Tango and Tokyo

Tango was first brought to Yokohama by North American dancers in 1914.¹ The first commercial dance hall opened in 1918 at Kagetsuen, in what is now Tsurumi Ward of Yokohama.²

Megata went to Paris in 1920 and stayed until 1926, learning tango while patronizing the cabaret El Garrón; he later opened a tango academy in Tokyo and taught the Japanese aristocracy free of charge.³ At first, the Japanese believed that tango came from France, because of the French labels on the records.³ In the 1920s and 30s the "first Japanese tango boom" was carried by the wealthy few who could get a gramophone and discs.⁴

In the late 1930s and early 1940s Noriko Awaya and other singers popularized the Japanese style of tango.³ On 31 October 1940, under a wartime ban on dancing, Tokyo's dance halls closed for good, each one packed that last night.² The boom ended with the war.⁴