[Tango-L] Origins

[Huck Kennedy]

Jake Spatz (TangoDC.com) <spatz at tangoDC.com> writes:
> 
> THEREFORE...
> 
> Since the original export eventually became a different
> dance (aka Ballroom)...
> And since the re-import clashed with the pre-import, which
> hardly had a national character...
> 
> ... the only viable conclusion, however you slice it, is
> that the first _inauthentic_ tango dancers were Argentine.
> 
> According to each other, anyway.

     An interesting argument were this 1920, perhaps,
but then that primitive coal of a dance went through
decades of crunching in the milongas of Buenos Aires,
the Golden Age, etc., finally emerging as the diamond
we know today as Argentine tango, so to pretend that
that diamond is anything but Argentina's culture is
patent nonsense.

     On the other hand, I think it's also nonsense
to think that nobody but an Argentine can dance
"world-class" (whatever that is supposed to mean)
Argentine tango.  But tango is Argentine (rioplatense
for the sticklers), and the overwhelming majority of
the best dancers do happen to be Argentines who have
been dancing for many years.

     The best teachers are also Argentine.  But of
course that does not mean that simply being Argentine
guarantees that you'll be good, far from it.

Huck