From: pmorgan@renzland.org (Peggy Morgan)
Subject: Tango History
Date: Sun, 4 Dec 1994 20:17:45 -0500 (EST)

Sad Affair:
It takes tragedy to tango . . .

by Carl Honore
Special to The Globe and Mail, Buenos Aires, Argentina

Reprinted in the Jive Times,
The official publication of the Dance Club Blue Silver, Toronto, Ontario. 

Despite the efforts of moviemakers and dance club owners around the 
world, Buenos Aires is still the home of genuine tango. With its uneasy 
blend of machismo and European affectation, the Argentinian capital is 
made for a dance that thrives on solitude and nostalgia. For a few 
dollars, you can still slip behind a closed door and into the most tragic 
elegance of all - night tango.

In many ways, the history of tango is the history of Buenos Aires. In the 
last half of the 19th century, massive European immigration brought 
alienation and unrest to the so-called Gran Aldea (Great Village). Born 
in the brothels and bars of the 1880's, tango expressed the resentment of 
both the indignant locals and the homesick newcomers. Its doleful blend 
of gaucho lyrics, Spanish flamenco and Italian dance tunes reflected the 
mongrel character of the new Buenos Aires.

At the same time, the city's uneven demographics infused tango with its 
erotic ambivalence. Because women were scarce, men had little choice but 
to dance with each other. This explains the two-tier movement: while the 
legs interlace with dazzling sensuality, the upper body remains stiff and 
partners stare into the distance with icy aloofness. Properly danced, 
tango is a grudging courtship. As novelist Ernest Sabato once wrote: 
"Only gringos dance tango for fun."

Certainly, the lyrics are not designed to lift anyone's spirits. Most of 
the songs are about lost love, faraway mothers or how much happier life 
was in the past. Despite its leap to international prominence and 
respectability inthe 1920's, tango in Buenos Aires has held on to its 
tragic and seamy origins.

Though most locals can no longer dance tango, they are still in tune with 
its sentiment. Cafes and bars around town are papered with the portraits 
of the great tango singers and a 24-hour tango radio station makes the 
mournful poetry and wailing voices part of everyday life. When the clock 
strikes midnight on the weekend, lonely tangueros come out in force.

One of their favourite haunts is Salon Argentina, in the centre of town. 
At one end of a hall adorned with ceiling-high mirrors and plaster 
mouldings, salsa and tango bands play alternate sets until the sun rises. 
With its aging chandelier and reddish lighting, the Salon is the ideal 
setting for tango: The air of past glory is spiked with remorse,

As if at a high-school dance, the men stand silently around the 
perimeter, pretending to ignore the women seated quietly at the tables. 
Most people are older than 30 and everyone is dressed to please. The 
smell of cheap perfume and stale cigarettes is unmistakable. Ture to the 
sprit, many stand and sit for hours without budging: tango, after all, is 
about invincible loneliness.

For an outsider, the etiquette is bizarre. Often with no more than a 
glance a man and woman about 6 metres apart will agree to form a couple 
on the dance floor. Without exchanging a word, they wind a path through 
the crowd, join hands and begin to tango. With their faces set in cool 
indifference, their bodies lock in a fiercely erotic duel. Back and forth 
they go, stalking and spurning each other. When the music finishes they 
aprt and return to their separate places without so much as a smile.

Many of the customers have sprung from the pages of a seedy novel. There 
are tall, raffish men who dance like the wind and smoke in silence 
between dances. Standing out a mile among the forlorn widows, the 
sprinkling of bottle-blondes in scanty leather evokes the 
turn-of-the-century prostitutes who used to tango for a fee. As the clock 
ticks towards 4 a.m., the dance floor is a little more crowded but the 
segregation between men and women is just as pronounced.

Until the bitter end, everyone plays the game: loneliness is all part of 
the act and nobody wants to look vulnerable or happy. As an Argentinian 
poet once observed, tango "is a sad thought that can be danced." Perhaps 
outside, in the morning light, the tangueros step out of character and 
discreetly swap small talk and phone numbers.

Then again, maybe not.