Naples, Italy. Alfredo played the Friday milonga (M22), Shall We Talk?, at Hong Kong Tango Challenge 2024. Alfredo became obsessed with tango in Buenos Aires in 2005. Since then he has been a constant part of festivals and marathons, among the most famous and exclusive in Europe and Argentina, without ever getting through a week without dancing. He is one of the top collectors of tango music and owns an immense database. Passionate about history, he is also a profound music connoisseur and an expert in the evolution of music and dance through social transformations, from the origins to the present day. During his countless travels he met legendary tango historians and artists, from Luis Adolfo Sierra to Eduardo Sibilin, Atilio Stampone, Alberto Podestà and Gavito. As musical and artistic consultant to many professional dancers, event organizers and DJs, Alfredo created Radio T25 in 2014: the first European online radio to broadcast tango music and programs exclusively, 24 hours a day, to spread tango culture. Through this project he set out to expand the then limited number of songs used in milongas, bringing to public attention the unknown or neglected orchestras (neglected even by the most famous DJs) that are absolutely suitable for dancing. In 2015, at the request of a group of DJs and organizers, Alfredo began to play music, at first rarely and only at friends' events, then at selected marathons and festivals (Bagaria, Wonder Tango Embrace, La Lanterna, Voluntad, Tango Land Fest, Paris Tango Weekend…) and the best intimate milongas, from Buenos Aires (El Motivo) to Paris (Dolce Vita, El Garron, Oh-La-La), from Naples (Mumble Rumble, Salon Baires, TangoBar) to Genoa, Catania, Thessaloniki… He loves to recall that De Caro conducted his orchestra from 1924 to 1954, which is the base period of reference for Alfredo's music choice, yet with full possibility to cross these boundaries whenever it is worth it. For Alfredo there is no milonga without D'Arienzo, Troilo, Caló and Laurenz, and before playing something unknown he always asks himself whether it is not better to play another tanda of Di Sarli. His DJing is like the magma of Vesuvius, where his passion turns into poetry. His tango mottos: Tango is by its nature revolutionary: an instant after it was born, it was already changing. If you know the rules and their reason, you can change them; otherwise yours will not be revolution but ignorance. The milonga is a place of absolute freedom, yet no anarchy. I do not dance to be alone, but to be with you. In tango, as a metaphor and sublimation of life, we seek beauty and harmony: there we all have the opportunity to be elegant without being superficial, charming without being vain, passionate without being vulgar… Let's not waste our opportunity!

Brussels, Belgium. Jens-Ingo Brodesser (Zingo) started tango some 25 years ago and is a leading expert and lecturer on Golden Age Rioplatense tango, as well as one of today's most experienced tango DJs, well known at high-level marathons and festivals across Europe, the Americas and Asia. He runs successful tango events in Belgium and Germany, among them La Cita de los Amigos, one of the best high-level dancing events in Europe, which draws top dancers from all over the world. He is co-founder of Tango Time Travel (TTT), a music project providing high-quality digital transfers from original shellac and early vinyl records (tangotimetravel.be), and in that framework researches the whole history of tango music. His in-depth articles are freely available on his blog, tango-dj.be. At Hong Kong Tango Challenge 2024 he DJed the Saturday milonga and gave the two-part tango music workshop (D1/D2) for music lovers, dancers, tango DJs and DJs-to-be, as he has at major festivals across Europe. Fashions come and go! At a DJ set I try to catch the mood of the moment by observing the dancers and translate this feedback into the tanda. Diversity and changing impulses are the keywords. I like to think of colours and shapes, like when you paint a picture. You start at a certain point and let the whole thing evolve. Maybe you tell a story, maybe you are abstract, but the most important thing is that you express something through the music you play and that you make the people dance!

Beijing, China. A young DJ of the "new generation" and the developer of the mini app "Tango Music", Haotian 昊天 has been responsible for keeping the atmosphere of the last night burning at major Asian tango festivals and marathons. At Hong Kong Tango Challenge 2024 he played the Sunday milonga (M24), with Chinese tandas of Cantopop and Mandopop. He is an active dancer who never stops exploring his freedom of expression in tango, and he is just as passionate about sharing music. He started as a tango DJ in 2015 to voice his understanding of tango through music. His zestful, exuberant DJ style is bold and innovative yet at home with tango tradition: he dares to try new ways of ingeniously integrating diverse music from various orchestras, to keep sparking the dancers' desire to step onto the floor and to stimulate their "musical nerves", opening up rich sensory experiences. This is the introduction I made quite a while ago. I hate writing essays the most. After all, I am not only bad at English, but also bad at Chinese. I am only good at playing music and enjoying dance. Give me some time to write essays! 这是我老早以前弄的简介。最讨厌写作文……毕竟我不光是英语烂，语文也烂，只擅长放放音乐跳跳舞……给我点时间写作文！ So we did a little bit of polishing to his English, as he requested...

Palermo, Sicily, Italy. Antonio hosted the Monday afterparty (M25), A Taste of Sicilian Alchemy, with his tango alchemy. In his own words: I often hear that tango is an erotic dance; this is as wrong as it is reductive. Tango is not the chemistry of the couple dancing on the dance floor but a true alchemy that is created when all the ingredients are present and are mixed in the right way. The tDJ is one of these ingredients, but he is also the blender blade that mixes them together. Tango is real magic, and we can activate it but not control it all the way. Every time I put music in a milonga, I am conscious and grateful to be part of this magic. Each of us knows where we started from but not where the tango will take us. We travel together and only together do we create new magic. My nature is quite eclectic, although forged in discipline, and this is reflected in my musical selections as a tDJ. I started out as a musician in a hard rock band and an athlete in a full contact martial arts dojo. After running away for years from the tango, because I felt I was being hunted by it, I finally decided to try it, and this first go-round changed my life: applying the discipline of martial arts to the study of tango, I was guided by my Masters to master first milonguero and then the other dance styles. My desire to learn everything about tango led me to join an international dance company based in Barcelona, Spain, for a few years, where I was tested in tango escenario. From my early years of study I was tutored and pampered by some history-making tDJs in Italy, and over the years I developed an energetic but romantic style of music-making in milonga. My motto? "Keep the floor full until the end of the night," a result achieved by observing and understanding the dancers, creating a good wave and making it difficult for them to choose to rest or simply leave before the final cumparsita. My shortcomings? I pass very few contemporary or modern orchestras, and I tend to pass very few mixed tandas. Hong Kong Tango Challenge: "But this is Tango Challenge! Please step out of your comfort zone once and embrace the challenge of incorporating some new ingredients into your tango mix!" Tango Challenge happily accepted! My pleasure to mix new tango cocktails with special music, only for Hong Kong Tango Challenge! My vices? I spend hours cleaning up tracks I like from imperfections and scratching noises on the vinyl, often not using a second sound card, and I refuse to use sound compression apps. Yes, this causes me a lot of work with the mixer, which I have to adjust almost every track, but I prefer my ear to the mechanical flattening of sound. Do I have a cortina that "feels mine"? Yes, it is the soundtrack of an old video game. My dream? To have a time machine at my disposal and enjoy the época de oro of Buenos Aires live. But I know this is a dream I share with everyone whose heart beats to the compás del tango. My "tango of the heart" is "Pensalo bien": it was the first song I dreamed of dancing to, when I was a "young" dancer. And what is yours?

Cɪᴀᴏ!Tᴀɴɢᴏ A very very wise friend who is always in rational pursuit of truth talked about the etymological origin of Ciao; Then Historian Alfredo talked about the metaphorical origin of Tango; Our dear musicians, Jie, Ivo, Angelo and Bobo are talking about naming their ensemble "Ciao!Tango" and debuting at HK Tango Challenge! All occurring at seemingly random times and places but telling the destined beauty of spontaneity in tango and in life.