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Discipline

Ballet dancers know all too well that a good dance teacher is strict, hard as a nails, and won’t let you get away with anything. While it may be hard on the body, and hard on the ego, the fact is that dance teachers like that are a godsend. However, the teacher is only one component to the educational process.

A big part of one’s desire to be a better dancer is self-discipline. And not just a discipline to dance religiously once or twice a week, but an active participation in focusing on one’s own technique, one’s abilities, and the execution therein. It’s a daily discipline, a mindful practice towards improvement, towards cleaning up one’s issues, and at the same time an honest and clear appraisal of where one is at in relationship to what one’s ultimate goals with the dance are. And then, here’s the hard part, following through on that discipline. 

Most people, sadly, mouth the words of improvement, but do not follow through on that improvement in any way, shape, or form with a myriad of excuses. And yet these same people complain that they don’t get the dances that they desperately want. There’s a reason why those get dances, it’s called ‘Discipline’. Hard work and lots of blood, sweat, and tears all in the pursuit of a better quality of dance. 

MORE REMINDERS

All Night Milonga ?

January 23, 2017 No Comments

Yes you read that correctly. There are places in the world where a Milonga does (theoretically) go ‘All Night’. The idea is very romantic, that you’re dancing until the sun comes up. ’Theoretically’ ? Because ‘all night’ has different meanings in different places. If, however, we’re talking about Buenos Aires, there are 3 Milongas that do in fact go all night long 1.) La Viruta (on the weekends), 2.) Salon Canning on Monday nights (usually until about 5 am ish), and 3.) El Yeite (Pron: Shay-tay). There are others that go ‘late’ to 4 am, but not necessarily until the sun comes up.

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Posture

January 9, 2017 No Comments

As has been said, many times, which is exceptionally important, and is frequently mentioned by many dancers almost immediately is: Posture.

Posture for most people boils down to the following two lines:

“Head up!”.

“Elongate your Spinal Column.”

This is a ‘good’ posture for most people.

Sounds easy enough, right ? Just lift your head up, and then ummmm ‘elongate’ your spinal column.

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The Talking Cabeco/Mirada

January 30, 2017 No Comments

If you’ve been dancing a little while, or for many years, at some point along the curve you’ve heard the word ‘Cabeceo’. Which roughly translates as a slight nod or nodding of the head (Cabeza) for the Lead to invite a Follower. The Follower’s side of that same invitation is referred to as a ‘Mirada’ (to look at, or ‘looked’). It’s an oddity that almost no one knows about the Follower’s side of the equation, that the Follower can ask for a tanda, employing the same methodology. It just has a slightly different name.

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Couples

February 24, 2017 No Comments

Couples, as a pair, develop their own shorthand for communicating with each other. They remark on events in their time together as ‘that time we did that thing when that thing happened, remember ?’. They invest their emotional time in each other as caring, loving (hopefully), partners that genuinely are invested in each other’s successes (hopefully). In one respect they are to each other intimates, while at the same time they see each other as support mechanisms, and so much more.

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Floorcraft

December 4, 2016 No Comments

What is Floorcraft ? In it’s simplest form, as there layers and layers to this stuff, it is how to navigate the floor while dancing with your partner and not hitting the couples ahead, or behind you. As well as not touching the tables, and chairs. All the while interpreting the music, concurrently interpreting the beat and the musical pauses to fit the tango vocabulary while maintaining the spacing between the couples.

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The Female Lead

July 8, 2017 No Comments

This post isn’t about the benefits of learning to lead for the woman that dances, of which there are many. No. Nor is it about the hyper awareness of all the things you do not want to do as a Follower, which is going to happen by default. Nor is this post about the supposition that women of a certain age swap shoes and end up leading because no one wants to lead them anymore. Not. Nor is it about the fact the simple fact that some women do enjoy leading quite a bit and are actually (contrary to what you might believe) pretty good at it. No. Today’s Tango Thought is all about Women that WANT to Lead! (Just as a side note, most of this stuff also applies to the male lead too, you need the reminders).

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Practice with Tango Sticks

June 9, 2017 No Comments

At some point along your tango curve, you have wanted 1.) to practice a step, a pattern, or a figure. Or 2.) you have seen something that you want to try out. Or 3.) you’re imagining an idea of how something might work and want to try it. In all three of these instances, you will need a practice partner. You’ll need to schedule their time against yours. And once you’re in the same room with them, balance their issues of how they do X vs. how you engage X. And once that challenge is overcome then it’s getting into the idea of what it is you had in mind to begin with. All told, this could be several hours or days between the idea and the actual doing of it.

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The ‘Right’ Shoes

February 4, 2017 No Comments

Some day soon, you’re going to want the perfect pair of shoes. These shoes in your mind, completes the Tango image you have for yourself dancing socially. They make you look elegant. They make you feel like you can do anything. Mind you that image is an illusion in your head, but let’s not quibble about reality. These shoes are either handmade in Italy, Istanbul, Buenos Aires, or somewhere and/or something in between. They’re the shoes you always dreamed of. They’ve got all the features that you believe will allow you to become, finally, the dancer that you’ve always wanted.

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It’s Too Late

March 15, 2017 No Comments

Frequently most dancers after they ‘learn’ something will fail to solo practice it, as well as use it at a social practica, which as a result fails to deepen their fluidity when dancing so that when X, Y, and Z is led or followed they ‘miss’ it and hesitate. Thereby creating the impression that they’re inept dancers.

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Keep something in the back of your mind: What you’re seeing in a youtube video is a couple that is performing for the 15th row for a room full of people. They’re not social dancing! Whereas this website is all about ‘Social Tango’  or how to make things function on a social dance floor. Social Dance floor ? Your local milonga! They are showing you flashy moves as a presentation, to show off! But not stopping and talking about how this works which is what you need to see. This website and all of it’s content show you the how and  why you’d want to put that piece of vocabulary there, or how to make things work. This website is all about those things and more!

You could watch Tango YouTube videos and thereby spend your time, trying to infer, and figure out how things may work in that particular situation. Bend your body this way or that, twist and force this position or that. Place your foot here or there and figure it out. This is known as Tango Twister.  Which can be a lot of fun, but more than likely it won’t help you, because you’re missing something: The explanation from an experienced teacher showing you how to properly excute this stuff from a Leading Perspective as well as from a Following Perspective!

The goal of YouTube videos is to get you to study with those teachers in person. The goal of Tango Topics videos allows you to work at your own pace, in the comfort of your own space, so that you can play them over and over again to improve your understanding of the vocabulary or technique being described to therefore better your dancing experience. The goal of classes and workshops is to get you to come back over and over and over again, thereby spending more money with that teacher. This website and the videos under it are here to act as a resource for you to help you to improve your dance. Pay once and you’re done.

Eventually, one way or another you’re going to pay for this lesson, either here and now, or with them. TANSTAAFL! The difference between that lesson and this ? Is that you get to play this lesson over and over and over again. Further still, there are supporting materials (other videos) that help to explain the language and the underlying technique of how and why things work, so you can easily reference those things in the corresponding articles that go with the material, and or any language in the Tango Topics Dictionary. 

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