The Linear Ocho Cortado is a venerable piece of tango vocabulary used primarily for cutting turns, adding accents to the ends of musical paragraphs, or just to add a bit more ‘fun’ to the dance. It’s great in open, fabulous in close embrace, and just delish when led and followed slowly. There’s nothing crazier than an Anti-Ocho Cortado (reversing the Cortado, lead doing the follower’s steps & the follower doing the lead’s), while going against the music as counter point. 🙂 However, far too often a fair number of Leads, and a good number of Follower overuse it as if it were going out of style and they just have to get all they can in, before the end of the Ocho Cortado. After about the 3rd time most Followers yawn and yearn for something else, a little nuance, a little spice, a little…something else. While this belief could make most Leads (the person, not the action) cop to the ‘more vocabulary is better’ philosophy that pervades most leading classes, there is another way to go here. And that’s the add nuance. The nuance in this case is today’s Tango Topic: The Ocho Cortado Wrap.
What is An Ocho Cortado Wrap ? Put simply it’s a Follower’s leg wrap….
mixed with an Ocho Cortado (the ‘Cut’ Ocho).
To be fair the Ocho Cortado is not really an Ocho, not by any stretch of the imagination, nor is it a broken one at that. It is more akin to the Follower’s Molinete more than anything else.
What is an Ocho Cortado Wrap ? In it’s simplest form, and there are a few versions of this variation on a theme, it uses the Linear Ocho Cortado’s “Open” Side step as a place for an Enganche or ‘Wrap’ to occur instead of the completion step of the Corrected Cross that we would normally see.
There are a few benefits to adding a Wrap in this position, one of them is that it allows for variation to occur. More variation instead of the same-ole, same-ole. Furthermore, it also adds a bit of fun for the Follower to engage a really wonderful Wrap or Enganche to the Lead’s invocation. The Wrap component on the side step is not the only possible wrap that’s sitting there. There’s an Enganche on the Follower’s step out of the Side Step. There’s also a Lead Enganche on the step into the Ocho Cortado! Then there’s the reverse Linear Ocho Cortado where the couple would invoke a Linear Ocho Cortado only from the open side of the Embrace. 🙂 There’s also a possible back cross that can occur in either variation as the closing step.
The Free Tip. The Wrap from the Follower’s perspective is ENTIRELY OPTIONAL, it’s not required. Ever. Meaning ? That the wrap itself is always, always, always, always the Follower’s CHOICE. If they don’t feel safe, or taken care of, then they quite rightfully should not wrap at all, ever. That means no pushing, no pulling, no squeezing, and the invasion of the wrap itself should be just enough to indicate the wrap but not forceful enough to push them into it. They must be given the choice to do it. The wrap itself is entirely learned behavior, this is not something that the Follower is going to do on their own by default. So if you lead it, don’t sit their and expect that it’s magically going to happen. It’s not. There’s a reason why this particular wrap occurs, and you as a lead must create those conditions. And so that we’re absolutely clear here, one of those conditions is not using your arms at all!
About the Video: This video comes is 21:44 in length in 14 Sections.
Section 1 – Introduction – 00:00:20
Section 2 – Ocho Cortado Review – 00:00:48
Section 3 – Lead Reminders – 00:02:22
Section 4 – Follower Reminders – 00:03:23
Section 5 – Ocho Cortado Both Roles – 00:00:23
Section 6 – The Wrap For Leads – 00:01:33
Section 7 – The Wrap for Followers – 00:01:42
Section 8 – Wrap and Cortado Together – 00:01:43
Section 9 – The Open Embrace Version – 00:00:50
Section 10 – The Close Embrace Version – 00:01:14
Section 11 – The Open Side Cortado Wrap – 00:00:40
Section 12 – Why This ? – 00:01:56
Section 13 – A Double Wrap – 00:01:53.
Section 14 – Adding a Lead Gancho – 00:01:19.
Section 15 – Closing.