2844  Jay Jenkins's Milonga

Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 21:56:27 -0700
From: Lima <amilsolrac@YAHOO.COM>
Subject: Jay Jenkins's Milonga

(One of the meanings of milonga outside Arg, if not inside, is tall tale.)

Jay Jenkins, why can't you just give your opinion, attack mine, and leave the
ad hominem stuff out?

SOME of your impressions may be right, but they actually do not always
conflict with mine. I talk about the milonga danced in the BAs area in the
1870's as derived from rural folklore, and having European (rather than, say,
Asian roots). It is indeed the case, it seems, that the milonga originated in
the countryside; but eventually it came to the arrabales, the suburban area,
if not BAs proper, and became an "urban" genre. I would very much like to
know what is the profound difference that you find between this and your "the
milonga was created in rural areas". Either your statement repeats a part of
mine, or one of us uses non standard thinking patterns. Maybe it is I, but I
very much doubt it. I make my living being logical.

The urban milonga is what I was referring to in my posting, though it does
not really matter a lot which. Since this period is a fuzzy one, and my goal
was to discuss only the probable sequence of the meanings of milonga and
milonguero, not write the history of the milonga (a much, much, taller order
than to understand where the old guard tango came from, that is pretty easy
comparatively), I clearly left the dating up in the air (1870's, possibly
earlier) which also allows for the possibility that the milonga was
christened earlier, and not necessarily in or near BAs.

My only theory, really, is that milonga (the word) was a dance party [much]
before it was a folklore / dance genre. And even though this is quite
probable, I cannot prove it, and I called my own "theory" merely plausible
speculation.

On the other hand you are an owner of the truth, who can make bald statements
of mere possibility into certainties. It is your approach, not mine, that
causes the spread of myths, which is certainly a curse in tango circles.

But I will play your game. OK, I wrote a skeleton piece, entirely from
memory, the main purpose of which was to provide a framework of support to
the probable sequence of meanings for the word milonga. A way of thinking
about the issue. To suggest that there are reasonable ways to look into the
matter, and that chronology is essential. It can be criticised, improved,
abandoned and replaced by a better one. It may prove useful or not useful. It
would be a major project to try to research each part of it from primary
sources, so I just used decades of reading (mostly nonsense) about tango,
during which I came to some tentative conclusions, and offered my tract
humbly as "speculations".

Actually I know precious little about the original milonga genres, and I am
sure you know precious little yourself (like, have you heard them, have you
seen scores, etc.? I doubt it). So I wrote almost nothing, since it was not
really the subject. But not you. You are a great scholar. So now, take every
statement you made in your last posting and give me and all others an
exhaustive account of the primary sources you used, or came to know about
through well documented secondary sources, in order to arrive to your
brilliant, irrefutable, conclusions. Take your time, but, please, not years,
because by then I will have forgotten your crap about my going home and
study.

Now it's your turn. You have already been home and studied, you just have to
tell us where you got the stuff. No unsupported secondary sources please,
they are mostly crap, and ABOVE ALL no random "web sites", PLEASE. I will
allow todotango sometimes.

Cheers,