. The government did not like large
gatherings of men helping each other as they feared revolutions from
them. So they
altogether banned gatherings, considering it a immoral dance while
ironically endorsing "rock and roll" culture while it was breaking
ground in
america and causing civil disobedience.
The generations of older people loved the tango soo much they blocked
their doors with the mattresses to buffer the music and danced tango
with their families, and it became a family thing danced on the Patios
with their family. The beauty of a tango is that a grandfather can
dance with a granddaughter without having raise questions. Tango is a
classy elegant dance and was considered too rauchy back in the
conservative period. Women would buy dresses and modify them to suit
the dance, having to slits on both sides to reveal their legs. the
women would sit and wait for cabaceo (invitation to dance by nod of
head from a distance). If no men asked them to dance during the night,
they would go home and tell then their friends they did the ironing
last night to avoid embarassment as as a joke.
In Argentina, the milongas start at before midnight until 4am in the
morning. Giving a small amount of time to sleep so they can get ready
for their morning asado (BBQ) followed by work, the siesta and then
more work, dinner and then a quick sleep before heading out to night
out in town again. Argentina was a rich country with nationalised
energy and the people benefitted.
After the regime fell there was another golden age of development,
Everyone took up classes for everything from yoga to karate, there was
a revival of tango. Tango is now considered a international treasure by
UNESCO because of it's artistic link with understanding complex
musicality, rhythm and phrasing.
In 1999,
Argentina's
economy
collapsed due to corruption and greed,
foreign and domestic. People protested the banks by banging pots and
pans. They went from super affluent to extremely poor.
The working class was destroyed in a number of years and their currency
dropped. These days Argentina is still recovering from the economic
disaster. Tango tourism has brought people from all over the world to
dance in argentina. Many fled the country to escape poverty as many
starved and many learned to protect themselves and survive in a lawless
society with mob rule. Normal working class people were forced to
protect themselves with guns and found ways to survive with little
resources and high amounts of crime and kiddnappings.
Fortunately the older generation passed the skills on to the younger
generations of argentinians and uruguayans due to their love of the
dance. My teachers Alberto and Angelica who treated me like their
grandson and passed the skills to me with unconditional love. My
teachers both were widowed, they had met at a milonga in Argentina on a
trip back to argentina and returned to australia to share their
ability. They were around when the famous traditional composer
Juan d'arienzo
was around. Angelica danced with him as a young woman. Astor Piazolla
was a progressive musician who went to europe to study music and
created elongated phrases that was difficult to dance traditionally to.
Pure Basics and Primitives
The first principle of tango is the connection it has with the circle.
Tango is an attempt to connect with the most primal of all shapes built
into the universal flow. Planets dance around the sun and the solar
systems dances around the galaxy in the orbit of sacred geometric
synchronicity. The moon revolves around the earth as the roles are in
the masculine and feminine are in tango. In tango, the woman has a role
to be a woman, and a man has a role to be a man. There are clearly
defined gender roles within the dance and both parties involved must be
accepting and respecting of this role in order to dance. The man must
be very masculine and respectful whilst the woman takes a passive role
with responsibility to show her grace and celebrate her strong divine
feminine.
Tango is like two step based dance like merengue, However is walk
based like a waltz. Each step is a stride to match the phrasing of the
music. The dancers usually stalk with accuracy of a knife and elegance
of a graceful cat. Breathing is part of the dance, Breathing in and out
naturally, while strolling in time with the compass. each step
represents a heartbeat in the 2/4 timing with a strong beat followed by
a soft beat. The soul is represented by the phrase and voice of the
bandeneon. Essentially walking to show a analog understanding of the
dance. The height of a tango is to be immersed into the dance as a
couple until true connective link of hearts occurs. Once this feeling
is acomplished two dancers become one. The tango essentially is a a
couple dance with a stylised walk on timing, connecting of two people
to the point whereby they feel each others emotion and draw people into
thier world in a captivating seductive way. When two people connect in
this way, the only way to describe it that a knowing that every emotion
you felt is the same emotion felt by your dance partner and you are
lost in space time vortex with your partner and want the moment to last
forever. The music sounds different as the music moves away distant and
hollow as you become the only two people in the world at that point in
time. And you know that the audience becomes one dimensional shadows
that are captivated and drawn into your world. The observers gain a
feeling of envy as two dancers on the floor at the time have achieved
this connection they desire.
- Derek, Passionata Dance
