Argentine Tango

The first thing that comes to your mind when thinking of Argentina is probably tango and who hasn’t heard of it? Tango is a social dance but also a music genre, extremely famous in both Uruguay and Argentina. Tango is expressed through melodic music, and often it lyrics are nostalgic and telling sad love histories.

Originated at the ending of the 19th century in Argentina, tango grew quickly and spread to the rest of the world. Have you heard of Carlos Gardel? He was the most important figure when it comes to tango music, he was a singer and also a songwritter, he changed tango completely and became famous really quickly as well.

Argentine tango is stronger than the typical ballroom tango music, and also much more varied. Nowadays younger generations developed a new genre of tango music called “electro tango” or also “nuevo tango” that is reallly famous in the whole word. This new tango music can also be danced like regular tango.

Tango is a dance for two, and there are two ways to dance it that vary from open, in which the leader and follower connect at arms length or close, in which the two of them connect chest to chest. A good tango dance has to feel the music, have passion and energy, so the dancers body can really express what the song is trying to say. An extremely good dancer is who transmits a feeling of the music to the partner, and this is important when it comes to this type of music.

There is no basic step or typical step in tango, but there are several movements that instructors codified to instruct other dancers, but still tango is basically heavy improvisation. Tango can be found everywhere in Argentina, locals enjoy dancing in the streets and giving dance shows at some bars of public places. It is Argentina’s essence and one of the most important parts of its actual culture.