Today’s Tango Topic is not a sexy topic, and it may almost sound like perfectionism, or complaining. When in fact it is a real world example of what can and does happen in Argentine Tango. Think of it as minutiae, but this minutiae has massive implications for how you dance and more importantly how your dancing skills are perceived!  Today’s topic deals with what can be referred to as ‘Tango Noise’. The word ‘Noise’ is a slight misnomer because this is not something that is heard but more importantly felt via the nervous system of the human body.
Before we go any further, let’s be clear about something: This topic is not about perfectionism! It’s an observation of what happens to the human body. This article and free video are not here to point out that you’re failing (which may or may not be true), so that you’ll be a perfect dancer in the end (as there is no end to this stuff). No! This article exists for the sole purpose of bringing your attention to the issues that you’re generating and then showing you a possible solution set. And so that we’re absolutely clear, this isn’t a beginner thing, nor intermediate, nor is it an advanced thing, nor does it have to do with those that have been dancing a minimal amount of time or a long period of time. Nor does it have to do with ‘style’, or genre of Tango in any way, shape, or for. No. Tango Noise as a whole is generated by those that have been dancing for 5 minutes and those that have been dancing for 5 years and/or 55  years, that dance any style or ideal of tango. Time and/or Style are not factors here. Perceived skill is not a factor here. Awareness is a factor, and it’s the only factor that matters at all.

What is ‘Tango Noise’ ? In its simplest form, it is a series of motions that by themselves are individual problems that we want to avoid, but are grouped together to describe what can, and does, happen to the human body while dancing that can generate kinesthetic unintentional motion which is perceived as instability or being unsteady. One of them this site has already detailed in detail is ‘Thud’. ‘Thud’, to refresh your memory, is where the dancer’s leg lifts the foot off the floor, and then is put down with some force, resulting in an impact with the floor that is heard as a ’Thud’. However more importantly the ’Thud’ is felt as a tremor which travels up the leg, through the hip, and then up through the spinal column and out through the arms of the embrace. This is just one element of Tango Noise.

Typically Tango Noise manifests itself as either unintended or unconscious motion in either the spine, hips, legs, arms, head, and feet. Which is your entire body. It is neurological in nature, meaning that it is generated by the dancer’s lack of kinesthetic awareness, however we only see the skeletal effect of this neurological lack of awareness.

Mostly everyone generates some kind or type of Tango Noise. Our goal in our solo practice is to minimize those issues or areas of Tango Noise as much as humanly possible. However the fact is that a lot of people don’t do that. They’re completely unaware that they’re generating these things to begin with, and believe, erroneously, that what they’re doing is desirable because no one has said anything about their abilities or skills. This is a fallacy of delusion. The reality is that a.) a good portion of the people that you dance with have not been trained to feel this stuff. and b.) because they’re untrained they’re not going to say anything about it. and then there’s c.) The Feedback Problem. Meaning that even if they knew about it, they have an issue with how to give you feedback so that you can hear it. 😉

That said…let’s talk about Tango Noise!

From A Dancer’s Perspective you can and do generate Tango Noise in a myriad of ways. While this is not necessarily an exhaustive list, it does touch on the major points that you want to become acquainted with.

1.) Tilting from side to side, breaking at the waist, usually in a side step.  2.) Pitching forwards and back (with & without breaking at the waist). 3.) Head Tilt towards and away from your partner. 4.) Wavering from side to side, or back and forth. 5.) Flailing arms, or threshing elbows. 6.) The leg going backwards, crossing the body meridian in an unintended, unaware, and uncontrolled fashion. and 7.) Obviously, ‘Thud’, which we’ve already detailed. There is one more which is common to both Follower and Leads, and we’ll get to that one below, and really it’s the focus of this article which is not shown in the video for good reason, it’s because it’s unseen, but rather felt: Wiggle. There are two areas where we feel ‘Wiggle’:

Spinal Column: The Spine can, and does, move a good amount which is desirable, we want that motion, mostly to be somewhat steady circular motion as it relates to Argentine Tango. At the same time a good portion of you are unaware that you are generating lateral ‘wiggle’ motion. This ‘wiggle’ happens in your spinal column which is felt as a slight or minor displacement that go from side to side, very slight. This motion is all to easily confused with walking instability. However if you stop moving, then then the ‘unsteadiness’ or ‘wiggle’ is felt independent of the walk. Ideally we seek a ‘quiet’ spinal column, no unintended motion, the less unintended or uncontrolled lateral movement in the spinal column the better. 🙂

Your Hips: While there is a certain amount of motion that we want in the hips, what we do not desire is where the sockets or joins are seemingly ‘wiggly’ through and through, meaning there’s a bit too much ‘give’ or looseness in them. This is usually felt as the leg extends, that it extends slightly diagonally to the left or to the right, and always to the same side with the same leg. To be clearer, sometimes this is an affectation of age and there’s seemingly not a whole lot you can do about this one, it’s just what happens to your body. Seemingly being the operative word. As you can in fact strengthen the tendons that surround those joints to a certain degree. Going forward, the looseness is felt as a ‘Wiggle’ and is undesirable. 🙁

From A Student’s Perspective let us be absolutely clear about something: “Tango Noise” is a Tango Topics term. Other teachers may have a different way of talking about this stuff, if they talk about it at all to this level of detail. Quite possibly this is not something that you’re going to hear from a lot of teachers on this topic in specific. You won’t find this stuff on YouTube or vimeo, and there is sincere doubt that your teacher is going to discuss it with you in any way, shape, or form, except as bypassing commentary while you’re dancing with them, and not necessarily address the underlining issues. That’s not a disparagement of your teachers or any teacher for that matter, it’s a statement of fact that they have a whole bunch of other things that they may need to address, so this particular point of minutiae may not be addressed at all, if ever.