From the Los Angeles Times:<P><B>'Camerata Tango' Works Above and Beyond Genre</B> <P><BR>By LEWIS SEGAL, Times Dance Critic<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>In the terraced, three-story showroom of the Key Club on the Sunset Strip, tango dancers Sandor and Parissa stalked one another in intricate, rhythmic choreography on Saturday, backed by a forceful piano and string quintet upstage. <BR> Meanwhile, 25 feet over their heads, a different tango continued--between aerialists Bianca Sappetto and Russ Stark, dangling from long skeins of colored cloth and looking just as hotly obsessive as the dancers below.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> <P><BR><A HREF="http://www.latimes.com/print/calendar/20010402/t000028111.html" TARGET=_blank>MORE...</A><BR>

From the Los Angeles Times - a really quite wonderful description of how it feels to tango:<P><B>Too Too Tango</B><P>By ROBERTO J. MANZANO, Times Staff Writer<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>SHERMAN OAKS--Karlo Abouroumieh's eyes were nearly shut. Anamaria Menendez smiled in bliss. They swayed in each other's arms as if in a trance. <BR> Then the song ended. <BR> "I release you now so more women won't get mad," Menendez said abruptly to her partner. <BR> As she walked away, sweat covered her arms and had pasted her dark bangs to her forehead. She had been dancing nonstop for nearly two hours. Minutes before, a frustrated woman had tapped Menendez's shoulder and asked to dance with Abouroumieh. That wasn't unusual. <BR> At the El Encuentro tango club in Sherman Oaks each Saturday night, Abouroumieh commands the dance floor like John Travolta in "Saturday Night Fever." The slender, blue-eyed native of Iran keeps the ladies riveted with his sensitive, heartfelt steps.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> <P><A HREF="http://www.latimes.com/editions/valley/sfnews/20010414/t000031752.html" TARGET=_blank><B>MORE...</B></A><BR>

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><B>Duvall Tunes Up for 'Tango'</B><P>Jonathan Bing, Variety<P>NEW YORK (Variety) - Robert Duvall is mixing business with pleasure for his latest movie project ``Assassination Tango,'' a Latin American thriller on which he serves as star, writer, director and producer.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P><A HREF="http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010513/re/film_tango_dc_1.html" TARGET=_blank><B>More</B></A>

I'm interested. My husband feels about ballet the way some of you do about tango. I think it's a combo of personal taste and the execution.<P>I'm one of those universal lovers of dance. I like seeing it all, even country line dancing.

Josephine Leask writes about the Thalia Spanish Theatre's musical <I>Todo Tango</I> in the Village Voice:<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>The musicians, dancers, and singer-actors assembled by artistic director Angel Gil Orrios make this a slick and sexy show, with gorgeous costumes and electric charisma.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P><A HREF="http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0125/footnotes.shtml" TARGET=_blank><B>More</B></A>

<B>To live is to dance for John Young</B><P><BR>Reporter KATHERINE HOBY and photographer PAUL ESTCOURT step on to the dance floor to meet a teacher whose name has been synonymous with dance in Auckland for 50 years - and who at 70 can still swoop and glide with the best of them. <BR>"Esto es tango." This is tango. And for dance teacher John Young the simple statement on his billboard has become his life philosophy. <P>The tango is Mr Young's latest passion, although the charming 70-year-old has been teaching the people of Auckland to dance for 50 years - with no plans to leave the dance floor anytime soon. <P>More than 60,000 people have learned to dance everything from the waltz to the salsa under the tutelage of Mr Young and a select group of teachers. <P><A HREF="http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm?thesection=entertainment&thesubsection=&storyID=222717" TARGET=_blank><B>click for more</B></A>

Clive James was recently in New Zealand and took some time to follow his tango passion - quite a good standard of dancer he found there too, evidently.

There is something about 70 year olds and the tango - the subject of the Kiwi article, John Young is not the only tanguero of advanced years - I have come across many in Buenos Aires and one of the best tango dances I ever had was with an octogenarian in Uruguay who, whilst twirling me around the village square during a tango festival, told me that he knew London quite well although he hadn't been there for a while (since 1952).

An article from an Argentinean newspaper about "Junior" a tango dancer and teacher, who starred in Carlos Saura's film and worked with Deborah Bull on her tango programme. In Spanish, for those that can:<P><B>De Brasil a la milonga </B><BR> <BR> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Nació en San Pablo. Conoció a Pepito Avellaneda y tomó clases con Todaro y Copes. Baila en La Tanguera junto a María Nieves y no lo puede creer. <BR>Antonio Cervila Junior, conocido como Junior en los ambientes de tango, nació en San Pablo, Brasil, hace 32 años. Su español, diez años después de haberse radicado en Buenos Aires, conserva un ligero acento portugués (pero cuando visita San Pablo, como suele ocurrir, la gente encuentra que su portugués tiene una clara sonoridad porteña). "Si yo usara mi voz actuando o cantando —dice— me preocuparía más en perder el acento. Pero como mi trabajo es bailar...". El trabajo de Junior, más precisamente, es bailar tango y viene haciéndolo de una manera intensa desde 1991: entre otras cosas, diez giras a Japón; dos meses en Broadway con la última versión del mítico Tango Argentino; un papel destacado en Tango, de Carlos Saura. Participó también en la tourné mundial con la que Julio Iglesias presentó su disco Tango y en un documental sobre el género para la BBC de Londres. Actualmente es uno de los protagonistas del espectáculo Tanguera, en El Nacional.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> <P><A HREF="http://laguia.clarin.com/diario/2002-02-12/c-01201.htm" TARGET=_blank><B>more...</B></A><P><A HREF="http://www.laguia.clarin.com/pls/laguia/gui_buscar.mostrarResSimple?p_buscar=tango&p_destino=TODO" TARGET=_blank><B> Tango shows</B></A>

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Story of tango<P>Carol Norris, Cincinnati Enquirer<P>Virginia Malton, local tango expert, has produced Tango Des-parada, a story of Argentine tango from its earliest days.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P><a href=http://enquirer.com/editions/2002/02/10/tem_ballet_students_make.html target=_blank>More</a>, in the second item of the linked article.

If you pop down to UK performance, you will see that Julio Bocca (ABT) is bringing his Argentinean Ballet to London. There are sure to be tango moves incorporated - particulary in the Piazzolla piece.<P><A HREF="http://www.criticaldance.com/ubb/Forum16/HTML/000209.html" TARGET=_blank><B>Click here </B></A>

A new offering from the man who brought us Forever Tango.<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Bravo will premiere 'Malambo' here<P>Octavio Roca <P>Luis Bravo, best known as the creator of the long-running "Forever Tango," will present the world premiere of his "Malambo" in San Francisco this month. The new dance musical with its cast of 30 performers from Argentina is scheduled to begin previews at the Theatre on the Square on April 30, with the official opening set for May 7.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P><A HREF="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/04/02/DD23623.DTL&type=performance" TARGET=_blank><B>more...</B></A>

<B>Tangokinesis: A Step Ahead</B> <BR>By Paula Durbin in The Washington Post<P><BR>First things first. This is Argentina's season in the Kennedy Center's multi-year AmericArtes Festival, so a celebration of the tango might seem a given. What also came across Friday and Saturday in "Buenos Aires Tango," a glimpse into the current state of the art staged in the Eisenhower Theater, was the visiting artists' spirit and determination during their country's tough times.<P>That said, this concert featured three groups cabaret style, with no thread tying the performances together, unless you count the performers' relative youth and a surprising avoidance of Astor Piazzolla material. Lidia Borda, a singer with an extravagant emotional range, was followed by Orchesta El Arranque and then the eight dancers of Ana Maria Stekelman's Tangokinesis, who carried half the show.<P><A HREF="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A25913-2002Apr21.html" TARGET=_blank><B>click for more</B></A>

Getting back to the initial topics discussed in this thread, I feel that tango is an art form just as much as any dance style that is studied and professionally performed. It is, however, one that I only feel a lukewarm response to, and have never particularly been interested in trying, probably because I can't picture being able to keep a straight face while doing it. (I'd be interested in trying it with my boyfriend, because I don't think he'd take it too seriously.)<P>I agree with another post that dislike of an art form is not necessarily due to ignorance, but can be a matter of it simply not appealing to you aesthetically. For me, a great deal of the appeal of dance depends on the music that goes along with it, and tango music, while I enjoy certain pieces, doesn't generally intrigue me. Flamenco is a dance form that, like tango, seems to take itself so seriously that I can't help imagining parodies when I watch certain performers, but it's more appealing to me than tango because of the music.<P>I was very involved in <I>raqs sharqi</I> (commonly known here as "bellydance") for several years, and I found it endlessly fascinating and varied to watch, assuming it was well done. My mother, a great flamenco buff, would apologize to me for getting bored watching an evening of this type of dancing and contrast it with flamenco, which she felt was so much more varied and interesting. I think it's all just a matter of personal taste.<P>Like LMCtech, I tend to watch all kinds of dance and can find something to enjoy in everything, even competitive ballroom dancing, which I think has distorted perfectly innocent social dances so that they're practically unrecognizable. I don't dislike it as much as the person who would prefer to eat broken glass than watch ballroom dancing, but I admit I watch it with the same kind of horrified fascination with which I'd watch a Richard Simmons commercial or a complete Dr. Laura show.<p>[This message has been edited by djb (edited April 22, 2002).]

Whether you enjoy watching the Tango or not does not make it an art form. Its a folk dance. In the same category as salsa, waltz, or any other ethnic dance form. Modern dance and ballet are art forms.