The Alienation of Tango

I never saw a dance that is as self-destructive as tango. Unlike other dances, tango music allows interpretations so dancers may treat it at their will. Also unlike other dances, the steps of tango do not have fixed configurations. Dancers are free to improvise and create when they dance. This rather untrammeled nature of tango induces dramatic changes to the dance at times like this when free-spirited foreigners pour in, bringing in too many foreign influences to the dance.

Whatever things people do, there are always some who tend to cross the line. Tango is without exception. We humans seek freedom, yet unrestrained freedom defeats itself. Our forefathers understood the danger of this human nature. That’s why they created a political system of checks and balances and the rule of law. Tango outside of Argentina, however, is a lawless society. People do whatever they please to exercise their free wills. They replace tango embrace with an open hold, supersede tango music with alternative tunes, exchange male and female roles, and adopt non-tango elements, such as underarm turns, high kicks and body lifts, into the dance. Now you go to a milonga in America, you often hear exotic music of foreign lands and see rogues of all kinds dancing wild. It is still called tango, but the essence of tango has been changed. There is nothing resemble the milongas in Buenos Aires.

Tango is a free dance, but it is not a you-can-do-whatever-you-want dance. It has its characteristics. For example, it is a close-embrace dance. Breaking the embrace and drifting the partners apart is not tango. Tango is an intimate and passionate dance. It lies in the feelings stirred by the music. In fact, tango is more about feelings than steps. No matter how many new steps people try to create, without feelings it is not tango. Tango is a macho dance. It is danced by a man and a woman and contains the beauty of both masculinity and femininity. The man is the leader who leads, protects and shines the woman. The woman is the follower who surrenders to the lead. Refusal of surrender, switching the roles or making tango a same-sex dance is against tango. Tango is danced to the music specifically created for the dance. Foreigners often do not know that the magic of tango is in its music, which connects the dancers, stirs up their emotions, synchronizes their movements, and inspires their creativities. Changing tango music to non-tango tunes, the dance ceases to be tango.

No one can stop the reform of a dance that invites free expressions, I suppose. Only time will tell which reforms may sustain. Tango has gone through the same trial for one hundred and fifty years. Whatever changes people attempt to bring in today must have been tried by others before. Most of those changes did not stay. The current form of tango, including its music, steps and codes as being practiced in Buenos Aires, is the survivor of the fitness among zillions of attempts to alter the dance along its history. Tango will continue to evolve, of course. But its evolution will be in the same direction that makes it tango. Any attempts to make tango a non-tango dance or hybrid will fail. If not so, tango would have stopped being the tango danced in Buenos Aires today long ago.