María Nieves: The Woman Who You Must Know if You Dance the Tango
COVID has taken Juan Carlos Copes at the beginning of January just before his 90th birthday. Maria Nieves, his dance partner for 50 years and life partner for 10 - is still here with her short red hair, black dress with the high cut almost to the hip, cigarette in hand.
María Nieves Rego grew up in misery, with an illiterate mother and a battering father. At 9 she was employed as a maid and at 11 she was already smoking 50 cigarettes a day. She met Juan Carlos Copes at the milonga. Together they danced through life. Or did they?
March is Women’s History Month – a time to reflect on truly inspirational women throughout our history, recognize the progress we have made, and acknowledge whole-heartedly that 2021 is set to be the “year of female leadership”.
We have decided to spotlight María Nieves, who dedicated her life to Tango. Together with her partner, Juan Carlos Copes, they worked to take Tango out of the social clubs in Buenos Aires and transform it into an international craze, bringing Tango to Broadway, which ultimately spread the tango worldwide and allowed you (and me) to encounter it and experience it.
Our Last Tango
The film, “Our Last Tango”, released in 2015, took a nostalgic look back at the history of Argentine Tango on stage, and Nieves was there every step of the way.
The movie also brings up the interesting and quite painful questions - is the man only considered a man if has many women? What is more - important artistry (dance in this case), or family. How do we choose? Does the spouse who married the artist has the right to demand partnership dissolution for the sake of - family? or possibly promoting the daughter? We can hear Johana saying in the movie (with great admiration) - ‘I was a clone of Marina NIeves’.
Cumbia and rock came in
For working-class Argentines of her day – dancing Tango was the one form of entertainment they could afford; the “joy of the poor”, she later explained. But when still too young to dance, Nieves used to sit and watch her older sister, Niata, and, as a determined young woman, she would emulate her sister and practice with a broom.
She began dancing at Club Atlético Atlanta as a teenager in the Villa Crespo neighborhood of Buenos Aires. Then, on a Saturday night in the 1940s, she met her dance partner and future husband, Copes, who was an inexperienced dancer at the time.
In the 1950s tango started to wane. Cumbia and rock came in and Nieves and Copes were thrown out of the Atlanta Club. They, though, had other ideas. The tango was going to be their future and they would make it work. They would take the tango on stage at the Caño Club in Buenos Aires, thanks to Copes’ spectacular choreography, and thence to Broadway and the world.
They danced together for over four decades, through intense periods of compatibility and separation due to his endless infidelities. Despite Nieves’ heartbreak, she never wavered from her calling to perform, and they continuously dazzled audiences with their intimate dance routines. They shared a life-long bond through their love of Tango and created their own dance style: “estilo Copes-Nieves
Initial Successes
Despite never having taken a single dance lesson, the pair began winning top prizes at dance competitions and contests from 1951. Then, after watching Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers at the movies for years, Nieves and Copes decided to borrow every peso they could and summoned other dancers to rent a theater to stage a Tango show. A prominent producer was in the audience that night, and that’s how the couple secured their debut at Teatro El Nacional, in 1955, and Buenos Aires' most prestigious nightclub, Tabarís.
Before Nieves and Copes, Tango was a folkloric social dance performed in neighborhood gatherings and dancehalls. Nieves became the woman that the best male dancers wanted as a partner.
Dancing Tango was how a young man could meet a woman, and that made Tango an essential part of life in the city.
In 1955, however, the Argentine military regime ended Perón's authoritarian rule and banned dancing Tango in nightclubs. Juan Perón, the former president, had championed the dance and used it in his propaganda, so it was assumed that people gathering in the middle of the night must be Perónists plotting against the government.
Tango only survived in secret (ie. in the basements of factories) and in the secluded neighborhoods outside of Buenos Aires. Nieves and Copes turned Tango into dance for the stage, with highly polished choreography, to keep it alive.
''Unless you love the tango,'' said Mr. Copes, ''you can't dance it. It has to be in your heart. And if it is, you can't do anything else.''
‘Tango Argentino’ and Worldwide Travel
Although times were tough financially, the couple toured Europe and, in 1959, they came to New York for the first time and performed at the Waldorf Astoria, introducing the world to Tango fever. Their streamlined style, which made them so popular, was characterized by superfast footwork and sharp kicks.
They married in 1964 but divorced in 1973 when Nieves discovered Copes had a child with another woman while they were together. Their love for Tango was so profound that they continued to dance even when they were no longer a couple, until 1997. They disliked each other intensely but from their hatred emerged a beauty that transformed dance into pure art. This seems fitting as Tango is synonymous with bittersweet and sultry passion.
“Tango dance has something very special: it’s the communication within the couple. That is why when we dance it we feel an endless number of emotions, such as love…and hate. I was born to dance tango and I will die for my tango.”
When Argentina’s military dictatorship fell in 1983, Tango Argentino, a musical stage production about the history and many varieties of Argentine tango was created and directed by Hector Orezzo and Claudio Segovia, and premiered at the Festival d'Automne in Paris in 1983. Nieves and Copes toured Europe and Asia before moving to Broadway in 1985, where it was nominated for several Tony Awards. It was an immediate hit, and they triggered the worldwide Tango Renaissance.
Today, Tango is popular almost everywhere in the world – that wouldn’t have happened without Nieves and Copes’ immense talent and passion. Even Ronald Reagan invited them to the White House to dance.
In her 80s, Nieves remains strong-willed and passionate, with a bright smile, and styled red, short hair. She’s a prime example of a woman who survived infidelity and alleged violations in her marriage to fight for what she believed in. And her perseverance has left us with the Tango we know and love today.
¡Yo soy María de Buenos Aires!
De Buenos Aires, ¿no ven quién soy yo?
¡María tango, María del arrabal!
¡María noche, María pasión fatal! ¡María de amor!
¡De Buenos Aires soy yo!
I’m María from Buenos Aires!
From Buenos Aires María, can’t you see who I am?
María tango, María of the arrabal!
María night, María fatal passion! María of love!
From Buenos Aires am I!Verse from the tango-opera “María de Buenos Aires,”
lyrics by Horacio Ferrer and music by Ástor Piazzolla.
Wait for the end - she does end up with that crazy upside-down pose! She is 76 in this video!
She’s a prime example of a woman who defied all the odds and survived infidelity and alleged violations in her marriage to fight for what she believed in. When Copes unceremoniously left her to dance with his daughter, Nieves moved on to create a bright future for herself. She was quite surprised to find out how much the world loved and admired her.
Watch this one till the end to see Maria Nieves perform.
Her bravery and determination engender hope for other women whose achievements are overshadowed by men’s egotism. She will be remembered by millions of spectators all around the world and her perseverance has allowed us to explore and experience the Tango we know and love today.
Nieves paved the way for women to be confident and passionate on the dance floor. Now it’s your turn – grab your Tango shoes and get dancing!