'Tango is more than music. It is the window to collected memories...'

– attributed to Homero Expósito, author and poet, a few years younger than Troilo, with whom he wrote tangos. The quote seemed to follow on from the previous post. Their memories and our memories, different, but all our memories are present in our dance, where we share unspoken memories, become aware, wordlessly, of the memories of our partners. Listen to the memories of your partner as you dance.

YouTube led me to this video. 

  

It's another of those channels of music, and there are five clips from this session. I love watching these two! Never heard of either of them, but there's a wonderful synergy. Basic tango, a voice and a guitar, song and music without the complexity of orchestration, perhaps not so easy to dance to, but then you might anyway prefer to sit and listen – and watch. & it's like watching a dance, it doesn't feel like a carefully rehearsed performance. Beatriz Carró is wonderful, sings with real spirit, and seems to sing very freely: the guitar is a skillful accompanist, following, filling in, adding where necessary. The words and the chords may be fixed but the interpretation is improvised; as it happens the lead is a woman singing, and the follow is a guy with a guitar. Vida Mia is another very familiar tango. It's great to notice these were recorded just three weeks ago. This is contemporary music!

(PS. I think you only get this kind of relaxed freedom with a few performers. If you have a whole orquesta there has to be a director laying down the beat. Here the guitar effortlessly follows the beat of the singer's phrasing.)

The channel is El Pardo Tango, and the guitar is El Pardo Vieyra, so I presume it's his own channel.

I was particularly drawn to Pedacito de Cielo as it's such a well-known vals, one we've all danced to many times, and it occurred to me that I didn't know anything about the words, so I looked it up and found the original with a rough translation alongside. It's not a perfect translation, but it gives an idea of the sense. I've tweaked it a bit in an effort to make it more readable. & thanks to D for clarifying 'ojeros': I've left it as 'dark eyes' since 'dark circles under the eyes' doesn't really fit.

The lyrics of Pedacito de cielo ('A Little bit of Heaven') by Homero Expósito in the original Spanish and in rough English translation by Albert Combrink 

La casa tenía una reja – The house had a fence 
pintada con quejas y cantos de amor – painted with complaints and love songs. 
La noche llenaba de ojeras  - The night filled with dark eyes
la reja, la hiedra  y el viejo balcón – the fence, ivy and the old balcony 
Recuerdo que entonces reías  - I remember then laughed 
si yo te leía  mi verso mejor  - if I read you my best verse 
y ahora, capricho del tiempo, leyendo esos versos – and now, the whim of time, reading these verses 
lloramos los dos!  - Cried the two!

Los años de la infancia pasaron, pasaron –  The years of childhood passed, passed
La reja está dormida de tanto silencio  - The gate is asleep so quiet
y en aquel pedacito de cielo se quedó tu alegría y mi amor - and in that little piece of heaven rested your joy and my love.

Los años han pasado – The years have passed 
terribles, malvados, dejando esa esperanza que no ha de llegar – terrible, wicked, leaving that hope that hasn't arrived 
y recuerdo tu gesto travieso – and remember your mischievous gesture
después de aquel beso robado al azar - after that kiss, randomly stolen.

Tal vez se enfrió con la brisa – Maybe the breeze cooled 
tu cálida risa, tu límpida voz – your warm laughter, your clear voice
Tal vez escapó a tus ojeras – Perhaps it escaped your dark eyes
la reja, la hiedra, y el viejo balcón - the fence, ivy and the old balcony
Tus ojos de azúcar quemada – Your eyes, burnt sugar,
tenían distancias doradas al sol held distances gilded by the sun
Y hoy quieres hallar como entonces – And now you want to find like then 
la reja de bronce – the bronze gate 
temblando de amor! trembling with love.

Todotango gives 1942 as the date of Pedacito de Cielo. 

One thing leads to another... So I came across this. Same guitarist, with bandoneon this time, no singer, another well-known classic. 



& there's much more where that came from. Check it out.

More from another world

I've been writing some notes for a friend who's visiting Buenos Aires soon. I've done this a few times and I always want to add, email and ask to be included in a tour of ESMA. It seems a cruel suggestion to someone going to enjoy a few weeks in tango paradise. & yet...

The Escuela de Mecánica de la Armada, the naval engineering school, or rather the large mansion that was the officers' quarters, was one of the most notorious of the places where detainees were taken during the 1970s into the 80s. Not that there's anything at all frightening to see there: parts of it were even rebuilt so that it wouldn't agree with any accounts of the few survivors. The ESMA campus has now been taken over as a 'Space of Remembering' and they arrange tours which recount what is known about what happened there.

I remember clearly the morning I visited. It was cold and overcast, and I was tired: I'd been late at a milonga the previous night. It was a cold morning, but I came away feeling colder than I've ever felt in my life. It's my impression that we can accept the coldness of the weather but it's nothing compared to a cold human heart, which chills you mind and body, the numbing cold-heartedness of people who can decide that other people are not worthy of being treated as humans and can be played with, tortured, almost as a game. It seems that there was hardly even the excuse that they were trying to get information. The prisoners were kept in the loft in the roof of the officer's quarters, and dragged down into the basement every now and again. Then a van would come by, on Tuesday mornings if I remember right, to take the living remains of humans for a flight out over the ocean. To be close to this, close geographically but mercifully not close in time, can only make you feel colder than you've ever felt.

All of which suddenly helps to make real sense of the embrace of tango in Buenos Aires. Maybe the embrace is as it was in the golden age, but we shouldn't ignore what has happened since. Sure there's nostalgia for the golden age, and quite right too, but I don't think one can ignore a decade or more when it was risky for young people, young men in particular, men who are now in their 50s and 60s to be out in the streets, and when everyone lived through a time when it was known that people were 'disappearing', when the authorities weren't protecting but often persecuting the people, when the 5am knock on the door was always possible, and when the country was very isolated. There's one sure way of feeling warm again and that's holding someone else very, very close. It makes sense that tango became popular once democracy of some kind was restored.

So don't take the embrace lightly, it really matters. Sure, tango is fun, but if you dance there and are taken aback by the immediacy and warmth of the embrace, it's serious too; think of the background. Visit ESMA if you're there, support the Space of Remembering: if we ignore history we don't like it can creep back and take hold of us again.

It's taken me a while to make this connection, and I hope it's not fanciful, but I can't help thinking that what happened then is part of tango there now.

Report from another world

I Skype a friend visiting Buenos Aires: she's been to classes with Alicia Pons. Was it about hyperactive ankles? I joke (badly). 'No, she talked about how we must relax into the embrace of our partner'.

In a flash it occurs to me that this must be the elusive difference between the embrace of partners I've danced with in Buenos Aires, and the embrace of many dancers elsewhere, that ability for total relaxation. Really total. Not as in 'relax because we're dancing tango and that's how it should be danced', but a complete relaxation into the other. Perhaps it's the secret of the fabled 'milonguero embrace', person to person, so complete that even the awareness of dancing tango doesn't come between. It's not necessarily a matter of whether you hold your arm higher or lower, whether your weight is further forwards or back, or whether your posture is more or less upright, although these might be helpful. It's personal.

I've really felt a different embrace there, and I'm sure it must be in the quality of that relaxation, completely giving yourself to the other without hesitation or fear. Surely that's tango, not double backwards 'estilo milonguero' ochos with saccadas thrown in, or whatever the dance teachers offer. Tango is personal contact, really personal: it's as if the dance is there to enable that personal contact, not to disrupt it. & the embrace, like the dance, has no absolutely specific codified form: it's just whatever works to get two people very close so they can move together with the music. I remember what an old tanguera says in the film Tango, Nuestro Baile: tango is when you feel your partner's heartbeat.

But we know what a warm embrace is, to give yourself to someone else, even if it is just for a tanda. Tango says you can enjoy this. Perhaps not a passionate embrace, but an embrace without warmth, without any commitment (however temporary) just isn't tango. Well, this is a personal view, it's not the kind of tango I'd enjoy dancing.

(I've just noticed Patricia of Tango Adelaide wrote on this recently, and links to a lovely video of one of her – and my – favourite milongas, Lujos at the new Plaza Bohemia on Alsina. Good to see the floor busy, to see familiar faces, and to watch again that beautiful dance, surging effortlessly with the music... under good lighting too!) 

Dancing in the light

Interesting that the two best London milongas I've been to recently are in the afternoons, which are light at this time of year. Best in terms of general dance quality, general courtesy, and the pleasure of feeling comfortable in fairly crowded rooms.

Another pleasure of these afternoon milongas is that strangers seem to chat with each other much more readily towards the end. I guess that's partly the time of day: by midnight most of us might have other priorities, but at 6pm after a lot of pleasant dances the mind opens out to other people.

So it was that I started chatting with someone I know only by sight. 'Such good dancing!' I said. 'Yes', he replied, 'it was light!' 'It does make a difference, doesn't it?' 'I've seen it myself' he replied. 'People are dancing well, and then the lights get turned down and it all falls apart. I've seen it happen!' & I agree: in fact it's something I've written about from time to time. In the worst milongas the lighting is dramatic, deep shadows, bright patches. It's much more of an effort to stay aware of the couples around you. But worse, as we agreed, there seems to be a loss of inhibitions when the light levels go down. People can't see so clearly, and become more careless. Perhaps they know they are less conspicuous. & we tend to think of dance as abandoning inhibition, letting it all hang out, but dance has to be highly controlled, physically. The formality of the Buenos Aires milongas helps maintain awareness of that control.

Of course there are other considerations. People are less likely to drink when they dance at 3pm: it's more normal to have a glass or two at 10pm. Perhaps the time of day rather than the light level is responsible. But it's true that we are all more alert when the light is good: moreover, bluish light is said to make us more alert, and reddish light to reduce alertness. Perhaps we need tango umpires with light meters! 'Bad light stopped dance.'

Joking aside, I really think it's worth looking at the possibility that upping light levels in milongas can improve the general level of dance. As far as I'm aware shady lighting is a disco/club heritage, and historically it's never been associated with any partner dance. True, some of the Buenos Aires milongas have reduced light levels, but by and large the organisers seem to accept the lighting already there in the halls they use for milongas, with no attempt to make it sexy or dim.

'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.

Flamenco and tango

'Try to be good friends with the earth and with the sky. Feel the floor. Lift the arms very slowly, but only feeling the feet and the floor. With the whole body feel the floor.'

'When you do only one strong beat with the hand or with the feet, but just at the right moment – and there's only one right moment, you know it? – and with your whole being behind (if not, it's not enough) it can be like, like a beam of light to other people. That's true; I know it.'

'If you are healthy you can dance until you die. In flamenco we only dance because it is necessary, not because the curtain is there...'

In one of his wide-ranging monologues Pedro Sanchez said there's a flamenco influence in tango, and since then I've wanted to sit down with him to watch flamenco and find out where he saw this influence. I was reminded of this when I watched Flamenco at 5:15, an Oscar-winning short about a flamenco class taught to students at the National Ballet School of Canada. The (Spanish) teachers speak English. (It's on Openculture, along with 549 other films that are free to watch.)

The three quotes are from the teachers, and they reminded me of things tango dancers have said, or things I've watched. Tete talking about the importance of the floor, of being grounded, Cacho Dante making one precise, clear step at the end of a tango, Ricardo Vidort insisting on the urgency of dancing. If you don't dance because you must, don't dance.

It's interesting watching trained ballet students, their whole discipline based around being aerial, trying to get to grips with flamenco, which is resolutely earth-based, however much the arms reach up. I watched the Bolshoi a few weeks back: not only are their leaps phenomenal, it's the way they land, softly, as if they are as light as a feather.

They did well, the students; quickly mastering the rhythms and movements, but in the end flamenco looked like a style of dance, without the personal urgency you see in great flamenco. The old woman who taught them could create real shock just by moving. & when they danced, their eyes looked out, as if looking for applause, for reassurance. In the best flamenco I've seen the eyes are lost, inward-looking. But they are young, still very young.

Rubén Harymbat

Regarding Rubén Harymbat, Jantango kindly sent me a link to her video of him last November in Lo de Celia: it's on this page of Tango Chamuyo. Jantango comments: 'See Rubén dancing at a milonga. Milongueros dance best with others on the dance floor.'

It seems to be the only YouTube clip of Rubén actually in a milonga, and it's a whole Canaro tanda, so I wanted make a new post rather than leaving it buried in the comments. It's well worth checking out. Demonstrations might give a better view of what the dancers actually do, but clips of dance in Buenos Aires milongas give us a much better sense of the feel of social tango, which is after all what matters. It's easy to understand the reluctance of dancers to be filmed in the social dance, but clips like this are really the best way to appreciate what tango is – apart from actually going there and watching. There's nothing complicated, it's simple stuff but it's done with absolute attention, and it looks great. It's also a pleasure to watch a floor that's not too crowded, and is orderly and calm.

The sensuality of the dance comes across strongly in this clip. Partly the music, of course: early Canaro often suggests a slow, sensual dance.

Wildly off the point, perhaps, but after watching this I went downstairs, where Radio 3 was on. More Wagner: it's a centenary. Not music I like, and there was a laboured interval discussion about the painful conflicts between earthly and spiritual love. Perhaps if Wagner was really such a genius at words, song and movement he would have invented tango, and saved himself a lifetime of self-inflicted agony! It seemed to me that the sensuality of tango is somewhere between the sublime and the earthy: it's not an either/or, it's both! A middle way.

Tibetan teachers told me that there's nothing wrong in enjoyment: it's grasping that creates suffering. So following their advice I continue to enjoy tango, and try not to be too attached (it's tough). Leave the conflicts of earthly and spiritual love to the imagination of others!

Nobleza de Arrabal

Something wasn't working, and it puzzled me for days. Perhaps a clue was that I'd danced with a partner I don't meet with that often, but when I do, every time, I feel her heart beat distinctly. On this occasion not only did I not feel that magic heartbeat, I realised later that I hadn't even noticed its absence while we were dancing. Something definitely wasn't working. Well, it's been hot and humid and the music was excellent, and sometimes it's just not a good idea to be on the floor nearly every tanda. After all, one simply can't be a tango machine. Tango requires a certain discipline, awareness.

Then, digging deep into chingolito2008's clips on YouTube (there's quite an archive there) I came across this from June 2008.  

It affected me in a number of ways. First, it's a fabulous piece of music by the Di Sarli orquesta. & one of Di Sarli's daughters is present, which is why Rubén Harymbat abandons his partner at the end and dashes off to kiss her. Di Sarli's last performance was in 1959 so Rubén is of an age to have heard and danced to Di Sarli live. 

Then the dance: sometimes an intense emotional charge comes through these videos, and this is certainly one, brief as it is. As if Rubén's dance is a celebration of the past and also an acknowledgement of the loss of a great musician. & Rubén's partner is Adela Galeazzi: sometimes I watch clips of her and think she's too ornamental, just because she's so good she can do it all, but here she's so much part of the dance it seems just right.

& the place! That familiar floor! The old Plaza Bohemia on Maipu: not that I was ever there that often, but it feels like as close to tango heaven as I've ever been lucky to get. Strange to see it so empty: I can only wish my first visit had been a few months earlier.

Sadly I don't recall ever watching Rubén in the milongas, and jantango's note on him partly explains that: however, her photo of him shows a face that is familiar. He was teaching until a year or so ago: I think he made several tours of the US and there are videos on YouTube of class demonstrations. I'd love to read accounts of his teaching. Jantango's post has a link to a class demonstration: tangueros of his generation could dance with style and elegance, even in trainers.

But another reason this was a revelation was that it reminded me of something dancers I've had classes with in Buenos Aires tried to knock into me: the leg that steps should be straight. I watch Rubén and see how the stepping leg is almost always straight. The other leg flexes to push the torso, but the leg that steps comes down straight and emphatic. I've found this hard to adjust to: there are so many other things to get right, in addition to actually enjoying dancing. But it's something both Myriam Pincen and Cacho Dante insisted on very seriously. Myriam would glance into the mirror and stop me if my stepping leg was bent: it was a stop-start class. 

I think I needed to be reminded that if the stepping leg is bent, the posture is weak and the connection poor. A straight leg and an upright body, and an upright body makes good connection in the region of the solar plexus. & the width of two fingers above the solar plexus is the point at which you press if you want to get someone's heart to restart.

(That sounds good, but as first aiders know CPR is unlikely to restart the heart: it keeps the blood circulating temporarily. However, the area just above the solar plexus is very close to the heart.)