February 28, 2011

The Bohemian Youth of Bs As Play Tangos

Music World is a video travel show produced and edited by the Brooklyn documentarian Oresti Tsonopoulos on the subject of musician subcultures around the world.

Tsonopoulos has just released Episode 4 of a multi-segment series on the revival of tango music in Buenos Aires. He has filmed young musicians performing tango music in places around San Telmo. They refer to what they are doing as new tango, meaning that it is their generation's engagement with the old music. They don't actually seem to be creating new tango music, and the songs they play are classic tangos. But their tango "scene" is new, or at least, they feel that it is.

In episode four, the band leader of "China Cruel" speaks of the difficulties of making money with tango.

You could be the most popular tango group in town and still not be able to live off that. However, if you are the most popular rock band, things are great for you. You lived well, both many shows and tours.

If you are among the top 10 tango bands, nothing! At best with some luck, you won't have to pay out of your own pocket to record your album. It's a very small movement fighting an uphill battle. There's no market for Tango, except in tourism words very limited and doesn't have a new and unique projects. The tourism is like… They bring everyone in the van to the door of the “Tango for export” house and there they stay. Then they put them back on them and take them back to the hotel.

Music World Episodes on VIMEO.

Music World Episodes on YouTube.

Posted by joegrohens at 01:40 PM | Comments (0)

September 09, 2006

Tango in a Korean pop music video

Ok, what she's singing is not exactly tango, but I am still glad to see this. I would like to think it as an indication of how much the Korean tango population grew. :-)

If you are interested in watching a Korean couple dancing, HERE's a sample.

Posted by yana at 01:03 PM | Comments (0)

June 14, 2006

Orquesta Tipica - a Film by Nicolas Ente

Watch this trailer. It's great, an indie documentary featuring the contemporary tango band "Orquesta Tipica Fernandez Fierro". There are some great scenes in here, like where crowd on the street chants to police "Let them play" while a middle-aged man pleads "We want tango, not cumbia that rots kids minds".


Quotes from the band members:

  • "Back in April, we got together with a bass, and a bandoneon player. So we said, since we are three, let's find a violinist and make a quartet. Within a month we went from 4 to 12 members."

  • "Trying to assemble an orquestra tipica back then was already really huge."

  • (The director) "They thought they were a garage band. With the Orquesta, I follow a dogma. The orchestra always comes first."

  • From the producer's description
    Twelve guys looking like punk rockers pushing a piano down the street. Their sound is elaborate but raw. Their music is politically committed while historically linked to counterculture; still, it is part of a genre more than a hundred years old. This is their story. This is Buenos Aires 2006.

    Links

    Posted by joegrohens at 02:05 PM | Comments (0)

    May 02, 2006

    Antonio Banderas in "Take The Lead"

    ANTONIO BANDERAS TANGOS IN TAKE THE LEAD
    ANS Entertainment News
    1 min 29 sec - May 1, 2006
    www.artisannews.com

    Antonio Banderas stars in Take The Lead modeled after ballroom dance teacher Pierre Dulaine who brought his program to inner city schools giving kids confidence by teaching them how to waltz, cha cha and do the tango.

    "I have a facility for physicality and physical things in a certain way. I will never be a great dancer but after dancing with Chita Rivera for 228 performances on Broadway I may dare to just play a tango in the movie. In movies you can do that actually but if you go into theater you have to be more careful because its real time. What you see is what it is. There's no where to hide behind anything, you know."


    Posted by joegrohens at 05:23 PM | Comments (0)

    September 10, 2005

    A New Tango Documentary

    Igor Polk in San Francisco has written a review of the DVD "Susana Tango Pial"

    It sounds like a very good film, and I look forward to seeing it. People can order the DVD from Igor.

    Posted by joegrohens at 03:41 PM | Comments (0)

    January 02, 2005

    Torito's web site

    Rob "Torito" Nuijten of Amsterdam publishes a very interesting, and attractively designed, web site for tango in Netherlands. Links of interest:

    From browsing his "Tango agenda" just now, I learned of the death of Jose Libertella, cited below.

    On a lighter note, Torito reports on a great tango video clip ( "Uniquely Spikey".) from a TV commercial of the Singapore travel industry. (Requires QuickTime).

    Fun: Webmovie commercial spotted: Dancing Tango for Singapore. Bold man with lady in selfmade SM bra. (Who are they, do you know?)

    One must note that Torito takes some very nice tango photographs, as I have mentioned previously.

    Posted by joegrohens at 01:41 AM | Comments (0)

    December 30, 2004

    Tango Video Clips

    Dirk Barbier's VideoClips-Gallery has some good stuff.

    Of course, so does mine. (We all seem to be copying from each other.)

    Posted by joegrohens at 11:10 PM | Comments (0)

    December 10, 2004

    Por Amor de Tango

    poramordetango1.jpg

    A Toronto tango dancer (Carolyn Dallman Downes) and her friends make a film about what tango improvisation means to them.

    For some time, I had wanted to make a film about what Argentine tango means to me, and what I think it means to the ordinary person who dances just for the love of it. Tango is not the highly choreographed dance we usually see on screen and stage; for the average person, it's about improvisation--the act of being totally present with a partner in the creation of a dance.

    That's not a bad creative group project... a little different than doing a show, and perhaps more personal. We could do something like that in our town.

    Slide show here: Por Amor De Tango. I think a DVD can be purchased from the filmmaker at dallmandownes@sprint.ca.

    Posted by joegrohens at 01:55 PM | Comments (0)

    October 31, 2004

    bbc tango documentary

    BBC - BBC Four Dance - La Confiteria Ideal: The Tango Salon

    Posted by joegrohens at 02:42 AM