You will probably notice a lot of Tango around when you visit Caminito, in the form of street performers, tango dancers and musicians, tango music drifting through the air from bars and restaurants, and tango souvenirs sold by the dozen in most of the shops, some of them situated inside the actual conventillos. Of course this may all seem a little tacky. And of course, it is! However, there is a reason why the Tango is associated with Caminito and La Boca. Tango music was born in Buenos Aires around 1870 (sorry Uruguay, but this is a Buenos Aires blog so I will ignore your revisionist claims!). However, it is still open to debate exactly where in Buenos Aires the tango originated from. Many say the arrabal (the suburbs / frontier between the city and the fields of the pampa) has the strongest claim. However, La Boca’s claim is up there with it, and also back in those days the arrabal would have started just south of La Boca, and so there was probably some crossover.
It is agreed that tango music first came out of the environment of immigrant-packed conventillo houses, where many different cultures and their respective types of music mixed in such close proximity, and from the melting pot of styles from around the world. It was on the outdoor patios in the center of the conventillos, where immigrants socialized together and played their musical instruments to each other after a hard day’s work, that this probably occurred. And who is to say it didn’t happen in the conventillos of La Boca?
And so, as Caminito is representative of the old immigrant La Boca, it is also a representation of the genesis of Tango music that occurred at the same time here in history. Plus, for me, there has always been something very Italian about the Tango…its passion, style, arrogance, showmanship, and feelings of nostalgia and longing (for the homeland, Italy)…and of course the lyrics are usually infused with lunfardo, the porteño slang dialect of Spanish corrupted with the Italian language and accent. And where was the main Italian community of Buenos Aires? La Boca…I rest my case.
