Simply, the community is not large enough to support separate traditional/nuevo milongas. Also, for an average milonga attendance of 40-60 people (Budapest), there are over a dozen people who do teach. Of course, they aren't teaching that 60 people. Simply, the amount of activity and overall tango population numbers are different: the mailing list for tango has over 300 members, tango courses usually churn out an average of a 1000 people per year. The problem is that most Hungarians are simply not interested in going to milongas, only learning 'some tango' (long story - has to do with danceschool tradition: people are led to believe for decades, that they only need 8-lesson courses and they have the basics in any dance). So milongas became the meeting point for the fanatics, the elite, a large percent of them with enough knowledge to teach (this is something we are trying to change desperately - especially the nuevo folks...). Also, most of Eastern Europe is nuevo land. Traditional teachers were considered lame by the general population, because dancing is/was mostly a stage phenomenon (after 40 years of state sponsored cheap elitist dance education and performances - along with the Soviet-Russian influence - it is a normal attitude) for the older people, for the younger ones, the freedom (and the youth of teachers) in nuevo was/is more appealing. That's about it, I guess. But nuevo folks dance to traditional tango, in close embrace, even if sometimes (when they have the space and the chance) to fancy stuff as well. For us it is completely organic to show characteristics of nuevo, salón, even canyuengue within the same dance... purists may cry now. Cheers, Aron
Aron after reading about your tango community I can sympathize with you. I can see that you need to find a way for the different styles of tango to coexist. Here in Southern California we have many milongas to choose from on any given night and it looks like a natural separation is already starting to happen. David _______________________________________________ Tango-L mailing list Tango-L@mit.edu http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/tango-l