Just another f-a-b-u-l-o-u-s evening
at
Firehouse!
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Last Thursday, Firehouse regulars and newcomers alike enjoyed a wonderful evening of Tango, Vals, and Milonga at the Firehouse. We were absolutely blessed to have the great Richard Ariza on hand to serve up his
very special choice of music. It made us all feel like getting up, staying up, and dancing the night away. And so, that's just what we did! We celebrated Marta's birthday with a long line of Firehouse milongueros keeping her nicely on her toes. Sue Dallon took the night off, and went to Boston for a family event. (She'll be back with us next week.) All in all, it was another night in Tango heaven. If you missed out, join us next week, and prepare yourself for a fun-filled evening of
social Tango at its best.Once again, the Firehouse clean up crew made smooth and swift work of cleaning, folding, putting away and leaving our 'Firehouse' sparkling! Much thanks and praise go to these folks who stay late and put in the indispensable effort to maintain our happy home:
·
Shan · Bob B. · Edna N. · Jesse B. · Hilda · Raphael · Steve M. · Elena
S. · Elena T. · Tsipoyra · Terri · Steve T.
Thanks also to all of you who continue to help by clearing your dinnerware, as well as cups and napkins. Your kindness and consideration goes a long way, and is very much appreciated by
all.
n Steve Turi
Celebrations and
Lessons - Back to Sue
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Next Thursday, May 14 - Lesson by Walter Monteblanco and birthday of Gay Fallows Monteblanco
Fran on vacation - Walter will teach lesson on May
14th
Fran and Pat are going on a well-deserved vacation in England, and they will be out on May 14th.
Walter and Gay travel so often that something had to give, and it was his weekly group lessons at Rogers Dance Studio. Take advantage of this rare opportunity to find out why Walter's students love him so
much.
Gay's Birthday Gay returns to Firehouse in between extensive world travels with her husband and our dear friend, Walter. We are thrilled to have her whenever we can. Gay has been a Firehouse friend for years, and we are always happy to celebrate with her. Walter will start the birthday
dance, and then all of the Firehouse milongueros can join in.
Last Thursday May 7 - Birthday of Marta Bautis
Marta Bautis has been around tango for a long time. She is a terrific dancer, and the Firehouse tangueros will love doing the birthday dance with her. Don't miss
it.
Marta is an Argentinean filmmaker who began her career as a photojournalist and has worked throughout Latin America. She is an award-winning documentary filmmaker whose work has been screened at numerous national and international film festivals. She is also a faculty member at the School of Contemporary Arts, Ramapo College of New Jersey and founder of Tiempo Azul
Productions.
If heaven is
anything like celebrating one's birthday at Firehouse Tango, it has a lot to recommend it. Frankly, I'd rather be at Firehouse. Thank you lovely tangueras, for a birthday memory I shall cherish. Con mucho amore,
Steve Turi
I keep saying I do not want to celebrate any more birthdays, but how many men will line up to dance with me, if not for the traditional tributes on birthdays.....oh well, you
know that is not really true because our tanqueros dance with all of the ladies...
Terri Lopez
Monica Paz visits New Jersey - Private lessons available |
Monica Paz, our wonderful teacher and friend from Buenos Aires, will be available for limited private lessons in New Jersey from Thursday, June 18th through Monday, June 22nd. Sign up now while the opportunity still exists.
Great news! Monica in New Jersey
Great news! Monica Paz, our dear friend and teacher from Buenos Aires will be in New Jersey from Thursday, June 18th to Monday, June 22nd. Happily she
will join us for Firehouse Tango's twelfth anniversary celebration on Thursday, June 18th. She will also be at Los Pitucos Milonga in Franklin Lakes on Saturday, June 20th.
Please call me at 201-826-6602 or e mail firehousetango@gmail.com to reserve time for lessons. I will be happy to answer any questions that you might have.
Thursday June 18 until 6:00 Friday June 19 whole day, starting 11:00 AM Saturday June 20 11am - 4 pm until Los Pitucos. Sunday June 21 Lessons in the afternoon, after 4. Monday 22 whole day, starting 11:00 AM
She will also be giving private and group lessons in New York City. I will publish her schedule as soon as it is available.
For registration, please contact Monica at: tangopaz@yahoo.com.ar
www.mptango.com
About Monica
Monica Paz was born and raised in Buenos Aires, and tango has been her full time profession for almost 20 years. She specializes in Tango Milonguero style (with its strong chest-to-chest connection) which she loves to dance with the best old
milongueros in the best milongas of Buenos Aires.
Three years ago, Monica realized her dream of opening her own studio in Buenos Aires (at 30 Riobamba near the Congresso.) One of the best milongueros in the city, Osvaldo Natucci, teaches group lessons on Tuesday and Thursday nights with Monica translating when necessary. Monica and Natucci also teach private lessons. If you are in Buenos Aires, I highly recommend checking out these lessons.
Monica has taught extensively all over the United States and Europe, as well as in Australia and much of South America. She has also been invited to Los Angeles to teach and perform in June.
Monica's web site with interviews of old milongueros
Monica is passionate about preserving the traditions, codes, and history of tango. To this
end, she continues pursuing her project of interviewing the precious few remaining old milongueros of Buenos Aires. Their stories and the videos accompanying them, as well as other wonderful videos of Monica can be found on her web site at www.mptango.com Scroll down for English or Spanish selection.
Facebook page and Calendar
Every day, our dear friend and teacher in Buenos Aires posts
a historical tango fact of the day. These interesting and informative tidbits always include English, Spanish and Italian information and a relevant recording. You can see all of them and listen to the recording by simply joining Monica Paz PractiMilonguero Facebook page. I enjoy these posts so much that I share them with my readers every week in my newsletter (See below.)
Buenos Aires with Firehouse Tango November, 2015 - More information |
Latest information on Buenos Aires
Our trip to Buenos Aires from October 30 to November 9th, 2015 (with a possible optional extension to either Mendoza or Iguazu Falls) is on.
Last year, we took a group and exceeded all expectations (references are happily available.) If you think you want to come, please send me an e mail at firehousetango@gmail.com or call me at 201-826-6602.
Trip details and payment information are below. What's
included?
- 8 nights/ 9 days in Buenos Aires with the friendliest group around
- Stay at the excellent, centrally located Bauen Suites Hotel
- Full breakfast every day
- Welcome luncheon at the hotel
- Transfers to and from
hotel (included if traveling with group on American # 953 and #954)
- Private group lessons with excellent local teachers and local partners (male and female) for each person
- Milongas with local hosts (male and female) who are there just to dance with us
- City Tour
- Full day at gaucho ranch with barbeque and
show
- Popular Tango show with dinner
- Day at San Telmo Flea Market & enough free time for shopping, exploring the city, visiting museums, taking private lessons, visiting milongas on your own or resting (heaven forbid)
- You most certainly will want to visit a shoe store (shoes cost about 1/3 of price here) Prices in Buenos Aires are amazingly low &
additional costs are minimal
- Excellent & inexpensive local teachers highly recommended
How Much: The cost of the trip including everything listed below (excluding air) is $2100 (double
occupancy). Single supplement is available for an additional fee of $400. Airfare should be about $1,400. Payment Schedule: $400 at signup - Non refundable (Single Supplement $400) due about May 7th $400 June 4th- Refundable if canceled before September 3 $400 July 2 - Refundable if canceled before September 3 $400 August 6 -Refundable if canceled before September 3 $500 Balance September 3 - Non refundable
We advise you to purchase trip cancellation & medical insurance (for
example www.accessamerica.com ) You should make your air reservations as soon as possible, since the fare may go up. There is also an Argentina Reciprocity Fee of $160. This
is a one-time payment that is good for ten years.
How to Register: Give check made out to Firehouse Tango for $400 together with your name, address and phone numbers to Sue or send to Sue Dallon, 16 Fox Hollow Rd. Ramsey, NJ 07446. For more information or references ask Sue or call 201-825-1570 or 201-826-6602.
Cortinas for Ben E King next Thursday May 14th Ben E King (Benjamin Earl Nelson), singer
and songwriter, born 28 September 1938; died 30 April 2015 |
The cortinas for next Thursday will all be in honor of another of Joe's favorite singers, Ben E King, who died last week at the age of 76.
A cortina (curtain) is a short piece (20–60 seconds) of
non-dance music that is played between tandas at a milonga (tango dance event). The cortina lets the dancers know that the tanda has ended. The partners can then without insult thank each other and return to their own tables, to find a new dance partner at the next
tanda. Cortinas are used at many of the milongas in Argentina and Uruguay but are increasingly common elsewhere. - Wikipedia
Let us
know if you are celebrating an occasion and would like to request special music for that night’s cortinas. We will try very hard to accommodate you. We welcome readers' contributions about Argentine Tango in general and Firehouse Tango in particular. Send your thoughts to firehousetango@gmail.com We welcome readers' contributions about Argentine Tango in general and Firehouse Tango in particular. Send your thoughts to firehousetango@gmail.com
From Fred Rueck
Check out the
lyrics, you may want to turn over and not get up!
Jun 10, 2013 - I, too, dreamt (Yo también soñé) [Canaro] ... I am amazed by the quality of this combination…. and after trying to study the lyrics in more
detail, Now these are lyrics!
Enjoy, Señor
Oucho
Hi everyone, Fran here with your Tango Tip of the Week. Recently, I witnessed something, which I had never actually seen before (but had heard about, and had found difficult to believe) in the Tango world.
I was sharing a teaching space with a very well known performance couple (whose names I will tactfully omit). They had been engaged by a
student whom I've seen around the Tango community for some years, and were demonstrating/teaching some extremely complex stage material. As I watched the lesson unfold, the student kept referring to his iPhone. The couple would work with him on a figure; then they would all hover over the iPhone; then they would work on something else. Occasionally, I noticed the male performer demonstrating something ridiculously difficult, and the student would shake his head as if to say, "Let's not bother
with that." Then, they'd go on to something else.
What was going on here? Eventually, it became apparent to me that the student had a video of the couple, performing a stage Tango, and had booked them to teach him the individual elements of the choreography.
With each figure, the male performer would demonstrate with his female partner; then the student would work on it with her until it began to come together (in a decidedly amateurish way).
When the student seemed satisfied that he had learned the figure (which, of course, he had NOT!), they would move on to the next piece of choreography. At the end of the hour, hugs and kisses all around, the student was blissfully elated by what he had "learned" (which was -- at least in my opinion -- zero), and the performance couple had pocketed their fee (which I later found out was $150).
I suppose one could shrug one's shoulders, and say, "to each his own,"
or something cynical like that. But come on, folks. Is this what learning how to dance Tango has come to? Forget the learning process; just grab the material; and call yourself a dancer? I picture this student, inflicting himself on every follower he meets, displaying his new found "expertise," and bragging that he has the imprimatur of the great master to his credit.
But, let's face it: his dancing was terrible before that lesson, and his dancing will continue
to be terrible forever -- unless he sometime somewhere somehow bites the big bullet and finally does what he has to do to learn how to dance.
There is no shortcut to learning Tango. Ask any professional how long it took them to reach even a modest level of competence. Most will say that it's taken them many, many years to get where they are, and that, in fact, they need to practice for hours every day just to maintain their art in minimally acceptable
shape.
If we make the supposition that a piece of stage choreography represents the pinnacle of artistic achievement, how can a student hope to simply pull the figures from YouTube, or pick up anything at all in a one-hour lesson with the maestro?
And -- deep breath -- what has any of this got to do with social Tango anyway? Social Tango depends on moment-to-moment lead/follow skill. Stage Tango depends on a superlative degree
of assimilated athleticism, years of work on specific techniques, and a great memory. The two iterations of Tango are worlds apart.
Some people allege that stage Tango is an expansion of the social dance, implying the stage Tango simply incorporates elements of the social dance in a more flamboyant way in order to entertain an audience. This is very often not true. Stage Tango has its own language of figures which cannot be led or followed, but must be
memorized, and then executed as if they are improvised.
One example: Try to execute an extended planeo, which incorporates two or even three complete molinetes as a lead/follow mechanism. It simply can't be done, not by you, not by me, not by anyone. And yet we see it in choreographed Tango all the time.
All this leads me to two questions:
1. Why do performers
(who really should know better) continue to offer such material to social dance students?
2. Why do social dance students insist on trying to learn them?
I would suggest that the answers are, respectively: money and narcissism.
What do you think?
Saturdays with Fran and Pat at Dardo Galletto Studios
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Please join us for our Saturday Practica at Dardo Galletto Studios, 151 West 46th Street (between 6th and 7th Avenues; 2-4pm, $10 per person. (Bringing a partner isn't necessary.) We think it’s just like being in Buenos Aires! We’ll both be on hand to answer
any questions you may have about your dancing, and to help you with material you're working on. Plus you get a new “must-have” tango move each week! If you’d like a private lesson, call Fran directly at 212-662-7692, or email him at franchesleigh@mac.com. Don’t forget to visit our website at www.franchesleigh.com and join is on Facebook at www.facebook.com/franchesleighllc
View Monica Paz' terrific tango Facebook posts - my pick from
this week is below
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Every day, our dear friend and teacher in Buenos Aires posts a historical tango fact of the day. These interesting and informative tidbits always include
English, Spanish and Italian information and a relevant recording. You can see all of them and listen to the recording by simply joining Monica Paz PractiMilonguero Facebook page. Below is a link to the Facebook page, where you can hear the music: Below is a link to Monica's interview with Juan Carlos Pontorielo from February 8, 2011. He passed away recently. How wonderful to have this video history.
Un bello recuerdo
Juan Carlos Pontorielo Q.E. P.D.
https://youtu.be/CiEib0rZ92Q
Calendario Milonguero
Birth of OSVALDO FRESEDO, bandoneon player and composer. He was
born in a family of high economic status who lived in La Paternal, a rather popular neighborhood. He was a great architect of the beautiful “tanguedad”. He recorded about 1250 themes in 63 years. His orchestra was the favorite of the upper class. Maybe that is why he did not favor tango for dancing. Now a theme of his own. ♫ ARRABALERO. Osvaldo Fresedo (1939)
⊙ CD Nº03 Colección Natucci (40 CDs) +info
Here is the Facebook link to see Monica's tango calendar: https://www.facebook.com/MPTango And the following one for her latest interview (She regularly posts interviews that she does with surviving old milongueros) : New MP Tango Interview
MPTango Presents Ricardo Rezk at PractiMilonguero Click on cc underneath the screen for English subtitles.
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/14d21c02e335a6a8
Simply Social Dancing - Salsa and Argentine Tango |
Dancing with Simply Social Dancing Special Events in May
Why not end your Memorial Dany Weekend with lots of dancing!
Sunday, May 24th 6:00 to 9:00 pm
Biagio's Restaurant 299 Paramus Rd, Paramus NJ 07652
Dinner & dance at Biagio's Restaurant. The evening will includes a beginner dance lesson, followed by dinner and dancing in the Banquet Room upstairs.. A variety of music will be played: ballroom, latin, swing. Singles and couples are invited. All levels are welcome.
$35.00 per
person Buffet dinner / cash bar
_____________________ Havana 59 Restaurant 110 Moonachie Ave, Moonachie NJ
The evening will start off with a 1/2 hour beginner lesson, followed by dancing. Mostly Salsa and Argentine Tango... some Rumba,
Bachata, Merengue, and Cha Cha thrown in.
$20.00 cover per person (pay when arrive) Includes 2 house drinks or 1 house drink and 1 appetizer from Latin night menu.
201-694-7087 http://www.simplysocialdancing.com/
Our cancellation policy - We STILL rarely cancel |
Even though we had to cancel once this year, we still rarely cancel!
We want to remind everyone that if the weather looks really bad, we will leave messages on our web site www.firehousetango.com and phone 201-825-1570. You can also reach
us on my cell phone 201-826-6602. Feel free to leave a message on either of these lines.
We cancel only when absolutely necessary (only about eight or nine times in all these years - including, unfortunately, the first scheduled milonga of March, 2015), but please check whenever you're not sure. If there isn't any message, we're on.
During Hurricane
Sandy, when we had only cell phone service, I was able to leave a message on my cell, so I guess that the best number to call is 201-826-6602.
The following folks helped set up, break down and clean up before and after the milonga. Without them, there would be no Firehouse Tango.
A reminder that Firehouse Tango does not supply wine - Your fellow tangueros bring it. Therefore, if you drink it, please make sure to bring a bottle every so often.
The folks below brought
food and wine this week -
And these people brought wine
Tango in New Jersey and New York
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