Eastman Showcase 2004
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It Takes Five to Tango
“There are three ways to deal with turning 40,” says pianist Jeffery Watson (MM ’88): “You can have an affair, buy a new car, or join a tango band.” Watson chose the third, and he’s very happy he joined the tango ensemble QuinTango in 2003.
What leads a “blond, Scottish-Irish, classically trained pianist” – as Watson describes himself - to the sinuous, sexy, quintessentially Latin music of tango? Watson, a former student of Rebecca Penneys, admits that playing tango wasn’t exactly in his career line; moving to Washington, D.C. after graduation, he made a name as an interpreter of contemporary American music, and was until recently executive director of the Capitol Hill Arts Workshop. His total experience with the music of tango was as a substitute performer for two concerts by the Pan-American Symphony.
He declined further requests to play the music until he was asked to substitute for the original pianist of QuinTango, Bruce Steeg, who had fallen ill with throat cancer; hearing a tango CD, he was suddenly attracted to the music. When Steeg died in 2003, Watson decided to “quit the day job” and take a chance with the group; he is now a happy, and very busy, tango musician. “The music is wonderful,” says Jeffery. “It runs the full gamut of emotions, and people respond to it immediately.”
QuinTango was founded by Joan Singer, a violinist who fell in love with Latin music while living in Mexico. The group consists of a pianist, two violinists, a cellist, and a bass – more “classical” than a typical tango band, but a valid approach to the music.
Watson has already traveled with the group to Mexico and Argentina – where there is “a very committed tango community” (in his words) that definitely knows good tango playing from bad. QuinTango passed the test with flying colors: “They loved it! We were playing, and 80-year-old Argentinean women in house dresses were dancing. It was crazy.”
As with other types of popular music, the rhythmic nuances and intricate voicings of tango are often unwritten, and Watson received pointers in idiomatic playing from outstanding Buenos Aires musicians. QuinTango was also a hit at a concert at the U.S. Embassy in Buenos Aires; you can see scenes from it, and hear music files from the group’s CDs, at www.quintango.com.