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"Dark Eyes"por milonga
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BarkellWH
Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
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 RE: "Dark Eyes"por milonga (in reply to Piwin)
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quote:
So, here's the point where I have to display my ignorance, what are the main characteristics of a milonga?
I really love Argentine music, poetry, and literature. Regarding milonga, it preceded tango, originating in the Río de la Plata area of Argentina and Uruguay around 1870 or so. The music was heavily influenced by the Cuban Habanera rhythmic pattern, repeated over and over in the bass line and rhythmic accompaniment, as suggested by Ramzi. I'll bet Lionel (Shroomy) ccould give us a tutorial on milonga.
I particularly enjoy listening to Argentine Gaucho and Chilean Huaso songs accompanied by guitar. (Huasos are the Chilean version of Argentine Gauchos. Both are cowboys.) A favorite of mine is the poem written by the Uruguayan Juan Pedro Lopez entitled "La Leyenda del Parron," recited with guitar accompaniment.
I first heard "La leyenda del Parron" in 1988 when I was assigned to the American Embassy in Santiago, Chile. A group of us spent five days on horseback riding into the Andes, through passes, camping out each night. We hired horses, and we had mules to carry our gear, food, and plenty of good chilean wine. We engaged a couple of Chilean arrieros to mind the mules, set up camp each evening, and cook meals. Fortunately, one of the arrieros brought a guitar with him. Each evening after dinner we would sit around the fire drinking good Chilean tinto and listening to him sing the old traditional Huaso songs accompanied by his guitar.
The first evening he sang "La Leyenda del Parron" I was (in fact, all of us were!) transfixed. It takes the form of a ballad when sung, and, done well, it is absolutely mesmerizing. It doesn't quite reach the level of the great Argentine epic poem "Martin Fierro," but it wasn't meant to; listening to it around a fire while drinking wine, one can imagine one's self back in the 19th century, wearing bombashas with a knife held in the back of one's belt. The lyrics could easily be converted into a short story, one that no doubt would have been written by Jorge Luis Borges.
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here,
Who tried to hustle the East."
--Rudyard Kipling
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Date Dec. 12 2016 22:46:48
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Richard Jernigan
Posts: 3430
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA
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RE: "Dark Eyes"por milonga (in reply to BarkellWH)
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Very nice jg7238!! Thank you.
Last night I heard a milonga by a composer I hadn't encountered before. It was at a concert by the Austin Classical Guitar Society's amateur ensemble, a very accomplished group. One of the members announced the piece, saying he had spent half his life in Argentina, and was a friend of the composer.
The composer said that whenever he took his clothes to the dry cleaner, he noticed that the employees were much better dressed than he was, turned out elegantly in well pressed suits. Eventually he came to imagine that the dry cleaners might be members of the Mafia, and began to hear a tune in his head whenever he took his clothes in.
By and by the composer wrote up the tune, and called it "Milonga Mafiosa." The ensemble played it zestfully.
Amateur guitar ensembles are more frequently something to endure, not to enjoy. However the people last night played together, in tune and with expression. I enjoyed it. In fact I was reminded of an experience a few years ago in Java.
There is a town called Parang Tritis (loosely translated as "Dripping Sword") on a high bluff overlooking the Indian Ocean. It is a fairly short drive south of Yogyakarta, the capital of a Sultan who still exercises political power. If you were to go south from Parang Tritis, the first land you would encounter is Antarctica, so the Indian Ocean there is not always balmy and tropical. At night you can look down from the cliff on the narrow sandy beach with torches and bonfires.
At the hotel the dinner entertainment was presented after dark in a pendopo, a pavilion with an ornamental roof supported by slender posts around the periphery, but no walls, so the breeze could drift through. A company of young women, dressed in elegant saris and blouses danced barefoot on a beautiful wooden floor thickly strewn with rose petals, accompanied by a string orchestra: violins, violas, 'cellos and basses. An unusual feature of the orchestra was that the instruments were at all times played pizzicato, never bowed. I don't remember whether they even brought bows along to the performance. Another unusual feature was that the players were all women.
They played magnificently, the strings plucked perfectly together by all the players, rich European style harmony, and a variety of dynamics, tempo and timbre. An unexptected hybrid of Javanese and colonial Dutch culture. Such fun!
Thanks again jg7238..
RNJ
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Date Dec. 13 2016 0:04:25
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BarkellWH
Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
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RE: "Dark Eyes"por milonga (in reply to Richard Jernigan)
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quote:
There is a town called Parang Tritis (loosely translated as "Dripping Sword") on a high bluff overlooking the Indian Ocean. It is a fairly short drive south of Yogyakarta, the capital of a Sultan who still exercises political power. If you were to go south from Parang Tritis, the first land you would encounter is Antarctica, so the Indian Ocean there is not always balmy and tropical. At night you can look down from the cliff on the narrow sandy beach with torches and bonfires.
Marta and I visited Parang Tritis in 1996 during our assignment to the American Embassy in Jakarta, and I thought the entire landscape and seascape had a strange and vaguely menacing character. The water always seems to have a pewter hue, and the shore consists of sand that is slate grey to almost black in some places. Parang Tritis and the surrounding area is home to one of the most interesting Central Javanese legends, that of "Raden Loro Kidul," who to Central Javanese is known as the "Queen of the Southern Ocean" (sea goddess), and she has a malevolent reputation.
Raden Loro Kidul allegedly married Senopati, the founder of the second Mataram dynasty, and legend (actually Central Javanese belief) has it that she takes as her own young men who enter the ocean wearing green, as green is her color (It has nothing to do with Islam in this instance.) No one will enter the sea in that area wearing green. In fact, there are treacherous flows and rip currents in the waters off the coast of southern Java, so there no doubt have been enough drownings to lend credence to the legend.
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here,
Who tried to hustle the East."
--Rudyard Kipling
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Date Dec. 13 2016 13:44:27
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Richard Jernigan
Posts: 3430
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA
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RE: "Dark Eyes"por milonga (in reply to BarkellWH)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: BarkellWH
Marta and I visited Parang Tritis in 1996 during our assignment to the American Embassy in Jakarta, and I thought the entire landscape and seascape had a strange and vaguely menacing character. The water always seems to have a pewter hue, and the shore consists of sand that is slate grey to almost black in some places. Parang Tritis and the surrounding area is home to one of the most interesting Central Javanese legends, that of "Raden Loro Kidul," who to Central Javanese is known as the "Queen of the Southern Ocean" (sea goddess), and she has a malevolent reputation.
Raden Loro Kidul allegedly married Senopati, the founder of the second Mataram dynasty, and legend (actually Central Javanese belief) has it that she takes as her own young men who enter the ocean wearing green, as green is her color (It has nothing to do with Islam in this instance.) No one will enter the sea in that area wearing green. In fact, there are treacherous flows and rip currents in the waters off the coast of southern Java, so there no doubt have been enough drownings to lend credence to the legend.
Bill
Another story is that the Sultan of Yogyakarta derives magical powers from a sexual relationship with Raden Loro Kidul. There is a pool at the Sultan's palace which is said to connect with the ocean, and I believe that shortly after a new Sultan is crowned, he goes to Parang Tritis to commune with the Sea Goddess.
After the string orchestra and dancing women there was another performance. All the lights were shut off and a few torches were lit outside the pendopo. There ensued what was said to be a ritual worshipping Raden Loro Kidul.
My companions were my Javanese guide, polyglot translator and friend Paul; our half Javanese-half Balinese driver Harry; Lia, a Javanese girl whom I had known for two or three years, who lived and worked in Bali; and her girlfriend from the same small village at the southeast corner of Java.
Driving back to Yogyakarta late at night I commented on the spooky atmosphere of the Sea Goddess ceremony. Lia said that when she heard the priest intone the first lines in Kawi, the ancient form of Javanese, the hair stood up on the back of her neck, and chills ran down her spine.
Lia and her friend conversed at some length in Javanese. Quietly, I asked Paul what was up. He replied that the girls were discussing a white tiger that had come into the village and possessed the spirit of one of their aunts. They were discussing whether to ask me for money to pay for a ceremony to free her aunt from possession by the tiger. In the end they decided not to.
I asked Paul whether the tiger was visible, or an entirely supernatural presence. He replied, "I'm pretty sure they saw it. I doubt that you or I would have."
Yogyakarta has a number of interesting things to see and do, as does Solo nearby, the capital of another Sultan. At the Yogyakarta Sultan's palace we paid for Lia to be made up and dressed as a 19th-century noble woman. Her hair was done in the style of the time, the sari and blouse were elegant. We toured the palace in grand style. The Sultan's numerous uniformed retainers smiled and spoke to her.
The Sultan of Solo has an antique gamelan, played only on special occasions, and he subsidizes a theater troupe that presents Wayang Orang. Human actors (orang) mimic the exaggerated and jerky movements of the Waying Kulit puppets of the shadow play, accompanied by music from a pair of metallophones and drums.
The immense Buddhist monument of Borobudur, and the Hindu temple complex of Prambanan are nearby. At Prambanan they say a giant built a thousand temples in one night. I didn't count, but there are quite a few temples.
On the road to Prambanan we enjoyed a meal of a single large roasted fish, rice, vegetables and dipping sauces, seated on the floor of a bamboo restaurant, eating with our fingers. One of the sauces was kecap (pronounced keh-chahp) a fluid tomato sauce with hot peppers and mint, a lovely combination of both spicy and cool.
I always enjoyed my trips to Bali and Java, and keep in touch with a few friends I made there.
RNJ
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Date Dec. 14 2016 0:00:32
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BarkellWH
Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
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RE: "Dark Eyes"por milonga (in reply to Guest)
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quote:
I haven't forgotten about this and will post my take on Milongas when I get some time. Been a very hard week at work so struggling to just keep it together mentally, let alone enjoy myself. Maybe this weekend I will tackle this thread with a nice bottle of tinto.
Looking forward to your take on Milongas, Shroomy. It is always good to hear from someone like yourself who grew up and lived at the source. Are you from Buenos Aires? Truly one of the world's great cities, filled with great music, great food, fine wine, and the source of exquisite poetry and literature. When I was living in Santiago, Chile, a good Chilean friend of mine compared Buenos Aires to New York City.
Oddly, my friend thought one of the defining characteristics that, in his mind at least, linked the two cities was Buenos Aires had the same number of psychiatrists per capita as New York City?! But as he was undergoing therapy himself, I guess he considered that to be an attribute! Among certain socio-economic elites, both in the U.S. and in Latin America (particularly the Southern Cone), it is considered a badge of honor to say you are undergoing therapy. I always thought it indicated someone with too much money and too much time on his hands. But there it is.
(Note to Ramzi: I am not disparaging those who genuinely need to undergo therapy. I am talking about those elites who consider therapy as a source of conversation when attending their in-bred cocktail parties and art gallery openings--the ones who refer to "my therapist.")
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here,
Who tried to hustle the East."
--Rudyard Kipling
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Date Dec. 15 2016 21:51:26
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rombsix
Posts: 7808
Joined: Jan. 11 2006
From: Beirut, Lebanon
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RE: "Dark Eyes"por milonga (in reply to BarkellWH)
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quote:
Looking forward to your take on Milongas, Shroomy. It is always good to hear from someone like yourself who grew up and lived at the source. Are you from Buenos Aires? Truly one of the world's great cities, filled with great music, great food, fine wine, and the source of exquisite poetry and literature. When I was living in Santiago, Chile, a good Chilean friend of mine compared Buenos Aires to New York City. Oddly, my friend thought one of the defining characteristics that, in his mind at least, linked the two cities was Buenos Aires had the same number of psychiatrists per capita as New York City?! But as he was undergoing therapy himself, I guess he considered that to be an attribute! Among certain socio-economic elites, both in the U.S. and in Latin America (particularly the Southern Cone), it is considered a badge of honor to say you are undergoing therapy. I always thought it indicated someone with too much money and too much time on his hands. But there it is. (Note to Ramzi: I am not disparaging those who genuinely need to undergo therapy. I am talking about those elites who consider therapy as a source of conversation when attending their in-bred cocktail parties and art gallery openings--the ones who refer to "my therapist.") Bill
Yeah, I've heard about that too. Apparently, the chair of Columbia charges $900 cash for 1 hour of therapy. 
_____________________________
Ramzi
http://www.youtube.com/rombsix
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Date Dec. 16 2016 19:46:25
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