The sky is an unremittingly pale grey. Rain has been falling — falling for ever, it seems — in a fine spray which makes no sound and barely dampens my hair. The trees are glistening in their earthy autumn colours: yellow-limes; pale sherbet oranges; deep, flame oranges; Indian reds; scarlets; vermillions; dark shocking pinks; burgundies; deep purples. Underfoot, the leaves have been pressed damply into the pavement in slippery scatter patterns: here, pointy, intricate, filigree stars of shiny red; here, curls of warm brownish yellow. My iPod spools through my favourite orchestra in pedantic alphabetical order: “Cuando se ha querido mucho”; “De copetín”; “De igual a igual”; “Demasiado tarde”; “Destellos”; “Dice un refrán”. I am walking alone, past the houses with their campy Halloween decorations: giant furry spiders; cheerful skeletons; grinning corpses; Jackson Pollock-like splashes of blood-red paint; cardboard headstones and pot-bellied pumpkins coordinating with the oranges of the fall foliage. It’s the cozy domesticated horror of American suburbia. The maple-syrupy sweetness of Vargas’s voice, the light touch of D’Agostino’s subtle fingers on the piano keys; the echoing ripples of violins and bandoneons: they all seem to express the same resigned ennui, the same early winter depression, the same sadness, achy nostalgia and regret that is making my eyes prick with unexplained, ridiculous, corny, self-indulgent tears right now. Everything is the same; nothing has changed. At least tell me that you hate me! But don’t be like this — so silent, so indifferent, so cold. How could these songs have been written in bright, sunny Buenos Aires, in that city jostling with people; with skinny, swishy-haired women in drainpipe jeans; with dog walkers preceded by starbursts of canines on strings, like bunches of furry balloons; with young men lounging in doorways and calling out hermosa as I pass; with children sticky-fingered from squat, square-bottomed cones of dulce de leche ice cream? Surely, tango should have been born here: among these dreary, drizzly, dreich Oregon streets, in this damp, chilly, solitary place.
. . . . . .
It’s night now and I am back again — at the little corner place, with its round white sign, lit like a diner’s, on the rainswept, trafficky corner. I can’t find a one-word translation for its lunfardo name. Obsession. Illusion. Passion. Hope. And soon I am slipping off my boots, discarding jacket, scarf and sweater; trusting to tango to warm my blood as I strip down to gauze, silk and skin in this chilly room.
Perhaps it is the contrast with the sweet, restrained melancholy of my afternoon soundtrack of D’Agostino. Perhaps it is the evening’s generous helping of twitchy, nervy, jazzy Biagi – three heaped tandas full, administered like shots of adrenaline at careful intervals. But, suddenly, I hear syncopations; I hear staccato moments everywhere. Between the smooth strokes of Di Sarli’s strings, there are sharp, sudden beats — thorns among the velvety rose petals — and it seems important to me to emphasise them. I am like a supernova hunter, searching eagerly for explosions of violence in an otherwise calm and starry sky. “I really feel that I want to pounce on those moments, those oomph moments in Di Sarli”, I tell my partner, apologetically. “You should”, he says encouragingly. Tanturi’s strong, regular beat has never sounded so relentless, his syncopations never so insistent, as impossible to ignore as your baby’s wail — cutting through the smoothness of the violins and the nasal silkiness of Castillo’s vocals like chilli seeds laced through dark chocolate. And Troilo provides a wild ride, a thrilling storm-tossed witches’ flight, a Walpurgisnacht. As the chorus of “Toda mi vida” sounds, I grow fierce and determined. Daa daa da; daa daa da. I feel I have to leap upon those 3-3-2 patterns. It’s not enough to mark them with decorations, either. I want to stomp right on every beat, to crunch them underfoot like cockroaches, to tread right in the sweet spot. Suddenly, I care about nothing else. I pull my partner with me, back leading him (“You were back leading? I didn’t notice anything; it felt quite normal to me”, he protests afterwards) so that we hit those beats, rub ourselves frantically against them, seize on them with almost erotic fervour. I feel possessed. It’s force majeure. Tonight, the music has me firmly in its grip and I am as fierce as a medium possessed by an unquiet spirit. I so often aim, in tango, for softness, for a relaxed body, for natural, unforced movements, for a melting embrace. But now I want to stretch my legs out completely straight and point my toes, I want strong geometric lines, I want sudden, even jerky, movements. I want to ride this express train, blow winds and crack your cheeks, I want to get soaked through. I feel as though I have just watched Sandra Dee discard her circle skirts and initial jackets in favour of tight black leather. Better shape up.
