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CULTURAL ORIGIN
Tango certainly has African, Latin American and European traces but its
cultural origin is such a fusion that it is impossible to recognize the
true roots.
In essence, Tango is a result of a fusion, an artistic
expression, it is wholly urban in nature and has suburban roots (“arrabalero”) and it is closely linked to the historical process of massive immigration, mainly European, which really changed the face of
River Plate societies, especially Buenos Aires and Montevideo starting in the last decade of the 19th Century. Argentina had a
population of 1,100,000 people in 1850 and received 6,600,000 million
immigrants between 1857 and 1940. Uruguay went through a similar
process, a sort of flood, quite a unique experience in contemporary
history.
The number of immigrants who came to the River Plate was
superior in numbers to that of the native population and it produced,
with the mixing of people a “ half-breed” ( “mestizaje” ) process both
multicultural and multiethnic encouraged by the State through the
public education school system. So the Tango is the “half-breed” (
mestizo ) son resulting from this union.
What we do know is that the first “tangueros” were Afro-Argentine and
Afro-Uruguayan. The “bandoneon” comes from Germany; the sensuality factor
has its origins in the brothels where immigrants had contact with native
Afro-Argentine and Indo-American women known as “chinas”.
The Tango slang (“lunfardo”) is full of Italian and African expressions. The rhythm and the nostalgic climate are quite close to Cuban Habanera, to Fado from Portugal, Tuna, and Jota (a dance and tune from Aragon in Spain). It is also said that: “Tango, Milonga, Malambo and Candombe “are part of the same musical family with African roots and also represent gaucho habits originating in the gauchos who migrated to the city.
However, Tango cannot be confused with, nor comes directly from any other musical style. Ernesto Sabato, the well-known Argentine writer says that, above all, Tango is a hybrid, a new and original expression which was born from an exceptional, gigantic movement of people across the world.
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