[Tango-L] Invoking Buenos Aires

[Sergio Vandekier]

Jay Rabe says: "Jake ... well said"  Not in my opinion and I will tell you 
why.

"Even ...in Buenos Aires itself ... there has always been dispute, conflict,
and competition over dancing styles. If the city is definitively anything,
it is definitively divided." "dancers [in BsAs]... have always been at each 
other's throats over who's got  the "real style"

*Not true*.   Tango has some elements that are essential that have to do 
with its being Argentine Tango.    It is improvised, people for many years 
learn by themselves, practicing with friends, discovering, creating, 
developing new steps, figures and styles. This process continues today and 
certifies to the vitality of tango.  Every neighborhood, club, person 
develops its own style.  This never created divisions, dispute, competition 
or division.  Everyone dances the way he/she prefers and this is fine.  
Milongueros do not criticize at all, they are very tolerant of individual 
styles as everyone has its own. All that you can say is "I like or dislike 
the way so and so, dances" this is an assertion of his personal taste.  
There is no "real style"  in Argentina this is something that concerns 
foreigners not Argentines.

"The old guard has always shut down the innovators, and the innovators have
always fought back."

**Controversy in art matters has always existed. This is what keeps art 
alive. It changes with times adapting to new discoveries, new techniques, 
different circumstances.  Nobody was ever "shut down" in Argentina for 
developing a variation.  As I mentioned before when a new wave develops 
there are those that join immediately and those that take refuge in 
tradition. This is also true in science.

"Teachers are notorious for contradicting each other and also themselves."

**This is normal when you are dealing with people that dance different 
styles which have different technique.  If they contradict themselves it may 
be because they are just regular dancers that are hired by Tango 
entrepreneurs to come and teach here. (Frequently looking for the cheapest 
way to hire somebody).

The same happened with every dance: country-western for instance had/has 
line dances with choreography being different (for the same dance) every 100 
miles away . The same line dance has different choreography in Buffalo than 
in Cleveland, this cause no problems here and never cause problems in Bs.As. 
either.

"[Tango] never even rose into prominence among Argentines, or approached
anything resembling a popular identity, until it came back from Paris with a
stamp of approval

If Buenos Aires is the mother country of the tango, she certainly needed a
lot of help raising the miscreant after she left it to perish on the stoop
of a whorehouse."

**Tango was born in the periphery of the city, in brothels, bars, gambling 
places.  Its choreography and lyrics were not acceptable by most people but 
since it had a strong appeal to any Argentine, young boys of middle and high 
class started a process of purification of tango and took it to their homes 
and taught it to their sisters, aunts and friends.

It was young Argentines of high class that introduced Tango in Paris where 
it became the craze of aristocracy and high society.  The news of this 
success reached the Rio de la Plata where high society in Argentina and 
Uruguay started to look at tango from a different perspective.

Tango was born and evolved in Argentina. With or without the European 
approval Tango would have continued to develop and become generally accepted 
by society as a whole for it appeals to the Argentine soul.  There will 
always be some people that do not like tango, or Jazz, or classical music 
but that is irrelevant.

"Every visiting Argentine teacher I've met in the U.S. - without exception -
[answers] questions about authenticity, [by shifting] emphasis to individual
style - not theirs, mind you, but Yours."

**Many of those teachers are improvised tango instructors, not used to 
discussing what is self evident and notorious to any Argentine.  So he might 
not know how to discuss authenticity but he knows when you look like a 
"gringo" trying to dance tango.

"[and the best one IMO...]

"Since the whole damn thing is an *ART* [emphasis added], ... [how can it 
be]
so boneheadedly orthodox ... so coweringly in search of validation[?]"

**Tango dancing is an art, you have absolute freedom to dance any way and 
form you wish, with another woman, with another man, with both of them at 
the same time, with your dog, with your broom, with a cloth hanger, to 
traditional tango music or to any kind of music, properly dressed or with 
shorts, socks and sneakers.

**All what we are discussing here is not that freedom that you have, it is 
to know the point when you have drifted so far away of what is essential to 
Argentine Tango that you are dancing anything but A. Tango.

A. Tango went around the world  with great impetus two times. At the 
beginning of the 20th century and in the late 80s.   The first time it was 
changed in Europe into what it is now known as
"International Style Tango" and in the USA as what is known as "American 
Style Ballroom Tango".

Authenticity is then an important factor unless you wish to dance something 
else devoid of the original characteristics and contaminated by your foreign 
culture.

Best regards, Sergio.

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