Ahead of his arrival in Macau with his quintet, Ramiro Gallo talks tango with Mark Tjhung.

The tango is in Ramiro Gallo’s blood. Born into a family of musicians, the Argentinean artist first picked up the violin when he was just five, playing folk music with his parents and brother in a family ensemble. Growing up, Gallo developed a love for Argentinean popular music, leading him to focus on tango. Today, both as a violinist and composer, he is at the forefront of Argentina’s re-emerging cultural treasure.

You’re from a musical family. Were they a big influence on your musical career?
Very big. I think the beginning of anything you do is what drives you to all the other things. The way [my parents] used to teach me was the real way that popular musicians used to learn. That was, my father sitting in front of me and singing or whistling a song, and me trying to produce it on the violin. This is a very simple, but at the same time very complex, way of teaching music. At those times, I thought it was something very natural. But as time went by, I discovered that it was such a treasure. In classical music, the training is very different – they teach you how to read music and not always how to play by heart.

Do you remember when you first fell in love with tango?
My father is a guitar player who played tango and used to play with me. When we were playing in my family ensemble, we played as a group. But in the middle of the concert, we had a moment where my father and I were alone on the stage, and we used to play three or four tangos. Those moments for me were really important, and I remember them today as the time when my love for tango was born.

Tango is known for being passionate. What is it about the music?
I believe there is an idea, especially overseas, that tango is a music of only passion. But, instead of passion, I would say it is more ‘emotion’. Tango is very subtle, very emotional and very romantic. In music, the real idea from the great musicians in the golden era of the ‘40s and ‘50s was always to find a personal way to express. They constructed their own style around their personal way of expression. That is maybe the reason that tango everywhere is seen as a very passionate music, because it centres itself on expression.

Around the world, the dance is thought of as much as the music. Are they linked in your opinion?
They are completely linked. First of all, tango was born as danceable music. It started as a different way of dancing different rhythms. Once the dance was born, then came the music… and tango developed its identity around the rhythm required for the dance. This rhythm that came from the dance became the very essence of tango. For me, dance is at the very heart of tango.

Do you dance as well?
Very little. Because I am always playing. [laughs]

You started your own quintet in 2000. Why did you form your own ensemble?
I decided to be a composer when I was 15 years old. When I think of myself as a musician, I think of myself first as a composer and then as a violinist. When I first started with the quintet, it was because I had quite a lot of material but, because of style, I couldn’t do any of it with any of the other groups [that I played with]. So I had to make a new group just to play my compositions.

Are your compositions more traditional or forward looking?
I feel both always. I think that [tango] is in a universe that is all-the-time expanding. You can be in the border, but you are still part of the whole universe. So you must know about the traditions and where you came from. So I like sometimes to expand a little bit and explore the borders, but I like to explore the past as well.

Is tango still popular in Argentina?
Very much, and I think even more and more. It is as popular as any traditional language can be. Of course, today the situation all over the world is that you have global music. Anywhere you are, you’re not going to listen to only one type of music. But everywhere, there is always a typical sound that is maybe not so much on the surface as global music but still remains alive. That is tango here. It is a music that has touched everyone, whether they know it consciously or not. It is very typical that the young people here, once they grow up enough and once they live more consciously, start loving tango. But also in the last few years, tango has become an important movement among the young. So it is coming stronger and stronger.