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It was 1984 when two Finns fuelled by beer and steam hatched an idea for a tango festival while sitting in a sauna. It must have seemed a good idea at the time - and it still is to the 100,000 people who, each July, trek to Seinajoki - an otherwise stolidly unremarkable town near Finland’s west coast for a slice of Scandinavian midsummer eccentricity which throws as much light on the Finnish soul as it provides exercise for Finnish soles.

Perhaps it's not so surprising that a country marked by empty distances and wintry solitude should be seduced by music based on longing and desire and a dance involving close human contact. "The Finns are very melancholy," admits festival spokesman Ilkka Heiskari. "We drink too much but do not speak much. Tango is our language." He pauses. "And it's the quickest way to get a lady."

It’s a view echoed by Heikki Hietamies, a renowned tango master of ceremonies. “The tango suits the Finnish mentality, especially the Finnish man” he says. ”The songs say things that he cannot say to his partner."

The atmosphere on Seinajoki's streets, however, is more jollity than steaming passion. The main excitement centres on who will be crowned Tango King and Queen in the song competition which accompanies the dancing. This is Finland's answer to Pop Idol, a clutch of bright young wannabes whittled down from over a 1,000 early contenders, belting out crowd-pleasing sentimentality in front of TV cameras and packed auditoria. A fifth of Finland’s five million people watch the televised finals, and like Pop Idol there's even official betting on who'll win, though the only thing which seemed a certainty, looking at the posters around Seinajoki, was that they would have great skin and awesome cheekbones.

A previous Tango King, Jari Sillanpaa was the hot ticket for my visit. "He is very big now," whispered my Finnish friend Riitta, though I wasn't sure if she was referring to his popularity or the fruits of success threatening to burst from beneath his cummerbund. But even if he did look like a bit like a slicker and slightly slimmer version of Meatloaf, Jari gave 'til it hurt, squeezing every ounce of emotion from each song of love, loss and dreams of better times.

The dancing is a less emotive affair. When Argentinian performers first brought the tango to Europe in the 1910s, the craze swept the continent over the next two decades, a torch picked up in Britain by bands with names like Geraldo and his Gauchos. But while the passion for tango waned elsewhere by the end of the 1920s, in Finland it took deeper root, undergoing a transformation which replaced sharp Latin athleticism with a slower northern European up-close shuffle - described memorably by one anonymous wag as “an Argentine tango with a bucket of water thrown on it”.

The 1950s saw an explosion in outdoor dancing as the Finns cast off their wartime cares. Dance pavilions (lavatanssit) sprang up in every village, and places like Pavin tanssilava just outside Helsinki in Vantaa remain popular summer attractions.

Like ballroom dancing, the tango is seen as largely a middle-aged thing. But it is still taught in Finnish schools along with perfect English and social responsibility, and even the youngsters who roll their eyes when you mention it, can usually name the Tango King and Queen crowned each year at Seinajoki.

After cramming into a little Seinajoki hall with hundreds of locals for a lesson from tango legend Ake Blomqvist, and fortified with drink from the sprawling marquees that had sprung up in the town centre I was ready for “Tango Street”. Here, no-one really cared if you had two left feet, though there’s not really enough space to try anything too flashy even if you knew how. Clutching fellow novice Amanda to my chest, we swept into the melee, shuffling convincingly enough to a procession of local bands beneath a midsummer sky that, even as midnight came and went, never lost its glint of blue.

Despite its northern European sophistication, Helsinki is not a tango-free zone, though attitudes to it are dismissive among the younger generation. "Tango is bollocks," I was told by twentysomething Jani as we drank in hip central bar Fiba, where the local Koskenkorva vodka inspires more passion than a dance lacking in both beats per minute and cool associations. His friend Sami echoed the sentiment. "I know all the moves, but I hate it."

Tango in Helsinki is an underground activity - literally, since the city's tango mecca is a basement dancehall, Vanha Maestro on Fredrikinkatu. It's not done to refuse a dance in the etiquette of tango. But even if Finnish liberalism means women are technically able to ask for a dance anytime, most wait until the bandleader announces "Naistenhaku" ("Ladies' choice"). I had just one dance, my partner, like most here, past her first flush of youth. "When people turn 40 they suddenly want to tango," she said as I tried not to step on her toes. "It's more popular in the countryside too."

The next night I headed for the countryside. Lohjan Tanhuhovi is an hour out of Helsinki, a country dance-hall whose neon-sign stood out in the twilit fields and pine forests. My initial impression was of a set from a Scandinavian Twin Peaks, without the damn fine coffee but with the same air of a world slightly out of kilter.

There are dance halls like this all around Finland. Over the entrance the word Hummpasali in big letters sounded like ribald acknowledgement of the city slickers' sneers about tango halls being more about pick-ups than dancing - though it turned out that hummpa was simply a Finnish cross between a waltz and a foxtrot.

A line of men, alone or in small groups, stood up one wall gazing across a wide dancefloor at seated tables of women along the opposite wall. On stage, a combo glorying in the name Markus Tormala & FBI Beat belted out numbers for dancers who ebbed and flowed to a pattern I couldn't even begin to grasp.

I watched impressed as a huge-bellied farmer belied his girth, gliding lightly around the floor with a succession of partners curved uncomplainingly around his paunch, proof perhaps that grace really can sometimes be more important than looks. Meanwhile a fashion parade of styles not seen since the early '70s swept by in the warm yellow light, to the amazement and amusement of the women in my group. "The only time I've ever seen anything like this was at the Rose of Tralee festival," muttered my Irish friend Eileen in awe-struck tones.

Locals come from as far as 35 miles away to dance here on a Saturday, I learn as I dance with Marjatta. A vivacious blonde pushing towards her mid-century, dancing is a passion that Marjatta has suffered for. "I broke my back," she reveals, "doing the paso doble on a slippery floor." We twirled with extra care added to the modicum of grace for a couple more dances before I resumed my position as visiting wallflower, watching as couples moved in time to the slow spinning of the glitterballs above their heads.

The derision of the Helsinki smart set was still ringing fresh in my ears but I thought they were missing the touching innocence of this search for closeness in the middle of a lonely northern night. Of course, it’s lacking in style and Latin fire, but for the Finns its compensations are those of inhibitions lost in a place of light and music.

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