What can Pugliese’s music teach you about life

People and drama

In my previous post about dialog and fights, I received quite a few comments. Sadly enough, in many cases, people would comment about fighting communities instead of dialog-based ones. Maybe because they feel more the need to express their sadness. Maybe I am a dreamer… but I just don’t believe that there are no other somehow harmonious cooperating communities.

Anyway. In one of the groups I posted the text, a member commented that he had the same experience in other dance communities too. What actually triggered me was his phrase

I keep reminding myself “where there’s people there is drama”.

I responded that indeed drama will and should always exist… but at least there should be at some point some exit out of it… some release… a bit of peace. Otherwise, you are totally consumed and drained by it. My point in the previous post on dialog and fighting was that differences and drama will exist. What we need is to learn how to get out of it.

https://goodnighttango.com/2023/05/01/diversity-and-competition

Drama and Greek gods

But the word drama in the comment triggered some strange associations in my mind. First of all, drama, as a genre of theater that originated in Greece has a specific structure. There is always a struggle… a predicament… a difficult situation… but there is always also a solution in the end. Many times this solution comes through what is in Greek called “the god from the machine”. You could translate it as divine intervention. Ancient Greek theaters used to have a kind of machine that would show the actor playing the god elevated from others and he would then intervene and provide a twist in the plot that acted as a catalyst to reach a solution. That is why in Greek the literal translation of the expression is the god from the machine.

Staying a bit more with Greek expressions there is one we also often use referring to goddess Athena. “You need to move your hand together with Athena’s” meaning that someone needs to also act by themselves, in order to solve a problem and not just wait for a “god”… a divine intervention… to solve it. So although you may have god’s help it won’t make a difference if you don’t do something yourself too.

Drama and Pugliese

The second connotation of drama is what else?… Pugliese! If there is a musician in Tango associated with drama then this is definitely Pugliese. Have you ever paid attention to his music? It looks a lot like the ancient Greek tragedy stories. There is drama, build-up, and then at some point, there is always release. If most of the songs the music ends with a release even if there was a huge drama and tension before.

I think this is the reason, why we love his music so much. Because it reminds us of life. As noted in the comment “Where there’s people there is drama”. Drama is part of our lives, but imagine a song from Pugliese where there is an endless build-up without any release of the tension. You could not stand it. It wouldn’t make sense. Because in the end we always need the release, the exit out of the drama. We can’t stand living under continuous pressure and tension. At some point, we will break down.

In the case of the dialog and fight communities, the dialog communities have found the tool to find the way out of it. They discovered their “god from the machine” but they did not let him solve the problem alone. They moved their hand too… they took action… talked… discussed… compromised and reached the necessary release. In communities where the drama, the fights, and the tension continue and always build up, without any releases, without any exits, it is inevitable that something will break. And this is the community. People will start abandoning the community and in the end, it will not even be a community anymore.

Tonight’s Goodnight Tango

Tonight’s Goodnight Tango is a song from Pugliese which when I first read the lyrics got goosebumps. I would dare to say it is the “Imagine” of Tango. It is full of dramatic moments and releases and it is talking about war and love as its antidote. I already said that Pugliese’s music teaches us that we should always seek the release after the drama but this song makes also one of the strongest points for peace and we definitely need more of it these days.

Don’t play war!

So how about you? Do you believe drama is an unavoidable part of any community? Can you recall a time when you successfully found an exit from a tense situation? How do you think Pugliese’s music reflects dramatic situations in life and provides lessons for it? Let me know with a comment below, an email, or a PM on Facebook… oh… and if you liked it… don’t forget to share it with your friends.