Does your style combine the roots of Tango Danza and improvisation?
Javier Rodriguez: Yes, it does. Today we are professional dancers, but in the beginning we were milongueros. To be able to show on the dance floor who you really are, you need to improvise and be natural. Just as the way you hold your body and the way you dance on a crowded dance floor should be when it's only for yourself. This is the reason we don't rehearse; at most we practice one or another sequence.
Andrea Misse: We move away from the technique, as we prefer to express what we feel in the moment.
How did you turn from amateur to professional dancers?
AM: I never decided to become a professional dancer. I started to dance with my brothers at the age of 12. Very soon after, we were invited by different milonga venues to dance and over the years the offers we received became more interesting. I was a student at university and I had other jobs, but my passion has always been dancing.
JR: I did not search for it, it happened to me as it happened to her. I started to dance as a teenager: in time milonga organizers asked me to perform here as well as abroad. In those days, professional tango dancers did not exist. Juan Carlos Copes was a myth and Miguel Angel Zotto and Milena Plebs, although they were not so much older, seemed equally out of my league. However, things just happened all of a sudden, I found myself on a speeding train that would not stop and that absorbed my life so entirely that the moment finally arrived when I couldn't imagine having a second job: I taught, danced and kept on taking classes. Tango Danza requires so much time that you end up accepting it as a career. But you have to give it your all, giving only hall of it does not lead to a good result.
What differences do you see between Europe and Asia?
JR: These days Asians are better disposed to tango: they copy and reproduce cultural activities that they are interested in with great skill. Eight years ago, Europe was the place to be. Fora long time Tango Danza celebrities outside Argentina were to be found in Germany, Italy and France. Today the old continent still offers very good milongas and organizes the best festivals. However, the level of the dancers has lowered compared to those in Asia.
Why did this happen?
JR: To dance tango men and women need to feel and think about the partner they dance with. Today there is a lot of hidden resentment, repressed relationships and there is fear. People are attracted by tango because of its embrace, they search for it, but once they come to class, they prefer a more open position where each dancer is in his own axis, maintaining his feeling of independence. They want to dance with each other, they are dying to be embraced, they need each other, but they neither show nor accept it. In the end they get tired of it and they throw themselves on the dance floor, but prior to that too much time has passed.
AM: Whereas for us to learn how to dance was like a game, which we played with brothers, uncles, fathers and mothers; therefore we don't have such a complicated attitude towards it.
You are also teaching, what kind of experience is this?
AM: I see it as our mission. It is not only about teaching how to dance, but also about passing on the essence and the cultural aspect behind the movements. All this has an enormous significance in our dance and later it can be decoded at the level of the technique. Nevertheless, if you do not know the nature of the movement, it becomes empty. All the little games that women play with their feet, which today are called embellishments, without their meaning, the color and the attitude they are performed with, are only movements. Each situation and moment is meant to express something and is not done only for the sake of doing it.
JR: When we watched the milongueros dancing years ago, we could perceive the mystery behind what they did, no matter if it was easy or difficult. Therefore, technique has to be understood first, then it can be copied, but the goal is to get to its essence. If you use the word "technique' less in class, and instead use words like "essence" or "sensation", students can perform the movement with a more natural attitude and will learn faster than if you speak about numbers, diagonals or muscles.
What do you think about the new generations?
JR: We started with legendary milongueros who showed us the way. Today the young people dance well - we needed so much more time to reach what they have achieved - but there is nobody to advise them and thus everybody dances the same way. To be really "top notch" in former days meant to be different, today it means to dance better than the others, but doing the same thing. It makes me sad because there are no mysteries on the dance floor anymore: there is nothing magic nor angelic to be seen in the milonga, just a crowd moving in the same perfect way. There are huge talents because there are many young dancers who started off with ballet or modern dance. You show them a movement and they get it immediately. However, they have no one to refer to, like a tribe without the chief, there is neither control, nor lack of control, it is all the same nobody shows them what is good or bad. They see a movement on YouTube, they copy it and off they go to practice it in the milonga.
ANDREA MISSE
The Misse siblings are well known on the scene due to their level of expertise and their dedication. Andrea tells us her story:
"We are five siblings, three girls and two boys. I am the eldest. We started to dance folklore with Santiago Ayala (alias) "El Chucaro" (The Wild) and Norma Viola from early childhood onwards. When I was 11, we came across the school of Carlos Rivarola and out of curiosity we started to take classes with him. Later on, of course, he took us to the Sunderland Club where we got a direct impression of social dancing and we got to know a milonga with family atmosphere. We were delighted. When I was 12,1 went with my younger siblings to all the milongas, accompanied by our mother or grandmother. It was not well viewed to bring kids into the scene, but in family places it was accepted. The next day we had to go to school, the afternoons we did our homework and at night, we went back to the milonga. Until today we've all stuck to tango.
JAVIER RODRIGUEZ
Javier Rodriguez worked for many years with Gloria and Eduardo Arquimbau, with whom he had an unforgettable experience. "It was just the best and I learned so much about tango milonguero mixed with show tango. They never hid anything from me, they taught me and my fellow students all they knew, they explained to us in detail how a show works. Starting off with the lighting, leading to dresses and make-up. It was a great apprenticeship; both shared essential secrets of Tango Danza with me. They are great people too".
"El Tangauta" #184
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