Tango mindfulness III: games for exploration, contd.

More games and exercises to tune into tango

Last post, I detailed the games that I use to teach how to tune into your own body and to your partner. In tango, we also need to tune into the whole group of people dancing for maximum enjoyment, as well as to the space and the music.

Tuning into the whole group

One of the things I remember from when I was doing my fieldwork in Buenos Aires for my thesis, was the description one older man gave me of dancing "in the old times" (pre-1990s). He said that there used to be very few crashes on the dance floor. If you watched the dancers, everyone seemed to be in the same flow, dancing together. He added that he didn't see that happening anymore, as new dancers were too focused on themselves.

I was struck by what he said, and constructed some exercises aimed at improving the awareness of the group and of the space around the dancers.

1. Blindfold tango: Just as you can feel that you are near someone or something when you have your eyes closed, you can tune into the group dancing without using your eyes. BOTH dancers in each couple close their eyes or are blindfolded. Using the breathing exercises we worked on before, the couple tunes into each other, and then starts to dance around the room in SLOW MOTION with very soft bodies so that if they collide with another couple, no one will get injured. The point of this exercise is to get both leaders and followers tuned into all the people in the room and the space in the room.

2. Solo-couple: I use this drill more than any other drill, as it helps develop navigation skills as well as tuning-in skills. When I call "Solo!" everyone walks around the room, to the music. I encourage people to walk the "wrong" direction, through the middle of the group, etc., to mix up the dancers. When I call "Couple!" everyone grabs the nearest person, and starts dancing WITHOUT pausing (grab & go). When the movement gets caught or clogged behind someone, I yell "Solo!" again and we repeat.

Tuning into the space

When I dance in a new space, I really pay attention to the shape of the space and how it affects the dancers. For example, El Beso in Buenos Aires is famous for that awful pillar that creates a traffic jam each time you go around the floor. Folks who are used to dancing there usually manage the space, but visitors take awhile to adjust their dance. Here in Portland, there are several spaces used for practicas and milongas with pillars that make dance flow problematic. In other spaces, the tables are set up in such a way as to intrude on the dance space; while other spaces feel easy to navigate.

Although space management is not just a beginner problem, I use this exercise mostly with beginners and intermediates. I recently used it in my advanced class for the first time, and saw a marked improvement in the quality of dance in a small space, so I will probably use it more in the future.

1. Full space: First, I let everyone dance using the whole room. When we are learning new moves, this is how I usually use the space, so everyone knows how big the room is.

2. 1/2 room: Then, I divide the room with furniture or a human wall, and make everyone do "solo-couple" in this new space.

3. 1/4 room: Gradually, I move the "wall" to create smaller and smaller spaces, each time doing "solo-couple" at least once so that all the dancers adjust to the amount of space they have. I stop squeezing the dance space when people start freaking out (not breathing, tightening their bodies, etc.) unless we are near a festival time, when I use this to accustom the dancers to how it will feeling dancing at the festival.

Tuning into the music

For dancers who grew up with rock 'n roll (or more modern versions of North American music), playing with tango music can seem confusing. Several of my students tell me that dancing milonga and vals are easier because they encourage simply dancing to the beat.

However, in order to fully explore tango music, the dancer needs to listen to more than just the beat of the music. Here are some exercises that I have designed to play with the music and get more out of a tanda.

1. Speed drill: sloooooow, pauses, half-time, regular (tiempo), fast (contratiempo)

Most dancers like one or two speeds of movement, but tango can have many different flavors within the dance. By practicing all of the possibilities, dancers can add a flavor or two to their movement, making their dance musically richer (BTW, I do NOT suggest doing this academically while dancing to be "interesting" but rather a way to access deeper listening skills to the partner and the music).

In class, we practice each way of moving to the music, one at a time, before combing them:

• Almost all dancers can find the tiempo, or regular beat. Those who cannot, can often cheat off of the nearby dancers visually, and more or less move to the rhythm of the dance.
• Dancing contratiempo, using syncopation, takes a bit more work. While most dancers can understand the concept of dividing the regular beat into two (or in vals, three) parts, many dancers struggle to remain elegant while dancing faster.
• Many tangos of the rhythmic era function well when danced using just these two ideas. Indeed, this is how most of my students prefer to dance, avoiding the pitfalls of the pausa (pause) :-)
• Alternating moving and pausing (half-time), or incorporating pauses into the dance, provides a challenge for many dancers. Foremost, if you are not dancing on-balance, pausing is very difficult. Also there is the question of "how long do I pause here?" for folks who don't hear phrasing in the music easily.
• Adding pauses into the dance, and emphasizing them in the romantic tango music, really brings out a richness that is lost without those pauses.
• Slow-motion dancing does not fit all tango music, but I like using it when the music is dramatic, or the melody line is slow and drawn-out. I encourage slow-motion dancing as a way to experience the widest range of possibilities for expression in the dance.

2. What's your favorite flavor?

Identify your favorite speed to use for dancing tango, and gradually add more layers of timing. Most dancers understand that more choices means richer dancing, but need some help identifying what they are using, and what could be added.

3. Repeat, repeat, repeat: same music three times:

We danced best when we love the tango (or the vals or the milonga) that we are dancing. Finding the soul of a particular tune can be easy or difficult, depending on our level of natural musicality and/or our level of musical training.

First, we listen to the song while NOT dancing. Then, we listen to the song while dancing solo (What adorno would I do? When? Where are the pauses? Where are the "fast" parts--if there are fast parts? Does this song make me dance slo-mo? etc.). Last, we dance the same song, but with a partner.

Three times through won't make that song yours, but it's a good start!

4. Find the adornos and pauses

What I do to work on my own adornos, is to put a song on and dance around my living room, practicing my adornos, and seeing what occurs to my body for each song. I try not to make any plan, but simply practice using adornos to a particular piece of music.

In a class, I have the entire class, men and women, dance around solo, interacting with the other dancers by playing with adornos (and not talking!). Then we dance again, trying to play more, cut loose, and improvise.

Tango mindfulness II: games for exploration

Teaching mindfulness in tango

First, let's get our definitions straight: mind·ful·ness (mīndfəlnəs/) noun, 1. the quality or state of being conscious or aware of something.

Over the years, I have developed a lot of games and exercises aimed at becoming aware of your own body, your partner's body, your surroundings, and the music. Some I have stolen from teachers; others I have created from a mixture of ideas from various people; and some have popped, fully formed into my head. I use one to three of the drills in a lesson, eventually covering all of them. Each group of students has slightly different needs, so I choose the activities that are most needed by that particular group of students. Here are short descriptions of each one.

Tuning into your body

1. Breath: With eyes closed, standing still on both feet, breathe slowly in and out 3-4 times, focusing on how the lungs and ribs expand and contract. Variation: while breathing, stretch arms out and up on intake; arms out and down on exhale, to encourage movement in the ribcage.

2. Energy: With eyes closed, stand on both feet. When you breathe in, imagine drawing the breath up out of the ground, through all four corners of the feet, up your legs, up your torso, and into your lungs. Exhale reversing the path, and imagine using your exhale to push a magnet away from under your feet/the floor.

3. Axis: Visualize how your body is stacked up, from the feet up. Depending on what we are working on, I will either work through the entire exercise, or just focus on one or two of these points, drawing a figure on the whiteboard for the visual learners to focus on:

• arch of the foot is the base; 50-50 weight on ball of foot and heel
• knees are soft, micro-bent (unlocked but not low); a bit forward of feet
• hips are back compared to feet, using the hip joint to tip to a good angle for balance
• pelvic floor lifts torso on top of legs, to stack pelvis over arches
• back is in natural curves, long and stretchy
• deep abdominal muscles have tone, allowing for fuller breaths
• ribcage is balanced over hips, a bit further forward to counterbalance
• head is floating, balanced over arches of feet

Tuning into your partner

1. Force fields: I always work on breath and axis solo before doing this exercise, as it takes the solo body and tunes it into the partnership:

• Facing your partner, stand so that you are in each other's personal space, but not touching.
• Close your eyes.
• Breathe, pulling the breath up from the soles of your feet into your lungs, and exhaling back down through your feet (or up through the top of your head)
• Imagine your favorite color, and as you exhale, send laser beams of that color straight out your feet, THROUGH your partner and to the opposite wall.
• [Give time for 3-4 breaths before going to next body part]
• Each time a new body part is added, make a longer rectangle of energy that goes through your partner, to the other wall:

1. knees
2. hips
3. belly button (makes people laugh and breathe)
4. pelvis
5. solar plexus
6. ribcage
7. collar bones
8. shoulder blades
9. full body

• Now, move in slowly until you are touching the front of your partner, and get into the embrace.
• Breathe together.
• On each exhale, step side.
• On each inhale, find your balance.

2. Breathing together/Darth Vader breathing: I designed this exercise when I taught at the University of Oregon. The students had a lot of fun playing it ("Luke, use the boleo, hooooooo") but older adults will also play it. The point of the drill is to have the partners breathe audibly and at the same time, matching their breath. I prefer to do this in practice hold, as it is a bit too weird even for me to have someone do this right in my ear.

3. Slow motion: Slow motion dancing is difficult because it requires good balance and breathing, but dancing with your partner in slow motion is an exercise in helping each other breathe and balance, and helps the couple tune into each other. At first, I need to remind everyone to slow down every 20-30 seconds, but eventually, the whole group starts to dance slowly, experimenting with whatever moves they know at their level.

And there's more!

Next week, I'll go over how to tune into the group, the space and the music for even more tuned-in, mindful tango!

Tango mindfulness: Tuning into your body and surroundings

A lot of people who come to me to learn tango feel disconnected from their bodies in daily life. I have had students who needed to look at their feet to see if they were standing on their right or left foot at that moment. I have students who, when I say, "Do you feel that?" when I align their bodies, often (repeatedly) say, "No, I don't." When I try to get people to feel how their hip joint works and how the torso is connected to the legs, I have had someone tell me, "I can't feel anything there," referring to their entire pelvic area. Many times, I ask someone to breathe, and they say, "But I am!" in a gasping whisper, because they have run out of breath.

Why are we so out of touch with our own bodies?

We write our life history on our body. Each event that happens, affects our body. It is impossible to divorce life experience from our body. Injuries, emotional hurt, stress, anxiety, abuse--inscribe themselves on our muscles, tendons, ligaments and bones, and affect how we stand, walk, and dance tango.

For some people, the best way to survive their life, is to tune out of their body. If the truth of what has happened is too big to face, and it is written on the body, then the body must be ignored.

Tango, however, demands that we start to feel our bodies and tune in to not only ourselves, but our partners. Tango can trigger a lot of emotions and past experiences as the dancer lets body awareness back into their lives. Tango will push your buttons; ALL of your buttons. Ask me how I know.

You cannot dance your best without becoming aware of your whole self, and not everyone is willing to delve into the deep reaches of their mind and body in order to dance better. For those people, a moderate level of tango works just fine.

For those of you who are willing to work through to a deeper or higher level of tango, what can you do to fight your personal body demons?

1. Practice breathing deeply: put your hands on your ribcage, and expand your ribs to the sides, front and back. Let your lungs stretch your ribcage out and let it release, without a lot of up and down of the shoulders. This will help your tango embrace and provide you with (a lot) more oxygen than you may be currently taking in. Try not to hyperventilate!
2. Feel your feet on the ground: barefoot, let your toes spread out and wriggle; let the arches of your feet work naturally; let your weight balance between the ball of your foot and your heel, freeing your toes. This will help, even if your tango shoes feel like they are squeezing your toes. Connect to the earth!
3. Open your solar plexus: many of us from stressful, stress-out families tighten our solar plexus because it feels protective. However, it also cuts us off from other people. Think about letting yourself feel more vulnerable in order to tune in more.
4. Increase your flexibility: stretching will help you feel more balanced, more open in your body, and more capable of using tango technique correctly. If your body won't stretch because you have spent too many years holding it in, consider Rolfing or some other myofascial release technique to break down adhesions between the surfaces of muscles, allowing your body more grace and motion with less effort.

I am not saying that this is an easy process, but it is a very rewarding process: your tango gets better, your balance gets better, your body strength increases, and your body feels better. Let's get started!

Pepito Avellaneda and his dance: an exploration

Being an anthropologist and a dancer, I like to find out about as many cultural facets of an idea as I can. When one of my students asked me to help him learn Pepito Avellaneda's dance style and steps, I began to search for as much information as I could find about him, as well as his dance.

Short biographies of him are on the web. Interviews with him give you an idea of his personality, as well as of his personal journey through the tango world. Videos show his steps; his performances; how he danced with different women, such as his wife; and how he taught. Several of my teachers studied with him, although I missed him: I started dancing tango in December 1995, and he died four months later. It took me until 1999 to get to Buenos Aires.

I am trying something that, as a teacher, I have never done: I am teaching from a combination of my experience with Pepito's students and his videos. Never before have I attempted to teach someone's moves and technique without studying with them personally. I don't think it would be possible to do this without the training from Omar Vega (one of his premier students), from Oscar Mandagaran (also Pepito's student), and from the various milongueros I have danced with in Bs As who studied with Pepito.

One experience has helped the most in learning and teaching these steps. In 2000, I spent a few months in Argentina, and took Omar Vega's milonga classes. He used me as an assistant, so I got to feel the movement consistently led, over and over, in each class. Because I was actually taking the class as a leader, I then got to lead the step immediately after experiencing it as a follower. Those moves are hard-wired into my body even now, almost 15 years later. In my "Pepito" class, almost every leader has been trained by me, and can lead and follow. I have used the "feel this as a follower from me, now go lead it" more in this class than I usually do. It works.

I have been surprised at the level of enthusiasm in the community for this class. It turns out that a bunch of the guys have tried to learn Pepito's step on their own from the video, but had difficulty. We are having a lot of fun in class working on these steps that are never seen danced here in Portland, but are part of tango's cultural history.

Dancing big in small spaces: what makes it work?

The fabulous Redwood Tango Ensemble played at Norse Hall a few weeks ago. Watching Portland dancers and visitors who came for the Tango Music Institute at Reed College, I realized that a lot of dancers were encountering difficulty dancing up to their regular standard because of the increased number of dancers on the floor. I enjoyed the extra energy level created by more people and less space, but I have a lot more experience dancing in small spaces because I learned to lead in Buenos Aires.

Because of that evening, I planned a six-week session focused on dancing with more energy AND in smaller spaces than the weekly milonga scene in Portland requires. As I always say in class, "I don't expect to see this [move] on the dance floor. The point is that everything else will feel easier once you have tried the more difficult thing." What I wanted to see was more expressive dancing, with good navigation, and without the fear factor showing when space got tighter.

What did we work on to challenge the dancers? For the past six weeks, the leaders worked on learning new classic combinations--and then took them apart and reworked them into new combinations. I think this helps the brain chose alternative possibilities more easily when faced with a navigational challenge. (If you stick to the same five moves, that's fine, but put them in a different order, or mix and match parts of them to fit the music and the space better!) To practice, after we had a handle on those new combinations, we danced in 1/2 the room; and then 1/3 of the room; and then 1/4 of the room.

For the followers, I taught a few elegant adornos, as well as working on stellar basic technique. Yes, my advanced dancers worked on turning, pivoting, walking, doing traspies--the basics--but as if each step REALLY counted in the dance. That added precision really helped the leaders know where the follower was, which in turn made it easier to negotiate small spaces.

Next, the followers worked on being the "motor" of the dance. We played a game I created at the University of Oregon that I call "naughty toddler." The follower does not follow when being the naughty toddler. Instead, they do any move they like, in any direction, but with lots of energy. The leader's job is to channel the energy into a dance as closely resembling what the leader had in mind before, but without wrestling the follower into submission. I think that the freedom created by being given permission to mess up, helps take the dance up to a new level of excitement and joy that eludes the cautious dancer sometimes.

Gradually, we combined the precision of stellar technique with the energy of "naughty toddler" into a follower who IS following, but with tons of energy. This gives the leader a lot more energy with which to play, and that creates new possibilities for combinations, without the leader spending a lot of energy thinking about what comes next. The dance becomes more organic, and more enjoyable for both partners.

As the space got smaller, what we found was that everyone danced BETTER. Why? Because everyone was dancing full out, expressing themselves to the hilt, and letting the moves come naturally. That energy spread from person to person, and then to other couples, and ended with a wild energetic tanda at the end of class that would have looked good on stage, without any dangerous flying limbs.

For inspiration, watch my teachers, Oscar and Georgina Mandagaran, in a video that they posted, providing a great example of how to use small spaces without giving up any expressiveness in the dance. You can listen to what they have to say about dancing well in small spaces, or fast forward to the dance example. I have seen them dance in the milonga in Buenos Aires, and the other dancers hang off of their seats to watch because they use space really well, don't hit other dancers, and still dance a strong, BIG dance.

Now, go out there and DANCE!

5 Ways to Listen Better: apply it to your tango!

I like to listen to TED talks when I do my spinning (black and light blue alpaca right now). Spinning doesn't take all of my focus, so I look for things to do while I spin to keep me motivated.  TED talks are great because they are short, I don't have to look at the information, and I love to hear all of the wonderful ideas that these bright people put forward.

I randomly clicked on one of Julian Treasure's TED talks, and ended up listening to "5 Ways to Listen Better" and thought, "WOW! This applies to tango 100%!" This talk spoke to me. I spent the rest of the day applying the ideas to the lessons that I taught. What caught my attention were his comments that we should be "connected in understanding to each other" and that we should "listen consciously to live fully"--both of which I believe tango aids us to do in the modern, unconnected world.

Julian Treasure's listening exercises

1. Silence: 3 minutes a day (reset your ears)
2. The mixer: how many individual channels of sound do I hear?
3. Savoring: enjoying mundane sounds
4. Listening positions: what's appropriate/playing with filters
5. RASA ("juice/essence"): receive, appreciate, summarize & ask

How to make Julian Treasure's 5 ways into tango exercises

I am not going to talk about music and listening, as I think that is more obvious after hearing the TED talk. Let's stick to the movement parts:

1. Silence/reset your body

Stand with your partner, touching or near each other, without moving, and feel the ebb and flow of energy, breath, slight movements for balance, etc. Tune in to the other person and to your own body in silence.

2. The mixer: find the individual channels of input in dancing

Feel your body in space; feel the floor under your feet; feel your partner's breathing; feel the connection with your partner; feel the space around you as you dance; feel the other people in the room; listen to the music.

What other channels have I forgotten?

3. Savoring: enjoying mundane movement

Isn't this what tango is really about? Savoring a wonderful walking step, or a turn you've done hundreds of times. Enjoying dancing to a song you know inside and out. Taking a partner in your arms with whom you have danced for years. Sitting with friends you see every week.

4. Playing with filters

Focus on the beat of the music; focus on the melody; focus on your breathing; focus on your partner's breathing; focus on the feeling of your feet on the floor. Play with how many ways we can tease meaning out of the dance.

5. RASA ("juice/essence"): receive, appreciate, summarize & ask

Don't forget that you also talk with the people who are your tango partners. Let them know you appreciate them. Be receptive to each other. Thank the DJ, the organizer, the people at the milonga pay desk--let them know that having a nice, friendly place to dance means a lot to you! Ask new people to dance in order to live life even more fully.

Your homework

I invite you to listen to the (short) talk. What does it make you think about in terms of tango? Comment! Let's listen to each other!

Portland Tango and Salsa Festival: what do you teach beginners in 30 minutes?

I will be teaching 4, 30-minute beginners lessons at the Portland Tango and Salsa Festival on Saturday. I just found out that the planners decided that beginners didn't need a dance floor for lessons, so I will be teaching tango on grass...

So, what do you teach someone who knows no tango, on grass, in thirty minutes? You reduce the dance to the fundamentals, to what really matters about tango.

Many years ago, I had the opportunity to take part in DanceAbility International's dance festival in Eugene. We had to take workshops on teaching in order to participate, and I learned TONS from the people I taught and from the instructors. I had to completely change how I taught, and I kept a lot of what I learned in my classes for able-bodied folks after the festival.

When confronted with a group of people who are in wheelchairs (some motored, some people-powered), you realize that dancing East Coast swing (one of the dances I taught at the festival) might not be about stepping back on the right or left foot. Instead, it's really about building momentum, stretching away from each other to then use that elastic pull to change places in various ways, turning one person as you do so. You find ways to face each other, back up to get some oppositional force, and then turn until you are facing again, to music, with a partner. It felt magical by the end of each class.

When applied to tango, what this means to me is: Tango is a dance where, for the most part, the two partners move together around a space. They can move in straight lines, curves or circles/turns. They can move to the music on every beat, every other beat, two steps per beat, use long pauses, or even move slow-motion. They are connected by energy, breath, and by touching. Both people are on balance, on their own axis, responsible for their own body.  Both are paying attention to how the other person is moving. They are tuned in to each other. Perhaps they are even breathing in unison.

Tango is not really about moves, even though we enjoy watching wild show tango or try flashy moves on the dance floor.

Survival tango means that, after a half hour, folks can steer more or less so they are not dangerous to themselves and other humans. They can deal with a partner who also has not much idea of what to do in a way that is fun and is dancing. They know their options for moving to the music, even if not all of them are accessible yet. They are tuned in, listening to their partners, creating a joint experience to the lovely live music that will be playing at the dance tent (with floor, thank goodness).

So, my tango dancers, when you see those new people standing around shyly, hoping to dance, please ask them to dance. Sweep them off their feet (figuratively only, please) and take them for a spin.

Balance and flexibility: stay on top of your femurs!

As my students have been learning to release their hips, I have been trying to find different ways to explain how to keep balance by using the SMALLEST hip adjustment possible.

The big picture

What do I mean by "on top of your femurs" when the entire body rests on them? The upper leg bones that attach to your pelvis and end at your knees are a strangely shaped bone (check it out). They channel all the upper body weight down the leg to the ground. If the femur is in the right place, a lot of your balance work for standing, walking, tango, etc. becomes much more efficient.

Many people lock their hips into one position for tango in an effort to stay on balance. As I have discussed before, that stability is created by asking too many muscles to work overtime. Locked hips means awkward, stiff dancing that misses the sensuality of tango by a long shot.

When dancers learn to release their hips, they often overdo that new feeling, and wiggle a lot. There is so much muscular relief at not having a stiff back and sore toes, that the rest looks somewhat like an earthworm :-)

Tango, as well as normal walking, works best in a position where the hip joint is free to move, but the deep abdominal and pelvic muscles are working lightly to keep the body close to its midline.

Finding your hip joints

When you lift your knee, your hip creases. Your hip joint is deep in that crease. You can feel the front of the area by pressing in as deep as you can at the hip crease. You can also find the back of the area by grabbing your ischial tuberosity, or sitz bones (the bony part you feel on a chair). For your right hip, use your left hand to find the front of the hip joint, and the right to find the sitz bone.

Tip your pelvis (and thus your upper body) with your hands at the hip joint. This always makes me think of the silly bird desk ornaments that tip back and forth. Notice how much your body can bend here! Feel how relaxed your lower back feels? The tip is in the hip joint, not in the arching of the lower back.

To find the best range of motion for your body, notice that, when you tip your body WAAAAY back, bringing the hips forward, the muscles on the front of the hip feel very tight. When you bend WAAAAY forward, the muscles also feel tight. There should be a range of motion between too far forward and too far back, where the front of your hip crease feels more relaxed. That is your correct range of motion (notice: there is not just one spot, because we don't just stand around in tango!).

Finding your midline

Your body moves most efficiently when you center movement around the midline. If you had only one leg, you would have to hop, but your midline would be obvious, and would stay in the same place for balance. We have two legs, so it's a bit different for humans.

Because we have two legs, we need to shift our balance/midline from one leg to the other while moving. If you use a lot of side-to-side movement, you waddle. In real life, walking like that is hard on the body, but it works. In tango, that makes you step on your partner.

When you walk efficiently, your hips tip slightly, like a pendulum, to allow you to walk in one straight line. The free leg is relaxed, as is that hip. The support leg hip joint is slightly higher than the free hip joint as the pelvis tips. Although this is more obvious on women, men's hips work the same way.

The main point of staying on your midline, is to allow your heavy head and torso to balance on top of one femur, then the other, allowing most of the work to translate into motion in the direction you want to move. Therefore, we want to find how to move from foot to foot with the least amount of muscular work possible.

Finding the muscles you need to use

Many of us don't have strong core muscles to help us balance: we spend too much time in chairs and not enough moving our bodies. To counteract our sedentary lifestyle, we need to work our core a lot more.

I got the idea for this exercise when I was sweating my way through a Barre 3 class. I have looked online, but the exercise is apparently too silly-looking to post on the web! Here's the closest I could find to show what we were doing. As we squeezed the Pilates ball between our thighs and lifted weights, the instructor called out, "Come on ladies! Try to pop that ball!" I realized that I could use this idea of squeezing in my tango practice.

I place a Pilates ball between my thighs, and do my regular side-side step practice: 1. release through the arch of the foot to push off; 2. project the leg; 3. finish rolling through the support foot to complete the step. As I land, I squeeze my thighs together, using my strength to keep me from rolling out onto my little toe. When I do this, my hip tip is minimal, but working.

When you do this, remember that the Pilates ball is made of a sticky plastic: it will stick to your clothes. You don't need to grip it tightly while you move sideways (otherwise, you look like you have go, and are trying to hold it). Let your entire leg still project for the step. It is OK to drop the ball as you are learning the exercise. STRETCH the leg and then squeeze.

It sounds weird, but it is making my dance more elegant. Because I am elongating more and using my body more efficiently, I look longer and stretchier. Also, I am moving my midline less to shift feet, so more of my work goes directly into moving the direction I want to go.

Try it and let me see what you think!

Ganchos: a primer on leading/following ganchos from a deep pivot

We have been working on perfecting ganchos ("hooks") and leg wraps in my advanced class this session, so I wanted to underline what technique needs to be in place for the follower to have a loose leg and good axis; and the leader to have the timing of the step perfected.

Followers: the secret to a good gancho is a good back step

The best gancho comes from making the best back step that you can do. When I see people preparing for ganchos, what I often see is abandonment of solid, basic technique. We get excited about doing a "fancy" move, and forget we know how to walk.

Also, when a gancho comes from an overturned back ocho, the angle of the pivot that prepares for the step is very important. The leader does pick the angle, but when I feel the extreme twist the leader provides, as a follower, I give my best, on-balance pivot. I try to pivot so that my butt is almost facing the leader.

Keep your legs collected during the pivot to get maximum rotation. Make sure that you are not sneaking the free foot out to get started on the back step of the gancho: that slows down your pivot and prevents you from getting the most you can out of your preparation. If you are even an inch or two further away from the leader, a gancho won't work.

For your back step, feet, knees and hips are in flexion and soft. As soon as you roll through your heel, the free leg needs to be elastic all the way to the hip. Let your foot brush the ground: holding your leg "ready" will only topple you over. The leg is heavy.

Think of your free leg as one of those wristbands that SNAP around the wrist. Your thigh makes contact, and the lower leg wraps from that contact down through the entire leg, and then releases. If you pick your leg up and try to gancho, the effect is not the same. Risk making a sloppy gancho rather than a tense one!

Above all, focus on your axis and stretch of the body: the strength of your axis makes the free leg's movement even more dramatic. It's not really about the gancho; 80% of your work is always about keeping your axis.

Last word of advice: keep breathing! A leader can't do anything with a stiff board as a follower.

Leading ganchos from overturned back ochos: let disassociation work for you

Disassociation, controlling the twist in your body so that hips and chest can maintain different angles, is the most important aspect of preparing to lead a follower's gancho. Disassociation allows you to stabilize your hips and use your torso to help the follower pivot.

I originally learned to lead these ganchos from turns, but many followers don't have strong enough turn technique to make this work well. I suggest: salida, (leader changes weight), one or two back ochitos (tiny ochos) to get the follower's hips pivoting, and then leading a stronger pivot to overturn the follower against your body, ready to gancho.

Stabilize your own hips: if you pivot the follower using your hip motion, the follower gets less of a pivot. When I follow, I prefer less torque but with stable hips. If the leader's hips turn, I get less help from the leader. Also, it brings the follower closer to the leader's body, so that the leader doesn't have to fish for gancho placement.

Adjust your angle AFTER the follower's pivot. I want to be facing perpendicular to the follower if I am going to do the gancho with the "same" side leg (i.e., using my right leg to lead a gancho on the right side of my body). I want to be facing opposite the follower if I am using the "other" leg (i.e., using my left leg to lead a gancho that was originally on my right side). Hint: I can sometimes get a secondary adjustment to the follower's pivot after I adjust myself.

Place the follower's back cross step/foot BEFORE placing your foot and ankle for the gancho. For best placement, turn your leg out at the hip, and lift your knee so that your leg is in an S-curve shape. I find that I usually get my little toe down on the ground, but I focus on connecting my instep with the follower's ankle, so that I know the location of the follower's axis/balance point. When I use the "other leg" I am aiming the back of my knee/thigh towards the spot where the follower is standing.

Keep your hips back over the support leg. Otherwise, the follower will not have space to allow the free leg to hook with your leg.

Continue to twist your torso around your own spine and rebound back to neutral in order to lead the follower's free leg. This not a wrestling match: don't pull or push with your embrace to make something happen.

As the follower's leg completes the gancho, gauge the space you have to move, as well as the force of the gancho, and use that energy to create the next step in your dance.

The principal error I see on the dance floor, is to make the gancho a move about momentum. True, a good gancho can be fast and snappy, but a slow-mo gancho feels better to me as a follower, and is no less of a hook. The gancho is about TIMING.

The best exercise I have ever seen to practice ganchos comes from Chicho Frumboli. In his teacher training workshops, he had us practice ganchos, without using an embrace (balance work), in slow motion (timing practice), over and over (motor memory). By the end of the two-hour intermediate class, followed by the two-hour advanced class, my brain was fried, but I really understood how this move works!

The moment is always changing--and so is my axis

I've been reading about impermanence: nothing stays the same forever. I've also been thinking about my axis in new ways that bring together the idea of permanence and balance. Here's what I have so far.

I realize that I've been talking about axis as if it is some attainable location that can be found and maintained. However, being on balance, or on axis, is not a stable state. Even if I have completed a step "perfectly" and have arrived on balance in a new spot, the one thing that can make me fall over, is trying to lock my axis into place.

What if the idea of axis was a constantly moving, micro-adjusting approximation of being on balance? The proprioceptors in your ankles send balance messages to the brain, creating small adjustments to keep you upright when standing. The circulatory system (and other body systems) circulate fluid throughout the body. You breathe in and out, unless you concentrate so hard to dance that you hold your breath; causing you to fall over.

What if axis is more like a fluid held inside a mostly stable body shape? Can we use this picture to have better balance by accepting that balance and axis constantly shift?

Body Dynamics for a technique boost

Body Dynamics is about learning to dance tango with elegant, sensuous power. It is about learning to use your body efficiently, so that you have reserves to pull out when your partner and/or the music demand more from you. This class will help you master balance, axis, breath--all the challenging parts of tango. In Body Dynamics, you find your own voice and energy within the dance to make it YOUR dance.

This is a serious class that yields major results in flexibility, technique and dance level, in a short time. We start with about twenty minutes of tango-specific stretches: a combination of what my teacher, Georgina Vargas, has taught me; and other stretches culled from my 25 years of teaching dance. Then, we do drills and exercises for the remainder of class, sometimes with a partner, sometimes solo. Each week, I focus on something that will be used in the advanced class, so that each person has a solid block of technique to apply to the steps taught that week. I also work on something for my students who take my intermediate/advanced intermediate class on Thursdays at 8 PM.

For example, this week the Thursday 8 PM class will be starting six weeks of milonga traspie (syncopated milonga), while the advanced class will begin tackling ganchos, leg carries and amagues in combinations.  We will spend part of class working on fast, small steps with elegance; and part on freeing the legs for swingy movements; as well as working on how to lead ganchos.  Each week, the material covered varies according to the needs of the other classes.

I can see the results of Body Dynamics: my students who take it improve much faster than those who do not. However, I know it is hard to make time for two classes a week, so I always offer a special for taking it: sign up for Body Dynamics and one of the other classes this session, and pay only $90 (instead of $120 for both); such a deal! Not sure if it's the right class for you? Drop in and check it out for $12. The Om Studio is at 14 NE 10th, PDX, just off Burnside. See you there!

Reverse culture shock: coming home from Buenos Aires

As both an anthropologist by training and a former Peace Corps volunteer, I am familiar with culture shock.  I have lived abroad, traveled and/or studied for periods of up to two years, on three continents. In adjusting to a foreign culture, you expect to find differences--sometimes very hard to adjust to--but you think that coming home will be easier.

Reverse culture shock is more of a shock to my system than culture shock. Nothing has ever struck me quite as strongly as my inability to choose a box of cereal in the cereal aisle, after returning from two years in Morocco (and two choices of cereal). However, the emotions I experience upon reentry from Buenos Aires almost rival that feeling of disorientation.

Each time I come back from Buenos Aires, I have a period of time when I need to re-adjust to my home tango culture of Portland, Oregon. I am used to cabeceo, and I feel a mental jolt to have someone walk up and ask me to dance verbally, even though I occasionally do the same thing after a prolonged absence from Argentina. Also, I get used to the high level of musicality I find in Buenos Aires, even if the technique level is not terribly higher than in Portland. I expect a more relaxed body contact and more energy exchange when I come home, and often feel frustrated by the North American focus on "steps" instead. I become accustomed to small steps and no room, and have to mentally adjust to the more globe-trotting Portland dancer who sometimes does multiple laps of the room during a tanda.

I call this period of time "the Buenos Aires letdown" and spend a lot of time griping about being back for a few weeks. When I go dancing, I experience a sense of withdrawal from a drug, a craving for high intensity tango in Buenos Aires, my favorite addiction. Gradually, I remember why I dance in Portland (to see friends, to relax, etc.) and rejoin the community mentally.

But those first few weeks are hell.

Dancing to tango music: what does that mean?

Students often get frustrated by tango music. After all, we have grown up with rock music here in the United States. Many of us dance by moving to each beat of the music, repetitively. We shimmy; we play air guitar; or we sit still, listening.

Our grandparents' music is swing if we are older, or rock if we are younger. Tango is not something we heard as children. Many of my students say that they prefer dancing tango to alternative tango, because it feels more like rock music. So what do you do to tango music? How do you learn what to do?

One approach is to dance on each beat of the music. Those of us with musical training, or with natural rhythm, can do that. Some people are able to watch others dancing and cheat off of their rhythm. Those for whom music is a foreign language from a distant planet, struggle with stepping to the musical beat. After a long battle, most are able to do this with practice.

I think that tango music yields a much richer experience if you dare to leave the beat behind, at least from time to time. As North Americans, we seem to find pausing to music a bit nerve-racking: our Puritan ethic of looking busy and keeping busy, does not jive with the enjoyment of a moment in dance where we are doing little more than sharing a moment of doing nothing!

If music is easy for you, consider listening to the melody and the feeling of a song as a place to start learning how/where to pause. There are natural pauses and breaks in the music that encourage the dancer to pause and play. For beginners, I tell people to stand on one leg, and "draw your name in cursive on the floor, as if you were drawing in the sand with your big toe." This way, the whole process of deciding WHAT to do with a pause is eliminated, letting the dancer focus on the music. Then we dance, incorporating our "adorno" into the dance.

Then, we practice using pauses of different durations. Most leaders think they are pausing when they don't move for one count of the music. Before the follower has even figured out that there is a pause, the couple is off and running again. To avoid this, I have students count while pausing: "one-Mississippi, two-Mississippi, three-Mississippi, etc." up to "six-Mississippi" or "eight-Mississippi." At this point, the followers have happily done an adorno, and are ready to move. The leaders are usually frothing at the mouth. We can ALL slow down.

The difficulty with pausing, is to figure out how to pause appropriately with the music. We have all seen the "advanced" dancer who plays with the music so self-consciously that every beat is accounted for, but his poor follower does not usually look happy. How can we pause organically, fitting it into the music?

Unfortunately, the answer is "get to know the music." If you know a song, you dance better to that music. You know where the pauses are. You know how emotional, or relatively steady, that singer sings. You know where your partner will try to end early, or if the final "bum-bum!" will be missing. Start listening NOW! Play tango until you are (almost) sick of the songs that you hear each week at the milonga.

Single-axis turns

My advanced class will be working on single-axis turns for the next few weeks: here is a head start on Monday night!

The basics

Single-axis turns are turns in which the leader and the follower are (as much as is possible) sharing an axis while spinning on one foot in place, and then exiting.

A single-axis turn can be done:

• in a right or left turn;
• with either the leader's right or left foot;
• and through any step of the follower's turn.

My main teacher for these was Luciana Valle, but I also studied them with Chicho Frumboli and Gustavo Naveira. I was taught them in open embrace, but I prefer to dance as many of them as possible in the interlaced, close embrace that I usually use to dance. Why? Because I find it easier to control the follower when I have a full embrace, rather than just two hands to guide them.

 

Secrets to make single-axis turns easy

Tips for leaders

1. Remember to keep your leg, knee and foot relaxed. This will allow you to land on balance, without knocking the follower out of your way.
2. "Pink Panther" timing: da-DUMP! The follower's foot hits the ground, and then you step around/behind a split second after they start the weight transfer. This allows you an escape hatch if the partner lands off balance, so that you can bail on the turn, OR help them regain balance. It also allows you to "ride" the momentum of the follower, instead of working harder ;-)
3. Don't go for super-rotation instead of technique: a a half turn is fine (heck, a quarter turn is fine). When you and your partner are aligned correctly, you will find that you turn a lot more, even without much effort.
4. There should be a moment at the end of the turn where there is a feeling of suspension before the exit: don't fall into an exit, use that suspension and enjoy it! It's like a wave gathering and then breaking.
5. Exit with the follower's easiest exit (usually back or forward) and arrange yourself as needed. If you need to change feet for stability, then do it, but ONLY to exit. For example, on the follower's back cross step version of this turn, I sometimes lead this in parallel, then transfer weight to exit in crossed system.

Tips for followers

1. Don't panic.
2. Remember to use your body like a spring: all joints are soft and flexible, but the body also stretches on axis so the whole thing doesn't compress.
3. If in general you struggle to keep your hips "back" for good alignment, focus on that while spinning to stay on axis.
4. Did I mention don't panic?
5. Do the best turn you can do, with excellent technique on each step, and you will be on balance, ready for anything. Do NOT try to "help" the leader with the step. Focus on doing the best front, side or back step you can instead.

Using single-axis turns

First, make sure you can do some basic single-axis turns before you string them into combinations:

• left turn, step through follower's open step with left foot (or right).
• left turn, step through follower's front cross step  with left foot (or right).
• left turn, step through follower's back cross step with left foot (right is dangerous here).

When those work, try them to the right. For some people, these are almost impossible. For me, the "harder" direction turned out to be easier for me. Try all of them, and see what makes the most sense to you.

I like using boleos and/or drags in combinations with single-axis turns, but I will hold off on making suggestions until we've worked through some of the combinations in class, and then I'll post the ones that folks like the best.

 

Upcoming classes start next week!

My Monday and Thursday night classes will start a new six-week session next week.  Come check it out:
 

• 14 NE 10th, PDX (one block from Norse Hall)
• $12 drop in
• $60 for 6 week session
• $90 for any two classes taken in the same session (i.e. Body Dynamics & Adv.)

Class topics/descriptions:

Body Dynamics (7 PM Mondays, Int/Adv)

This is the class that will improve your dance the fastest, but it is "no vacation!". Each session, we work on stretches and drills that will help in 8 PM classes on Thursdays AND Mondays. Wear clothing to stretch on the floor, and bring both socks and your dance shoes. This is a true tango workout!

Take It To The Next Level (8 PM Mondays, Advanced)

This class will focus on single-axis turns and multiple turns this session.  We will use drags and sacadas in combinations that work well with the single-axis turns to create fun combinations for the advanced dancer. We will learn some new adornos to play with on the dance floor. Connection, musicality and sensuality, here we come!

Top 10 Tango Moves (7 PM Thursdays, Beg/Int)

This class focuses on getting the basics down, dance-floor-ready, and connected to your partner.  For more advanced dancers, get the little details you never learned as a beginner! We always do some work on walking technique, plus some other topics.  This session, we'll do front and back ochos, basic paradas, and adornos for lead and follow for creativity and musicality.

Next 10 Tango Moves (8 PM Thursdays, Int./Adv. Int.)

Designed to add more repertoire for the dance floor, navigation and musicality for leaders AND followers, this class learns a new combination each week that is ready to take over to Norse Hall and use by the end of the hour.   This session will cover turns with a parada, a lapiz and/or enrosque for the leaders; and turn technique as well as more advanced adornos for the followers.

No pre-registration required: just show up!
 

Dancing in tight spaces: tips for leaders

With the Valentango festival coming up here in Portland, a lot of my students have asked for pointers for dancing in small spaces. Having spent more time leading on the Buenos Aires dance floors than most women, I have experienced leading in VERY tight spaces. I learned to hold my own while men who objected to my leading, tried to push me and my partner off the dance floor. I also learned how to dance and have fun without using much room by following skilled leaders.

When I dance in small spaces, I concentrate on the follower's experience, not mine. I don't worry about what to do with my feet. I put my follower's feet in safe spots, and my body usually ends up in the right place. I keep my solar plexus relaxed, which helps my follower stay more relaxed. I make sure that I lead to the appropriate level: I try out different moves, and then stay within my follower's comfort zone in terms of levels and steps.

I focus on making each dance fit the music as perfectly as I can. If it's a rhythmic tango, or a vals, or a milonga, I play with the rhythm. If it's a romantic tango or a vals, I look for the pauses, for the changes in flavor of the music, and work from there. I tend to dance the feeling of the music and the melody more than I did as a beginner or intermediate dancer.

However, I try to NEVER dance the music instead of dancing my partner. If my plan for the music and steps isn't working, my first responsibility is to the follower. I slow down; I wait for the follower. I make sure my follower feels secure and protected. So what if Joe Schmoe watching from the tables thinks I danced "off" the music? If my follower is happy, I am happy.

One of the best tandas I have ever had, was at Salon Canning one Sunday afternoon, to Pugliese. Before that, I had really thought that, to do justice to Pugliese, you needed a bit of space, but we were shoved in about the third row in from the tables, with almost no space to move. That guy made every pause count, with small, wonderful movements as we had space. Although he was not a advanced, polished dancer, his dance changed the way I led more than almost any lesson I have ever had. It was an experience in connection with my partner, with the music, and with the entire crowd surrounding us. I try to dance like that every tanda.

Dancing in tight spaces: tips for followers

With Valentango approaching, I have been thinking about what advice to give followers for dancing in small spaces. Leaders often panic when faced with tight quarters. Even a trusted leader may panic and leave you to your own devices as they try to figure out what to do. What can you do to help?

First, I focus on being on axis. If I keep my alignment in order. I make sure that I have my shock absorption system working: feet, ankles, knees and hips are soft and energized. I make sure my heels are down on the floor, not off the floor where I could injure other dancers. I keep my torso elastic and stretched, connecting to my leader. This makes it easier for the leader to lead me, leaving more focus for navigation.

Next, I DANCE. It's easy to cheat in small steps, and not dance your best. When in tight spaces, I play with my quality of movement, small changes in speed, and use my smaller adornos. I try to be as musical as possible. Every step counts. I am never treading in place, waiting to dance. I am dancing each step, making every bit of the song count for myself and my partner. I am dancing my heart out, in less than a square meter. If I really dance, my leader feels that and dances with me.

Third, I try to ensure that no one is going to run into us from a direction my leader cannot see. If I need to, I will use my left hand/arm to give a slight warning signal to my leader if s/he is about to back up into trouble. But make sure that you don't get into "back-seat driver" mode: you are following.

However, if you are the kind of follower who gets tense in small spaces, you may need to close your eyes and concentrate on relaxing in order to let yourself be led; I used to do that for years until I learned not to panic. If someone runs into you and your lead, exhaling and releasing the tension in your body will help you not get injured--and will make it easier for your leader to lead you.

Have fun!

Leading different size steps for a saucy tango

Now that all the followers have learned to take uniformly sized steps, we are starting to learn to vary the size of steps during the dance. WHAT?!? What was the point of learning to keep them the same?

• Safety: As the leader learns to lead, there are already so many variables that having a constant step size from the follower helps make tango danceable;
• Control: You can't learn to vary your step size on purpose until you have learned to FEEL where your body normally exists in space (kinesthetic awareness).

Now that you have learned control over your steps, we can play with the dance to add flavor (what my teachers Oscar and Georgina call "picante") to your movement, based on musical promptings, other people's use of space, of just for fun.

Two of the combinations we have worked on in the Monday advanced class have dealt with leading the follower to use small steps interspersed with larger steps. In both, we changed the follower's "back-side-forward" steps of a giro into something a bit different.

The marca is the key to changing the follower's step size

One of my advanced students told my teachers that he didn't like using his hand as a part of the lead. He said he had been trained to NOT use his right hand and embrace to control movement. Oscar told him that he could continue to dance like that and "do your four or five moves" but in order to develop clear leads for more moves, he needed to learn to use the marca.

This is to head off all the comments from those of you who say to me, "But [x teacher] told me not to use my hands!" I believe that that person probably just didn't understand 100% how to make this dance easier and more elegant. Yes, it IS more work to learn to lead this way, but it means that your follower will go where you want, and do what you want them to do. I personally like to see that glazed, happy look on my follower's face after a tanda; don't you?

The point of the marca is not to signal the follower, but rather to be able to control the follower's movement gently and effectively. The follower does not need to "know" a signal because the follower's body is adjusted by the marca to make the move work.

The marca needed for step size is the suspension of the follower WHILE MOVING. When I suspend the follower:

• If she is stationary, she will (hopefully) stay put on one leg;
• If she is moving when you suspend, the follower's feet stay under her more, making her steps smaller: this is what we need!

Medialuna to the left (1st part of the combination)

Rather than getting three medium-sized steps for the medialuna, this combination asked the follower to step "big-big-tiny" in order to end in the cross: #4 is the key part:

1. salida
2. regresa (side step back towards original position)
3. 1 step LOD (leader left foot, follower right foot)
4. medialuna to the left, with the leader stepping forward diagonal on the first step with the right AND STAYING ON THAT FOOT, and then pivoting in place with the chest to twist the follower into the cross, rather than taking a forward step on the third step of the turn.
5. Use the marca to pivot the follower into the cross with a light suspension. This limitls the size of step the follower can take.
6. Collect and (if needed) pivot counterclockwise, then both move laterally facing left diagonal LOD, and collect again to pivot clockwise and step laterally, facing right diagonal.
7. End ready to move LOD.

 A note: I teach followers to do uniform giro steps UNLESS led to do #4. Other teachers in the community teach to automatically do the cross, but then the leader has only one option for movement. This way, the leader has a choice of possible movements, one of which is to truncate the forward step into the cross.

Main object of doing this medialuna into the cross: use your new skills in step size to adjust spatially to position your next move on the crowded dance floor.

Eighteen years and still together!

This week, I made a joke about having a long-term marriage with tango, complete with ups, downs, dry spells, and long arguments. Then I started thinking about it: my relationship with tango has been very much like a marriage.

Tango and I started as an infatuation. In one short weekend, in December 1995, I fell in love at first sight. I started practicing three days a week with the one, and then two people in town who knew tango and were interested in getting better. I posted the "You know you are addicted to Argentine tango if..." checklist on my office door at the university, and set about solidying my habit.

As the infatuation turned into a new love affair, tango took precedence over many other parts of my life. I switched from a PhD program studying the Balkans, to a MA program in cultural anthropology, and wrote my thesis on Argentine tango. I started studying Spanish. I saved all my money and went to Argentina three years in a row (as a graduate student!), with the excuse that I needed to do research. If I hadn't switch my thesis focus to tango, I am pretty sure that I would have failed out of graduate school.

I started teaching tango because I was desperate to have tango partners to share my obsession. I initially taught tango as part of my advanced ballroom class at the University of Oregon in 1996.  I came in and announced to my class, "I have started learning Argentine Tango. I don't know very much about it, but I will teach you all I know." I started hosting a weekly practica, as well as organizing workshops with traveling teachers. I convinced the dance department to start offering tango classes for credit. After all, this was my big love, and I wanted everyone to share it! The daily routine of married life, of schedules, going out on special dates, cultivating mutual friends, creating a shared history--this was what I was doing.

As with most newlyweds, I thought that my love for tango would stay at a fever pitch forever. I remember chatting with Jose Garafolo, one of my earliest teachers, and asking him why he didn't go out to the milongas in Buenos Aires. When he told me he had already been teaching for ten years, and after work, didn't feel like going out dancing, I thought he was crazy. I could not imagine feeling that way about tango. After all, I was in LOVE. How could one not want to dance as many hours a day as possible? How could teaching get in the way of dancing?

Like a long-term marriage, what is fabulous and exciting at the beginning, becomes more comfortable, more predictable over time. Now, after dancing tango for eighteen years, and teaching for seventeen years (I don't recommend this quick path to anyone, but back then, we were desperate for teachers), I understand Jose's point of view.  When I have taught six or seven hours of tango in a day, I have to force myself to go to the milonga to dance. I still love dancing and I love seeing my friends of many years, but my love affair has become my job. I am married to tango.

And yet, there are those moments from time to time that are even more exciting than at the beginning, because now I understand the movement, the music, the lyrics, the cultural details--there are richer, more moving tandas, that I would not have appreciated when in my lovestruck mode. This is why I keep going back to Buenos Aires, going to the milongas in Portland, practicing drills and combinations at home, and teaching. I wouldn't give this up for the world. So even though I "cheat" on tango by dancing West Coast Swing or going to the salsa club, I am married for life to tango.  'Til death do us part, baby, 'til death do us part.

To show off is human?

Today, one of my students said that he has urges to show off when folks are watching, and asked me how to stop being aware of others watching him dance. I know that that the tango politically correct answer would be somethinglike, "You should just focus on your partner, and not pay attention to the others in the room, except to navigate." After all, this is a social dance between two persons.

However, my first thought was, "Hmm, I know exactly what you are talking about!" We are all human and imperfect: I feel the urge to show off whenever I am passing one of my teachers at a table at a milonga, or when I know that a really good dancer is watching me. I want to impress that person, so that they want to dance with me, or are proud of my progress, or just to show off--and I am a self-conscious, shy person in general, who prefers to remain more in the background in most situations. Imagine if you are more outgoing!

So why is it a problem that we want to show off? After all, can't we also show our partner off and make them look good to attract other dance partners for them?  This doesn't have to be a purely selfish action. If we acknowledge that most of us can't stay only in the moment, focusing on only one thing/person for even a tanda, why does it matter if we think about a little showing off?

I think that the problem is that, usually, we mess up when we try harder. We get nervous about something, and our bodies tighten up. How many times have you thought, "Oh, [x] is watching, so I'll try something cool/fancy/harder," only to screw it up WHILE that person is watching? How embarrassing! I find myself thinking things like, "OK, just relax! Do NOT try to show off, just be cool. After all, this is about dancing with the partner I have right now and focusing on them. Focus! Do the right thing! Oops, I just messed up..."

Thinking about what my student asked made me realize why I prefer to dance in Buenos Aires instead of in my home community. I like the anonymity: no one knows I am a teacher; no one cares if I have status. I get to dance more than at home, because I am just some tourist. I can blend in, with my dark hair and medium height and clothing bought in Buenos Aires.

What is really silly about this, is that I know folks are watching me dance in Buenos Aires as well.  Women touch me on the shoulder and say, "Pretty feet!" after a good tanda.  Men obviously watch, because new people invite me to dance. But I don't feel the pressure to show off, and I don't feel as self-conscious. This may only be my experience, but I feel more permission both to relax, and to screw up, outside of my home community.

As a result, I have more memorable tandas in Buenos Aires; tandas that I will always remember, even if I can't remember the guy's name. Last year, there was that tanda with Hector (who I have only met once) at Sala Siranoush. The year before, it was a tango tanda (and a rocking chacarera) with Guillermo, my tango crush of the year. There was the great tanda with Juan the year before that, when we talked about life and how there are rocks in the road, in between sweet dances.

What does that say about showing off? When I am more relaxed, I show off less.  When I show off less, I invest more in my tandas. When I invest more in my tandas, I get more memorable tandas. Focusing on my partner, instead of showing off, makes for better tangos. If I dance for my partner, instead of for the tables, I will have a good time, and dance better. Showing off is human, but resisting the urge makes for stellar tango.