With the return of a mini ice age to the Nice coastline, this evening was truly welcomed. Last weekend, the Nice Opera House hosted “La Milonga de Buenos-Aires” featuring two couples of tango dancers embodying the purest Argentine tradition. A descendant of the street and cafe tango inspired and developed by the renowned composer Astor Piazzolla, the choreographer Orlando “Coco” Dias, who has been in France since 1977, learned tango at an early age in his Buenos Aires neighborhood with the “Milongueros.” At eight years old, he won a contest with his sister in the clubs of his neighborhood. Starting at sixteen, he began dancing as an amateur. With Delphine Robin, his partner of ten years who herself was awarded a first prize from a dance conservatory at the age of thirteen, and accompanied by another couple comprising Selva Violetta Mastroti and Marcelo Sebastian Ramer, Orlando “Coco” Dias instantly captured the audience from his first appearance on stage.
The dancers indeed benefited from exceptional musical support, the “Quinteto El Después,” five instrumentalists fully engaged in a passionate exchange with the dancers: the bandoneon player Victor Villena, violinist Cyril Garac, guitarist Alejandro Schwartz, double bassist Bernard Lanaspèze, and pianist Ivo De Greef.
The tango, needless to remind, has its unchangeable ritual: amidst dim light reminiscent of the smoky back rooms of Buenos Aires’ underworld, a slick, confident macho man in a double-breasted suit appears. From a distance, he gives a brief nod of his head, which tolerates no negotiation, to an enticing woman dressed in a long, slit, glittering gown, expectantly sitting on her chair. She rises to join her male partner nonchalantly—desire must be maintained.
In a movement paradoxically mixed with brisk rhythm and sensual languor, legs and bodies twist and untangle, each partner seems to take the initiative in turn in a relentless and tumultuous physical dialogue where sexuality surfaces without ever seeking to impose itself. The couple turns, moves forward, retreats, spins in meticulously measured harmony while their gazes meet and then haughtily look away. Finally, the lips draw closer, the caresses become more precise. Not yet! The dancers launch back more passionately into a series of embraces and aesthetic figures imperiously dictated by a bandoneon, which some had mistakenly thought they heard expire! An “incandescent” ovation greeted the performance, forcing the artists to give an encore.
In the second part, the ballets of the Nice Opera led by Choreographer Eleonora Gori staged a 21st-century Tango, an “Alter Tango” more intellectualized but not losing any of its emotional message. With great care, the dancers of the Nice Ballet Company scenically highlighted the concept of exchange within the group, a man and a woman finding themselves momentarily isolated among their respective partners, also reminded by hand claps on their bodies or on the ground, the unalterable dimension of violence in the encounter.
Maestro Sergio Monterisi led the Nice Orchestra, in musical arrangements highlighted by the bandoneon of William Sabatier who, during the enthusiastic applause from the audience, had the humility to present the instrument he had played. A fitting tribute to this moving Argentine music.
