A class in canyengue by Vittoria Natale and Guillermo Elkouss will be featured on Saturday,June 10 at Piccolotango in Charleston,SC ** *Canyengue is considered the precursor to the tango that we know today. * *Its rise dates around the last decade of the 19th century and remained popular until the 1920's. * *The word itself means "to melt [into one another or into the dance] or "to be tired" according to Robert Farris Thompson. * *It can be a very jovial dance. The style of dress of theera was mainly long dresses for the ladies that made for short somewhat flat-footed steps. * *The canyengue is the child of milonga which is a faster rhythmic dance mainly attributed to the Afro-Argentines and Afro-Uruguayans of the 1800's. * *Canyengue is also considered a dance of the blacks which caught on amongst non-blacks as did milonga and candombe before that.* *Canyengue music is very rhythmic and appears to sound like a slow milonga. The musicians most noted for this style in this era was and still is * *Francisco Canaro, Roberto Firpo, Juan de Dios Filiberto y Juan D'Arienzo. Watch out because canyengue is starting to make a come back in Buenos Aires, and after the appearance of Robert Farris Thompson's new book on tango that dedicates a whole chapter to canyengue, it's going to grow even faster. You can get a jump on the masses that will start getting into it in the next few years. *
