Musicality :: The Holy Grail of Tango

The Carina Nebula



So I just ran across this, thanks to my very first original tango teacher, Heather Morrow, high up in the Rocky Mountains in Aspen, Colorado. The link that is. The link at the very bottom of this post. The referenced post is courtesy of Elizabeth Wartluft out of Portland.

Nothing profound here (in her post), but it's a good start. I'll use this post (this here post) as the initial/starting post on a series looking into "musicality". The Holy Grail of Tango.

I like to believe my musicality is pretty good. I'm not sure how it happened though. I'll venture a guess that it's from Elizabeth's #1. I seem to recall a period, early in my tango years, that I decided I would only listen to tango music. That lasted about two years, if memory serves.

I think I've taken a few "musicality" classes at festivals in years gone by. I think I remember them being pretty nebulous. Maybe even arcane. Well hell yeah arcane! Now that I look up the definition. Nebulous AND arcane!!! (hence the nebula photo)

I'm not sure (tango) musicality can be "taught". You have to want it bad. You have to listen to a ton of good tango music. GOOD TANGO MUSIC. NOT THE SHIT THAT MOST DJ'S PLAY. Separating the GOOD SHIT from the BAD SHIT, the GOOD from the BAD and the UGLY SHIT, is a damn good exercise in musicality. If your community's DJ's are playing bad shit, it's likely their musicality sucks. It's likely there's not much good musicality being manifested by the general tango populace of the community. And that, my friends, is some sad shit. Bad tango music will ruin a tango community, and ruin it's dancers.

So listen to good tango music. Watch who you perceive to be good/musical dancers. Leaders, primarily I suppose. Leaders for leaders. Followers for followers.

Listen, watch. Listen, watch. Hyper-awareness whilst listening and watching. Feel the music.

Oh. Another thing I've done and I still do. I transport myself back to the 1940's. Maybe even all the way back to the 1930's. I transport myself back to a milonga, visualize a live orchestra playing, visualize a beautiful piece of architecture, a ballroom or whatever. Visualize the room, the dancers, the music, the cigarette smoke, the smells. I'm not sure you can visualize smells, but you get my drift. (grin) Visualize yourself dancing back then. In the middle of the zeitgeist that created tango. Astral projection is prolly the better word/s.

Oh yeah, and dance. Dance and practice, but to damn good tango music.

Listen, watch, feel, whilst hyper-awareness-isizing yourself. Listen, watch, feel, astrally project, dance.

Do all that shit and the "musicality" will come. It has to steep, absorb, infuse, assimilate...all the way down deep into your DNA. It will take months and years to get it hard-wired into your brain and hard-wired into your tango.

Oh, also - for a later post - we should talk about how much more musical you can be with songs you've heard before. Dancing to a live orchestra, especially to a song you're not familiar with, can be one of the most challenging, uh..."things" to your musicality-ish-ness. Again, a later post.

Anyway that's what I think.

What do y'all think?


https://www.elizabethwartlufttango.com/blog/2010/01/31/vals-and-argentine-tango-musicality-games-and-exercises