5770 Misc:Missing Magic
Date: Sun, 4 Oct 2009 19:21:56 -0300
From: robin tara <robinctara@gmail.com>
Subject: [Tango-L] Misc:Missing Magic
To: Tango-L <tango-l@mit.edu>
<9e1cc4860910041521t1e72bfddu46fec6bf8936de8@mail.gmail.com>
You know, I danced in the milongas of Buenos Aires, New York, Montreal, San
Francisco, Boston and London beginning 1993.
I missed Berlin, the other hotbed of tango at the time - big mistake, I'm
afraid.
There was a magic then that has been missing for me in today's milongas.
Things began to change drastically in the milongas of Buenos Aires around
the time of the crash. (2001/2002)
All of a sudden the regulars began staying away from the salons. They just
couldn't justify spending 5 pesos on something as frivolous as the milonga.
They needed to eat. The milongas began to suffer from lower attendance and
raised prices. The Cro Magnon disaster closed dance venues all over the
inner city. On the other hand, it became much cheaper for tourists to visit
Buenos Aires. So in about 2 years time, the balance of tourists to locals in
the dance halls reversed completely.
The milongas feel so different to me these days. Sitting in a Buenos Aires
milonga on a Friday night, I see the group from Japan at one of the primo
back tables - they don't dance tango yet, but they're ordering dinner! From
there to the right sit a table of local (mostly) women, a group of men who
really have been in the milongs for years, but rarely get up to dance. The
there are the group from some European capital, a bunch of older folks from
the midwest, a table of local guys who don't dance very well, a group of
local women who don't dance very well. Lurking around the edges, men who
can't catch anybody's eye and have decided to prey on the unsuspecting and
longing to dance, middle aged women from the US. It just lacks some sort of
mystery.
Is it all because I see it more clearly now? Was it always this way and I
was too enraptured to notice? No, I'm sure it was more full of the promise
of adventure back then.
Oh, I'm just rambling
Interested in what others think
--
Robin Tara
https://www.taratangoshoes.com
https://www.tangotique.com
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 2009 15:28:51 -0300
From: Shahrukh Merchant <shahrukh@shahrukhmerchant.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Misc:Missing Magic
To: tango-l@mit.edu
About a week ago, Robin Tara wrote:
> You know, I danced in the milongas of Buenos Aires, New York, Montreal, San
> Francisco, Boston and London beginning 1993.
> ...
> There was a magic then that has been missing for me in today's milongas.
> ...
> Things began to change drastically in the milongas of Buenos Aires around
> the time of the crash. (2001/2002)
I was actually expecting more responses to this email, well more than
zero anyway. But I did want to respond myself since I identified a lot
with what Robin says.
> So in about 2 years time, the balance of tourists to locals in
> the dance halls reversed completely.
This has no doubt change the dynamics significantly--the observers, by
their presence and especially their vast numbers, have changed what it
is that they have come to observe. Whether this is a good thing or a bad
thing is besides the point (well, a different discussion, anyway), but
it certainly has changed things.
> The milongas feel so different to me these days.
...
> a group of men who
> really have been in the milongs for years, but rarely get up to dance. The
> there are the group from some European capital, a bunch of older folks from
> the midwest, a table of local guys who don't dance very well, a group of
> local women who don't dance very well. Lurking around the edges, men who
> can't catch anybody's eye and have decided to prey on the unsuspecting and
> longing to dance, middle aged women from the US. It just lacks some sort of
> mystery.
And depending on which milonga you go to, some of what you describe may
not apply, or may apply with different demographics, but you're right
that there was some sort of *something* that is now missing.
> Is it all because I see it more clearly now? Was it always this way and I
> was too enraptured to notice? No, I'm sure it was more full of the promise
> of adventure back then.
Ah, this is the question isn't it? "Did the world really change around
me, or did my perception of the world change?" I drafted a similar
article for Tango-L some months ago, let it sit on my desktop for
several days while I tinkered with it, trying to convey satisfactorily
what I wanted to say, but was never entirely satisfied with it, and so
deleted it. But my conclusion was essentially the same: No, the change
is real.
> Oh, I'm just rambling
I'm glad you posted this article even though you seemed to have had a
similar problem managing to express the feeling to your satisfaction.
I'm guessing that, at this point, the majority of list members were not
dancing in Buenos Aires at regular milongas (i.e., not counting just
visiting for festivals) on a semi-regular basis pre-2001. But there is
probably a significant minority who were. What's your feeling about this
change? Do you dance less often in Buenos Aires for reasons you
attribute to this change?
Shahrukh
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 2009 12:04:50 -0700 (PDT)
From: NANCY <ningle_2000@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Misc:Missing Magic
To: tango-l@MIT.EDU, Shahrukh Merchant <shahrukh@shahrukhmerchant.com>
--- On Mon, 10/12/09, Shahrukh Merchant <shahrukh@shahrukhmerchant.com> wrote:
I'm guessing that, at this point, the majority of list members were not
dancing in Buenos Aires at regular milongas (i.e., not counting just
visiting for festivals) on a semi-regular basis pre-2001. But there is
probably a significant minority who were. What's your feeling about this
change? Do you dance less often in Buenos Aires for reasons you
attribute to this change?
Without a doubt. ?I too, have had problems trying to communicate the feeling, but I have come up with this: ?The thrill is gone. ?Gone are the days of discovering and being discovered by excellent dancers; from having spirited discussions with the local women about the dancers we are watching; ?of going out to dinner with a group of enthusiasts both local and visiting; of being asked to go to a specific milonga later in the week to continue dancing with a leader I have just met. ?Now, I am older, wider and not so spritely as I was back in 1996 when I first went to BsAs and so I attribute part of the malaise to that. ?But I also sense that I am no longer looked upon as a dance partner but rather as a source of funds - either for lessons, taxi accompaniment, shoe sales, or a visa to the US. ?Things have gotten much more commercial and less social. ?New visiting faces are getting lots of attention even if they are terrible dancers. And...my old
friends are dying out, unable to fund a daily trip to the milongas, or just too creaky to dance well.
I get more excellent dances at a festival than I do in BsAs. ?Will I continue to make an annual trip? ?Probably. ?But I will limit my dancing to 3-4 days a week, mostly afternoon milongas. ?I will visit with friends, enjoy the restaurants, the theaters, and the vibe of a big city. ?I am unlikely to buy any more tango shoes as the quality has plummeted even with my favorite brand and I am unwilling to continue to pay the special gringo price after purchasing 12 pairs of those shoes.?
Should you go to BsAs if you are a tango dancer? ?Definitely. ?It will be new and wonderful and thrilling to you and you will feel the flavor of tango everywhere you go if you open your heart to it. ?Some night a cab driver will sing tangos to you all the way home and it will be beautiful. ?Some day you will chat up a woman in the grocery store who will tell you about her father, a famous violinist, who invited all the tango greats to his home for Sunday dinners. ?And you will see folks like Milena Plebs dancing on a concrete basketball court in a very blue collar part of the city. ?But when some of us old-timers tell you, "You should have been here before....", you will regret you did not come earlier. ?
NancyAnnual visitor for 13 years
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 2009 15:41:27 -0400
From: macfroggy@aol.com
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Misc:Missing Magic
To: tango-l@mit.edu
"Did the world really change around
me, or did my perception of the world change?"
That's the crux of the question, isn't it?
Please tell me what in this world has not changed since 1993?
Whether it's the same as it was "then" or not isn't relevant, especially to people who came to tango much later.
What is important still is that Buenos Aires offers a depth, an understanding, an immersion in tango that doesn't exist anywhere else. Like Nancy said, where a taxi driver will sing you his favorite tango at 2 a.m.
Take me, for example: last week on an excursion with tango tour clients to La Boca, where I've been a million times, the truth of living in a "conventillo" finally hit me--I could really see clearly what it meant to sing about the hard and crowded life there, a popular tango theme. There is always something to discover new here about tango.
Sure, it's not as it was in 1997 on my first trip here, when foreign dancers were a novelty. Maybe middle-aged foreign women are a dime-a-dozen today, and we are less "special" than we once were and are treated more like we are "back home." After dancing tango for a decade or more, "we" are also different. This nostalgia for what used to be, that life, people, things, milongas aren't what they once were, is very tango!
But Buenos Aires will always be the Mecca of Tango.
And every serious dancer will make the pilgrimage one day.
It's worth it.
https://tangocherie.blogspot.com
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 2009 15:55:38 -0400 (EDT)
From: "Keith Elshaw" <keith@totango.net>
Subject: [Tango-L] Missing Magic
To: Tango-l@mit.edu
Over the last few years, I have been ruminating on these same thoughts and
perceptions.
Periodically, my concern has been quieted when I've had a conversation
about it with dancers in other places ... and they say they having been
feeling the same things.
Whew! It ain't just me.
I like it that everyone seems to be keenly aware of what part the
subjective might play in the perception. Thinking that through must surely
be important.
This thought came up recently:
It's been about 4 years that this kind-of malaise has been around.
That's a cycle.
We can be through it, perhaps. A new cycle might be rendering itself right
now.
I can believe that from what I sense/intuit.
Well, good to have hope after what has been a dark period. For people like
us.
It's also good to know there is a multitude of people who are new to it
and don't know what we have been suffering.
Their time might come in 4 years!
;-)
Quality - not quantity!
k
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 2009 06:16:09 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Trini y Sean (PATangoS)" <patangos@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Missing Magic
--- On Mon, 10/12/09, Keith Elshaw <keith@totango.net> wrote:
>
> This thought came up recently:
>
> It's been about 4 years that this kind-of malaise has been
> around.
>
> That's a cycle.
Was that the time of the nightclub fire? I've heard it said that that event really changed the milongas. When the clubs were closed, people found other things to do and some didn't go back to the milongas. When people went back they may have changed where they went. No doubt the success of CITA and the World Championships would have brought in more foreigners and changed the mix, as well.
When Daniel Trenner taught here, he surprised us with some of his take on dancing there thirty years ago. Like the women holding up the man in the embrace. Women doing ochos pretty much automatically once they got started and not stopping until they were asked to do something else. I could see that happening in an environment where people were trying to be social with each other as opposed to being "correct".
Trini de Pittsburgh
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 2009 14:50:31 -0300
From: robin tara <robinctara@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Missing Magic
To: "Trini y Sean (PATangoS)" <patangos@yahoo.com>
Cc: Tango-L <tango-l@mit.edu>
<9e1cc4860910131050n780b7273k217fb1a73c028f51@mail.gmail.com>
Thanks Cherie, Nancy, Shahrukh, Keith, Nina and others who wrote off list
with comments on this thread.
You've all been around this scene for a long time and have experienced,
more or less what I was getting at.
I want to apologize to anyone for whom my posting seemed like an admonition
to forego the tango experience in Buenos Aires. Or to imply that going to
BA these days won't thrill you at all. Both Cherie and Nancy described the
kind of magical experiences that still exist there.
As is always the case, we bring ourselves and all our foibles and experience
to the milonga with us. Many have written about this much better than I can,
so I admit that much of my dismay at the milongas these days is of my own
making. The other is that we have lost many of the "tipos" that made the
milongas fun. Think of Pupi, Omar and Gavito, to name a few. Not to mention
the old milongueros who are leaving the dance floors because of illness,
poverty or death.
Hope you'll all understand that it makes me sad, that;s all.
On Mon, Oct 12, 2009 at 4:41 PM, <macfroggy@aol.com> wrote:
>
>
> "Did the world really change around
> me, or did my perception of the world change?"
>
>
>
> Sure, it's not as it was in 1997 on my first trip here, when foreign
> dancers were a novelty. Maybe middle-aged foreign women are a dime-a-dozen
> today, and we are less "special" than we once were and are treated more like
> we are "back home." After dancing tango for a decade or more, "we" are also
> different. This nostalgia for what used to be, that life, people, things,
> milongas aren't what they once were, is very tango!
>
> But Buenos Aires will always be the Mecca of Tango.
> And every serious dancer will make the pilgrimage one day.
> It's worth it.
>
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 2009 11:13:25 -0700 (PDT)
From: Alberto Gesualdi <clambat2001@yahoo.com.ar>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Missing Magic
To: tango-l@mit.edu
We live in the present .
Our ego clings to the past and our mind tries to hide into the future because it does not like a present continuous as it happens to be.
If we can dance at the dancing floor, ?and leave the mind at the wardrobe , there is no missing magic.
Our mind makes stickers of everything we thnk of , what we are, what we wear , what we look like, how we dance, how we were , how we used to look like.
We need to see the mind as? ourself a ?witness within a process of thought , ?and then the mind will atone (with some complaining , yes , but will atone). And we dance , here and now.
alberto
________________________________
De: robin tara <robinctara@gmail.com>
Para: Trini y Sean (PATangoS) <patangos@yahoo.com>
CC: Tango-L <tango-l@mit.edu>
Enviado: mar, octubre 13, 2009 2:50:31 PM
Asunto: Re: [Tango-L] Missing Magic
Thanks Cherie, Nancy, Shahrukh, Keith, Nina and others who wrote off list
with comments on this thread.
You've all been around this scene for a long? time and have experienced,
more or less what I was getting at.
I want to apologize to anyone for whom my posting seemed like an admonition
to forego the tango? experience in Buenos Aires.? Or to imply that going to
BA these days won't thrill you at all. Both Cherie and Nancy described the
kind of magical experiences that still exist there.
As is always the case, we bring ourselves and all our foibles and experience
to the milonga with us. Many have written about this much better than I can,
so I admit that much of my dismay at the milongas these days is of my own
making.. The other is that we have lost many of the "tipos" that made the
milongas fun. Think of Pupi, Omar and Gavito, to name a few. Not to mention
the old milongueros who are leaving the dance floors because of illness,
poverty or death.
Hope you'll all understand that it makes me sad, that;s all.
On Mon, Oct 12, 2009 at 4:41 PM, <macfroggy@aol.com> wrote:
>
>
> "Did the world really change around
> me, or did my perception of the world change?"
>
>
>
> Sure, it's not as it was in 1997 on my first trip here, when foreign
> dancers were a novelty. Maybe middle-aged foreign women are a dime-a-dozen
> today, and we are less "special" than we once were and are treated more like
> we are "back home." After dancing tango for a decade or more, "we" are also
> different. This nostalgia for what used to be, that life, people, things,
> milongas aren't what they once were, is very tango!
>
> But Buenos Aires will always be the Mecca of Tango.
> And every serious dancer will make the pilgrimage one day.
> It's worth it.
>
Yahoo! Cocina
Encontra las mejores recetas con Yahoo! Cocina.
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 2009 14:06:49 -0300
From: Shahrukh Merchant <shahrukh@shahrukhmerchant.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Missing Magic
To: tango-l@mit.edu
macfroggy@aol.com says:
> This nostalgia for what used to be, that life, people, things, milongas aren't what they once were, is very tango!
Alberto Gesualdi <clambat2001@yahoo.com.ar> kindly provided the lyrics:
> We live in the present .
> Our ego clings to the past and our mind tries to hide into the future because it does not like a present continuous as it happens to be.
> ...
> ?and then the mind will atone (with some complaining , yes , but will atone). And we dance , here and now.
Now all that's missing is the music ... :-)
Some other comments:
"Trini y Sean (PATangoS)" <patangos@yahoo.com> wonder:
> Was that the time of the nightclub fire? I've heard it said that that event really changed the milongas. When the clubs were closed, people found other things to do and some didn't go back to the milongas. When people went back they may have changed where they went.
No, that was much later, December 2004 (the sentencing for those deemed
responsible just took place a few weeks ago, almost 5 years later). And
I wouldn't say that that really changed the milongas anyway. For a
period of several months, yes, while all dance venues were closed and
only slowly being allowed to open. And a few never came back, or came
back in different locations, etc. Some like "Lo de Celia" took longer to
come back. But ultimately, it did not really change the nature of the
Milongas as a whole.
robin tara <robinctara@gmail.com> (who started the thread) adds:
> I want to apologize to anyone for whom my posting seemed like an admonition
> to forego the tango experience in Buenos Aires. Or to imply that going to
> BA these days won't thrill you at all.
No, your posting didn't come across that way at all, but yes, it
probably bears reinforcing that Buenos Aires is still the only city that
lives and breathes tango, but you have to know where to find it (though
you will likely run into it accidentally anyway).
The change is that the milongas are decreasingly the places to find the
"original" Tango (but many are still special places nonetheless). In
fact I would suggest that you come sooner rather than later, because the
flat-world phenomenon is increasingly flattening the Tango as well (by
that I mean that, for better or worse, it is being increasingly
internationalized).
Art and commerce (of art) have always had an uneasy symbiosis, and Tango
is not immune to this. What the recent internationalization phenomenon
has done is upset that balance. International interest and money feeds
the commerce *but does not have the same stake in the culture*, having
"discovered" it a decade or two ago at most (I'm talking about
discovered it in its current form, not about the Belle Epoque era export
-to-Paris discovery), without even the strength of a sense of identity
behind it. Contrast that to a century plus of local Tango culture in
Buenos Aires (ok, Rio de la Plata region), where the culture is
furthermore intertwined with a strong sense of identity that is part of
a subconscious national identity. Which do you think is more likely to
care about preserving traditions?
The "art" part of the symbiosis got confronted with a huge uphill battle
(and it's not clear whether the UNESCO declaration has helped or hurt
art's side of the battle--my take is that bureaucracies and art don't
mix ... but let's see). Whether it's up to the task remains to be seen.
Tango survived suppression during the dictadura ... but perhaps it has
an insidiously stronger challenge now: insidious because it is not
suppressing it, but chipping away at it.
Ultimately, it's all Darwinism at it's finest, but that doesn't mean one
shouldn't reflect on the some beautiful now-lost species, and lament
that one now has to visit a zoo to see what was once out in the
wilderness for those willing to seek it out. And sure, write a Tango
about it ...
Shahrukh
Date: Sun, 18 Oct 2009 11:57:41 +1000
From: Tango22 <tango22@gmail.com>
Subject: [Tango-L] Missing Magic
To: tango-l@mit.edu
