“Takes Two To Tango”

Ray Charles duets with Betty Carter on the oft-covered “Takes Two To Tango”, the alliterative and swinging hit for Pearl Bailey from 1952. The song is the fourth song on Side 2 of the Ray Charles And Betty Carter album (1961) and crystallizes the moment on the album where the man and woman announce that the tentative and coy flirting is over, and they are in happy agreement that the relationship is ready for consummation.

“Takes Two To Tango” was written by Al Hoffman and Dick Manning, both born in what is now Belarus and who had each moved to the United States and had become a popular songwriter. It was a hit twice in the year it was written, for Louis Armstrong and especially for Pearl Bailey.

In Ray and Betty’s collaborative effort, they each swap verses and join to sing the choruses together. It’s as if each wants to declare the autonomy of his or her feelings, and then present a united front to the world. Her + him = them.

Betty begins, settling comfortably into the taut, jumpy rhythms of the upbeat tune with the song’s lengthy and comical list of “lots of things that you can do alone”. Ray then sidles up beside her as they sing the funky chorus: the song’s title, with its peppy brass and slinky melody that you just have to get up and dance to.

Ray Charles is rather hoarse on “Takes Two To Tango” – perhaps it was the end of the day of one of the two recording sessions that yielded the entire album in June 1961. Or perhaps it’s an illusion, just an extreme example of the juxtaposition of the gruff masculinity of his natural voice and Betty Carter’s silvery, shimmeringly angelic tone. Whatever the reason, the effect is a little dissonant; it gives the song a little tension and unease. They may be on the same page but Ray is still eager – come on, let’s go!

But only a little: the main point is that these two disparate voices are joining together in harmony, finally, after the several songs that preceded “Takes Two To Tango” showed the playful back and forth of ardent Ray and indecisive Betty. Ray has been successful in wooing her, and now the question of what will happen is settled – the next song on the album, “Alone Together”, is the tender and earnest moment that the promise of this song comes to fruition.

With its unusual tango rhythms and the differing dynamics of Ray and Betty – like the yin-yang of the universe, pulsating inexorably as it always has – “Takes Two To Tango” is an especially enjoyable duet for the lovers as they get ever closer to one another, both happily reveling in the presence of the other.

Listen to “Takes Two To Tango”

Get your own “Takes Two To Tango” on LP, CD or MP3 from Amazon.