[Tango-L] Bachatango et al.

[RonTango]

----- Original Message ----
> From: Trini y Sean (PATangoS) <patangos at yahoo.com>
> To: Tango-L <Tango-L at mit.edu>
> Sent: Wed, June 2, 2010 3:00:25 PM
> Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Bachatango et al.
> 
> I'll be honest.  There are times when people do ballroom to ballroom music 
> at a milonga and I laugh, which probably says more about my snobbishness about 
> tango than it does about them.


Trini,

I'm trying to figure out what context you're referring to. I don't think you're referring to the non-tango sets (salsa ('tropical'), swing) that are fairly commonplace at milongas in the US. I suspect what you're referring to is the 'alternative milonga', where music with a ballroom dance rhythm other than tango is played and people dance what they think are 'tango steps'. 

Well, I had about 3 years of ballroom dance experience before I started tango. Most of our tango community at that time came from ballroom or salsa. So we often played sets of salsa - merengue - swing, sometimes even cha-cha once or twice during a milonga. People danced the steps they had learned to use for the rhythm of music they heard. This was way back in the last century, before there were 'alternative milongas', at least way out on the prairie.

Some years later (I think about 2004 or 2005), the first time I went to an 'alternative milonga', I walked in and heard music that I recognized from ballroom dance as samba, rhumba, cha-cha, night-club 2-step, and hustle, and people were doing tango steps to this music. How odd, I thought. My body tells me to do cha-cha steps to cha-cha music, not tango.  I was informed that some people believe you can use 'tango steps' to a wide variety of non-tango music and you could still call it 'tango'. Or so they say. 

So I am one more likely to laugh when I see people doing 'tango steps' to disco music, or some new age electronica trance house world music hybrid. The music defines the dance and if one uses steps learned in a tango workshop to dance to a cha-cha rhythm, perhaps they are advancing the evolution of cha-cha, but they are not dancing tango. Maybe they can call it 'cha-tango' and go into business.    

> I think it's useful to think of these 
> other dances or alternative tangos in the context of an overall milonga.  
> If an entire dance event was only of tangos (no vals, no milongas), then that 
> event would likely be less satisfying than an event with vals and 
> milongas.  Milongas and vals are there to provide a different flavor and 
> create a little color.  They are good in small doses.


The usual sequence of tandas at a milonga is

T-T-V-T-T-M  or
T-T-V-T-M     or the one time I went to Nin~o Bien the DJ played
T-V-T-M       or the one time I went to Glorias Argentinas the DJ played
T-V-T-other-T-M-T-other, with other being tropical or jazz or rock-n-roll or chacarera (to which no one danced tango)

so about 1/4 - 1/3 vals and milonga. Anything less is disappointing. Vals and milonga are not there to provide 'color'. they are part of the aural environment of a milonga.    

> I can see that 
> for the right audience, something like bachatango or kizomba would provide the 
> same thing that ballroom music or salsa or the chacarena does at a 
> milonga.  It would, of course, have to come in an even smaller dose than 
> vals or milonga.

Maybe they could do bachatangoi or kizomba at an alternative milonga. Nobody would notice. Or maybe they could call it a 'fusion dance'. That sounds really hip.

Ron