Dos milongueros mas

Alfredo B. Barcones (June 21, 1930-October 15, 2007)

I hadn’t seen Alfredo for about a year in the milongas. On May 1^st, I decided I would call him at home to find why he wasn’t in the milongas. It was Labor Day, and I expected to find him at home. The last time we danced in Centro Region Leonesa he said that he had pain in the left leg and the doctor told him to quit smoking. As I was leaving that night, I saw Alfredo smoking a cigarette. I went over to ask why he was smoking against doctor’s orders. That was the last time I saw Alfredo. I left a message for him with my telephone number hoping he would call me. Later that night I found a message on my answering machine from his son to call him. I was prepared for bad news. His son informed me that Alfredo had died six months ago. Dario wanted to meet to talk about his father with me. We spent three hours talking about Alfredo. He gave me the photo above of Alfredo at the age of 36, the age of his son Dario is today. Dario said, “my father was born to dance. He loved tango. He went to dance from the age of 14.” I had the distinct pleasure of dancing with Alfredo in Lo de Celia, Salon Canning, and Region Leonesa. He continued working for a furniture manufacturer until the very end of his life. Alfredo was married to the milongas. I shot this photo of him in when he grew a ponytail.  He is giving Amanda Lucero a birthday kiss in Afiche (2002).

Alfredo decided on the spur of the moment to compete in the IV Campeonato Metropolitano de Baile de Tango. He was dancing in the semifinals in Nuevo Salon La Argentina on his 76^th birthday, June 21, 2006, but didn’t make the cut to the finals. He told me that day that he had danced in another competition thirty years ago. He didn’t have anything to prove.

 

Luis Santillan (June 21, 1931–)

I hadn’t seen Luis for more than a year, and I had been wondering about him as well. I was relieved when he and his partner Soledad attended the opening of Oscar Hector’s milonga last month on May 3^rd in Salon Sur in Pompeya. I used to see them on a regular basis in Lo de Celia where I took this photo of Luis. He said he has had some health problems, but the important thing is that he’s back to the milongas.  I called Soledad on her cell phone to send my greetings to Luis.  I was pleasantly surprised when he answered.  He was so happy that I remembered his birthday and called. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Roberto Rafael Carreras (June 18, 1931–)

He is known simply as Pocho. He and Nely met as teenagers at a neighborhood social club dancing tango. Together they made an instructional video series only a few years ago—Tango de Puro Cepa—for Solo Tango television.

Pocho danced regularly at the matinee milonga Pavadita in the former Confiteria Montecarlo at Corrientes 1218 where I first saw his smooth dancing. It wasn’t until years later that I had my first opportunity to dance milonga with Pocho in Salon El Pial. It was the night they were filming him with Nely for the video series. He was a regular at Club Bailable Juvenil at Corrientes 4534, where all the milongueros went on Saturday night until the place closed in November 2000.

Pocho has the distinction of being the first milonguero to teach classes in Chicago, my hometown. He was invited to teach master classes with Nely at the Chicago Mini Tango Festival in April 2008. You can see them on YouTube.

 

 

 

 

 

Club Almagro

I have vivid memories of the first time I entered the club at Medrano 522 near Sarmiento. It was in March 1996 during my first visit to Buenos Aires. Our tour group had no introduction whatsoever to the milonga codes, so I walked across the empty floor to greet a stage performer who had arrived. That’s a newbie blunder for you. No one told us that the dance floor is sacred. You don’t cross it during the cortina; that’s why there is an aisle between rows of tables. I also remember being singled out by a local dancer by the name of Nicholas for a tanda. He wanted me to put my right cheek next to his rather than turning my head to the right. I had a lot to learn about how things were done in the milongas. Buenos Aires was the best place to learn them by total immersion.

Almagro had many organizers over its 40-year history, and during the 1990s until its closing on December 19, 2000, Juan Fabbri was in charge. It had a parquet floor with three rows of tables around the floor. The long-time regulars had their reserved tables in the front row. The club was actually a sports club with swimming pool and basketball court that rented out the main floor. On one of our tour group visits the milonga was relocated to the basketball court. There were classes held before the milonga and exhibitions during the night, not the way things were in the 1970s and 80s. Milongueros go to a milonga to dance, not to see performances. Famous personalities like Madonna, Julio Inglesias, and the Rolling Stones showed up at Almagro. I met Winton Marsalis and a few members of his band when they were in town for a concert.

I was a foreign visitor going alone to Almagro, so I was seated in the back row of tables against the wall where I couldn’t see the dancing. Jose was the man at the door in charge of seating. He always wore a bowtie and never smiled. It was during my fourth trip in 1998 when Jose Santoro seated me in the front row. I thought I had died and gone to tango heaven. I didn’t ask to be seated up front; I was promoted there. It’s a different world from the front row. I went regularly on Tuesdays and Sundays. I didn’t attend closing night at Almagro. My friend Diana has a piece of the parquet as a memento.

 

 

 

 

Osvaldo Vicente Centeno (June 15, 1937–)

 

He is called “El Oso,” but he’s as warm and gentle as a pussycat. He doesn’t talk in the milongas because he goes there to dance. He knows with whom he wants to dance each tanda, and a commanding tilt of his head gets immediate results.

During the daytime, Osvaldo drives a taxi. He is a porteno who lives in Avellaneda, the province of Buenos Aires. I regard Osvaldo as my friend. We have danced together since 2000 in Salon Canning, Club Carribean, Lo de Celia, Centro Region Leonesa, El Beso, and Club Gricel. He loves all the orchestras of the milongas, but especially Anibal Troilo and Juan D’Arienzo. He has told me he becomes completely absorbed in the music when he dances. I know the feeling. He began learning tango in Club Sol at Saraza 951 where he attended practicas. He started dancing in 1956 at Centro Asturiano on Solis and Venezuela. His favorite was Club Almagro, where he danced during its 40-year reign as the place to dance in Buenos Aires.  View his dancing on YouTube. Osvaldo and his partner were one of 38 couples in the semifinal rounds who went to the III Tango Dance World Championship for salon tango finals in August 2005 at La Rural in Buenos Aires.  His daughter Cintia and grandson Nicholas were there to see it all.

 

 

Galeria del Tango Argentino

Located at Av. Boedo 722 near Independencia, the milonga Galeria del Tango Argentino opened September 25, 1991. Carlos Gavito and Eduardo Arquimbau were the organizers. Everyone who attended the opening signed this piece of leather. Gavito once told me that all the best dancers were invited, and everyone wanted to be there. Galeria space was being rented for classes until about six years ago, but milongas are no longer held there.

There were three rooms on the first floor. The largest room was used for milongas. The entrance walls had these colorful posters, and artwork hung throughout the space. There were two smaller rooms that were used for classes. I attended canyengue classes with Marta Anton and Luis Grondona, folklore classes with Cynthia Fattori, women’s technique workshops with Graciela Gonzalez, and one forgettable class with Gustavo Naveira.

Our March 1996 tour group attended their first milonga in Galeria del Tango Argentino with Eduardo Arquimbau as our host.

 

 

Juan Carlos Copes (May 31, 1931–)

I first met Juan Carlos when I attended Stanford Tango Week, July 1993. I wanted to take of photo of him, but he handed my camera to someone else who took this photo of us. Stanford is the grandfather of tango festivals in the USA, and it wouldn’t have been complete without the Maestro. Shortly after Stanford, I approached Northwestern University’s dance department about holding the first international tango congress. Juan Carlos and Maria Nieves were both invited to teach at Northwestern in June 1995. It was a privilege to know and study with them. I went to O’Hare Airport to meet their flight and got down on my hands and knees when I saw them walk off the plane. They started dancing as teenagers in the milongas and danced in New York City in the 1950s.

Juan Carlos invited me to dance during the final milonga/reception of the tango congress. It was the finishing touch after two years to turn my dream into a reality.

 

 

 

Ernesto Ramon Delgado (May 30, 1935–)

I called him today at his upholstery workshop in Boedo to wish him a happy birthday. He sounded as cheerful as always.  Ernesto has made furniture practically his entire life, and his fingers are proof. He and his son Sergio do all the work.  The youngest in a family of ten children, Ernesto still has four older siblings. I’ve been to family parties at his Valentin Alsina home. The family photo below was taken at his brother Hector’s 70^th birthday party in July 2000. Ernesto raised three sons and has been widowed since May 30, 1989. He grew up in the Almagro neighborhood where played soccer and learned to dance in his teenage years.

Salon Canning is Ernesto’s second home on Sunday evenings. When the milongueros occupied a corner table on Friday nights in Club Gricel, Ernesto was always there with his friends. It’s where I first danced with him in 1999. Those were the days when everyone smoked in the milongas. It was difficult for Ernesto to breathe since he had tuberculosis as a child. He runs out of air, but that doesn’t keep him going to the milongas.

His other favorite pastime is singing tango. I’ve heard Ernesto at parties and penas de tango over the years. He sings regularly at two amateur sessions with live accompaniment in Afiche and La Biblioteca.

 

 

Dos milongueros

Jose Guillermo Salurso (May 17, 1934–)

I heard that El Tano Guillermo was living in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, so I went there to meet him in June 1996, while I was still living in Fox Lake, Illinois, about a two-hour drive. El Tano lived thirty years in Milwaukee with his wife and three children until 1997. He has residency in the USA, but hasn’t been back for ten years to see his children and grandchildren because he can’t afford to travel.

El Tano met Emma in a dance salon in Buenos Aires when she was only 14, and he was 21. They married and moved to Chicago, but finally settled in Milwaukee where he worked as carpenter. They raised three children, Eduardo, Vanesa and Verona.

During the summer of 1996, I made several trips from Fox Lake to Milwaukee to Chicago to escort El Tano for a few hours at the Tango nada mas or Rupert’s 33 Club milongas. We had many hours on the road for interesting conversations.

El Tano Guillermo is in a milonga every night of week with a glass of whiskey in hand, singing the lyrics of every tango. He could be living in Milwaukee, but he prefers to be in Buenos Aires because he is married to the milonga.

 

Chiche (May 17, 1938–)

I shouldn’t use his real name because his family doesn’t know he is a milonguero. One search with Goggle for his name, and they could read my blog about him.

It wasn’t easy pretending I didn’t know Chiche when I met him and his wife one summer in Villa Gesell. I had danced with him many times in Gricel where he had a reserved table on Fridays. He always wore a suit and tie to the milonga. I had to remind myself not to talk about the milongas nor ask him to dance during parties at their home. I attended his daughter’s wedding where his stumbling on the dance floor was just an act.  Chiche doesn’t go to dance anymore so I suppose he has a bittersweet separation from the milonga. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mario Alan Candamil (May 13, 1929–)

Born in Mexico, his family immigrated to Buenos Aires when he was three years old. I met Alito for the first time when I danced valses with him in Regin in November 1998. It was an “aha” moment for me.  I danced with a milonguero.

Alito organized dances over many decades in Palacio Rivadavia, Mariano Acosto, Club Almagro, Tourbillon, Club Savoy, Salon Agusteo, and Confiteria Piccadilly, among others. In September 2001, he and Miguel Angel Balbi were partners in a milonga known as “Buenos Aires Tango (Milonguero)” held in Mundo Latino on Esmeralda. They were forced to close it after only three months when the city was in turmoil with President de la Rua in office. Alito’s last milonga was in Plaza Bohemia in 2004. He set the admission at one peso, hoping to entice dancers to attend. Sadly, it never came to pass, and he lost money. One evening during his milonga, I was sitting with Alito. The deejay played a tanda of Alfredo De Angelis. Alito turned and said to me, “in my time, if they played De Angelis in a milonga, the disk jockey would have been taken to the street and shot. De Angelis was the music of the carousel, not the milonga.”

Last night Alito quietly celebrated his birthday at midnight in Club Gricel. We danced a tanda of Tanturi/Castillo—the only tanda he danced all night. Today, Alito and Osvaldo Centeno came to my apartment for lunch and conversation. Alito has a daughter (41) and a grandson (14) who live in Villa Urquiza. As Alito left my apartment a couple hours ago, he said he was going home to shower, change, and go to the milonga in Plaza Bohemia.  Alito is married to the milonga.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dos flacos milongueros

Rodolfo Cesar Indegno (May 8, 1931 –)

He is small and very thin, has never married and has no children to his knowledge, as he likes to joke. He has a reserved front row table in Lo de Celia where he dances regularly at least twice a week. He lives in the neighborhood of Chacarita. Two weeks ago, we danced a vals tanda before the floor was crowded. It was fabulous. All we could do was smile at one another.

 

 

 

Ernesto Hector Garcia (May 8, 1936 –)

He’s known as “El Flaco Dany” and could be called the Fred Astaire of Tango. He is slim and always smartly dressed in a double-breasted suit and tie. His specialty is milonga con traspie that he has taught in Italy and the United States. I saw him last Friday night at Salon Canning where he was singing more than dancing. I listened while he and Eduardo “El Nene” Masci sang the tangos they know and love so much. When the Miami festival organizer wrote me about inviting a milonguero, Dany was the one I arranged for her to hire. He went for three consecutive years to the Miami Beach festival to teach and perform. He lives in the family home in Villa Urquiza, not far from Club Sunderland, where he celebrates his birthday. Dany may be 72, but his dance partners are usually less than half his age.  (see photo in April 27 post)