There is a general consensus among scholars that tango originated first as a dance style and later as a musical genre. It was the tango dance that gradually led to a progressive musical transformation from the mid-19th century, culminating in the creation of tango as a musical genre in the last decade of the 19th century.
Tango as a dance began to emerge in the mid-19th century in the outskirts or “arrabales” of cities like Buenos Aires and Montevideo, in other words, the marginal areas inhabited by the working class. In these outskirts, within the Afro-Rio de la Plata communities in the final stages of liberation from slavery, places of dance and popular entertainment, known as “academias”, “milongas”, “piringundines” or “canguelas” were established, where tango would be invented. The main actors were the Afro-Rio de la Plata communities themselves, with social types called “negros,” “negras,” “pardos,” and “pardas,” as well as the rural populations of mixed race in the process of migrating to the cities, called “chinas” and “compadritos,” the latter being a prominent figure in the origin of the tango as a dance. Additionally, these academias and milongas also saw an increasing presence of immigrants from various European and Middle Eastern countries, mostly Italians.
José Gobello explains that after the fall of Juan Manuel de Rosas in 1852 in Buenos Aires, Afro-Porteño communities could no longer parade with their candombes in the streets and were forced to perform in closed venues. It was under these conditions that the dance transformed, blending the characteristic steps and breaks of candombe with the coupled dance of waltz and mazurka. The waltz had become fashionable in Europe with the novelty of couples dancing in close embrace in the early decades of the 19th century, sparking strong criticism from conservative sectors for its supposed indecency and immorality, especially in England. The mazurka, also danced in close embrace, was the popular dance of the 1850s. The fusion of styles gave rise to waltzes and mazurkas danced with breaks and steps, laying the choreographic foundations of tango: closely embraced couple, walking, break or step. These characteristics were already defined in the 1860s. In Buenos Aires, there are records of the arrest of four men and two women for dancing with breaks in 1862.
Over the next three decades, this type of dance was used in the Río de la Plata to dance various styles: mazurkas, polkas, chotis, habaneras, Andalusian tangos, and milongas, in search of a style that would adapt to its rhythm. At that time, “tango” referred to everything danced by “the blacks.” In this process, a new musical genre was generated, perfectly adapted to this peculiar and sensual dance style. Finally, this new genre appeared in the late 19th century and was baptized with the same name as the dance: “tango.”
That initial way of dancing tango is known as “tango canyengue”, “tango orillero” or “tango arrabalero.” Tango canyengue acquired the profile of a defined style, strongly marked by the “corte” and “quebrada,” with a very tight embrace and bodies in contact. It is a provocative and very sensual style.
But as tango moved away from the academies, milongas, and piringundines of the suburban night to begin to be danced in ballrooms and public or family settings, a new style of dancing emerged that sought to moderate its more provocative aspects, separating the bodies but without losing the embrace and softening, or even eliminating, the “corte” and “quebrada,” at least their most sensual figures. This style, developed mainly from the second decade of the 20th century, received the name of tango de salón or smooth tango. Tango de salón or smooth tango relied mainly on the tango walk. It was basically the style that was popularly danced between the 1920s and 1950s.
In the ballrooms, it was forbidden to dance with a “corte”; if we did it, someone would approach us and say, “Go to the ticket office,” and there they would either recommend us or throw us out. They called us “compadritos.” Petróleo (Carlos Estévez)
Almost simultaneously with salon tango practiced as popular recreation, a tango danced by professionals oriented towards the spectacle appeared, which received the name of stage tango. Stage tango uses more audacious and free choreographies, often taken from other dances or physical disciplines, such as jumps and figures with the dancers loose, which neither salon tango nor tango canyengue accept.
Tango almost ceased to be danced from the 1960s in Buenos Aires. Some milongas survived. However, in the 1980s, it received a new boost thanks to the success of the show “Tango Argentino” by Claudio Segovia and Héctor Orezzoli, first in Paris and then on Broadway, generating a tango mania worldwide. Tango academies flourished everywhere, and people from all over the world began to pilgrimage in search of places to dance it, especially Buenos Aires, promoted as the Tango Capital.
Since 2003, the World Tango Dance Championship has been held annually in Buenos Aires, with competitions in two categories, “stage tango” and “salon tango” or “floor tango.”
Among the outstanding professional tango dancers in history are Pedrín de San Telmo, El Cachafaz (Benito Bianquet), Casmiro “El Vazco” Aín – who danced before the Catholic pope in 1924 – Negro Navarro, Parda Haydé, Parda Ester, Petróleo (Carlos Estévez), Jorge “El Vasco” Orradre, Cacho Lavandina, Antonio Todaro, Virulazo (Jorge Orcaizaguirre), Los Dinzel, Juan Carlos Copes, and María Nieves.
The man and the woman in the Tango
In the traditional male-female couple in tango, gender roles are sexually defined. This means that in the tango couple, it is the man who leads and directs the dance, while the woman follows, although with an autonomous choreography. However, this traditional assignment of gender roles in tango is conditioned by the also traditional custom of dancing tango between men.
Argentinian writer María Fasce has depicted — not without irony — the concept of gender roles in tango in her work “La verdad según Virginia” (Planeta Publishing, 2004): “Dancing is not like making love, but it comes pretty close, and this is where the male objects come into play. How to recognize them? The male object is not particularly handsome — although some are, they exist — and, in any case, he will look handsome if he dances very well under the reddish light, with a woman who is not one and who discovered him first (…) The problem with them is the same as with female objects: they usually resist their destiny as circumstantial companions of the activity in question (…) They leave us no choice but to make them notice, with more or less delicacy, that their condition only enables them to take us by the waist and lead us, as if we were flying, on the dance floor. Because that’s the irresistible and fleeting charm of male objects: that we can surrender, let ourselves be carried away; they decide for us the right direction, and we surrender happily and confidently, sure that their desires are ours”.
Tango choreography also allows for occasional instances where the woman “leads” the man in the step. Carmencita Rodríguez, companion of the legendary Cachafaz, recalled that when she felt that a run was appropriate, she would indicate it to her partner, if he did not initiate it first.
In the late 2000s, a movement emerged in Germany, self-described as “tango queer”, which proposes to dance tango without fixed roles based on the gender of those who dance it. Therefore, in this style, same-gender dance couples are common, and the roles of leader and follower are exchanged. From Germany, the movement spread to different parts of the world. Tango Queer festivals are held in Argentina, Germany, the United Kingdom, Denmark, Sweden, Uruguay, Mexico, the United States, etc.
