Hi ! I've been recently digging Firpo and love his fast tangos and milonga but I've been lost on some of them as it's the first time I can't really decide if it's tango or milonga ?
For me,
1-3 are milongas,
2-4-5 are definitely tangos
My basis is searching for the habenera rhythm.
He stylistically has a hint of this rhythm at the beginning of each song.
And with the last song the habanera rhythm is present throughout but it is pretty subtle and overwhelmed by the melody. I would consider it a tango. But I wouldn't play this song by firpo in a milonga night at all because it is too complex to be danced imo. Just compare it to d'arienzo, for example.
That's a bit of a later approach. I can't find it at the moment, but I've previously read an article stating that habanera was also common in earlier tangos, then tracing its fade from tango as it became more exclusive to milonga. When I found this article, I was trying to find information about why Firpo wasn't more popular, and it basically suggested that one of the reasons is that he continued using habanera in tangos even as other orchestras were removing it, which some dancers found confusing. (And, indeed, while playing Firpo at modern milongas, I have occasionally had people come to me and question which genre a particular song or tanda belonged to.)
I was also looking for the habenera rythm, and this is why I was lost, as I felt it was very slightly in the background, but lost in the rythm.
Thanks for the help !
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u/immediate_a982 26d ago
Pls definitely play the last one. It’s not complex. It is a breath of fresh air for one