'The last milonguero from Urquiza'

It's how 'El Chino Perico' Ricardo Ponce gets described, but in a wonderful Practimilongueros interview with Monica Paz he says he doesn't like being included with the wonderful dancers he's seen in his life.

I especially love his story of how when he was young his mates thought his posture wasn't that good; they tied a board to his back by ropes at the waist and neck, so every time his head flopped forward he nearly strangled himself. (Could use some of those at London practicas: in my mind's eye I saw a row of boards with ropes waiting at the entrance...) Standing straight and walking well are prerequisites, they need attention: all very well to stare at your partner's feet and twist her around so her legs fly up, like those cloth dolls they dance joke tangos with in the Buenos Aires streets. Dancing with good posture and feeling is something else altogether.

There's deep passion when he talks about tango: 'You're dancing tango and you know that you should be dancing your music with your heart... Tango is a piece of life that you can dance.' & his sense of tango as family is familiar if you go repeatedly to milongas.

I watch El Perico Chino dance and see an extraordinary attention and courtesy to his partner. This level of attention and respect as well as a total sense of the music make this a dance that seems incredibly personal, the momentary awareness of two people for each other and the music. Tango from the heart of Villa Urquiza.

From Practimilongueros.

Villa Urquiza

Thanks to Jantango for passing on the link to another of those remarkable archives of videos that grow day by day on YouTube. This one is the channel of José Luis Ferraro, and Jantango characterises it as Villa Urquiza tango, some 80-odd videos filmed in Sunderland, Glorias Argentinas, Sin Rumbo, and elsewhere, and uploaded over the last seven months.

Perhaps it's a good time to remember what Villa Urquiza really stands for, since many of the wildest young Argentine teachers who come to London claim to dance Villa Urquiza. Watch El Chino Perico, his utmost calm and effortless sophistication on the floor: I get the sense of someone marvelously courteous, and I believe that is real Villa Urquiza, not the antics young teachers try to impress us with. I get the impression that tango was a civilizing influence: that young kids came in off the streets and learned how to behave with courtesy and dance with elegance, and if they didn't they weren't welcomed back. Tangoandchaos has a bit of the history, the story of El Chino and his friend Alberto Dassieu and their tutelage under Luis Lemos, the patron of tango in the Villa Urquiza barrio.

There's a variety of dance styles in these videos too. There's a marvellous clip of Carlitos Anzuate, a kind of dance I suspect goes back to the 1930s in which it is the man who has all the 'decoraciones' and the lady follows him around in a kind of minimal tango. It reminds me a bit of Osvaldo and Coca. (A number of these clips share the same opening sequence of social dance before the 'solo' sequences.) Then there's another couple in the archive who dance a tango that seems much closer to canyegue.

It's José Luis Ferraro's chanel, and about half the clips are of him. This is where I find it a bit less edifying, as I don't find triple voleos and high kicks that impressive. Just my opinion, but I believe it's far harder and much more impressive to dance like El Chino than to dance like Ferraro...