I'm busy knitting

I'll get back to you.

Adrian and Amanda Costa - now with transcript

Danny asked for a transcript of this interview in the comments on the previous post; I find it pretty hard to hear, myself, so I should think he's right about not being the only one. I've done my best below, I can't hear every word (Amanda is clearest) but I think I've got all the sense.



CLAIRE LOEWE: What is tango-salon for you, if you could essentially say what is important for you about tango-salón?

ADRIAN: For me tango-salón is, the first, be able to respect the people dancing, I mean, what I think about social dancing, about respect for the other ones; is be able to dance with the music and really know what you are doing with the music; is trying to do that with elegance, and make the womans feeling like a queen.

CLAIRE: [To Amanda]: And do you feel like a queen?

AMANDA: Yes, In his arms yes! Depends on the man. But for me, it's more, the walk; and how a couple can be, er, to share the space with the others; and the, the harmony with the couple and with the others and with the music; and not ... with together, not .. in [inaudible] in opposition with all that.

CLAIRE: All of those things are things you've become very well known for here, people are crazy about you, your musicality, I think until you both came here there hasn't been a teacher really, who has clearly spoken about the musicality, [inaudible] you've spoken about the music, and also about the floorcraft, you know, how every single figure fits in with the direction, the first things, it feels like, you've taken tango a level up in London, singlehandedly, the two of you, have done that because your teaching is so clear. So, I really want to thank you for that, if I see the dance which you've brought [inaudible] to our school here, [inaudible] ... hopefully, my students, they're respecting each other, I hope there's no fighting going on as we're talking here, maybe, behind us, there's somebody ... it looks pretty good.

AMANDA: They are walking!

ADRIAN: [inaudible]

CLAIRE: They're in their lanes. And they're doing - how are they doing? [inaudible] the experience of teaching here?

AMANDA: In this place, it's very easy because you gave all the fundamental things, the ball-room, the technique of the ball-room, the embrace, the posture, the walk, so, it's easier. In the other part of London, it's more like a fight. But - we win, together. We win sometimes - not win, it's not a fight, but, we convince to do less, and with more quality, than more, and without quality. There are more ... [fades out].

Adrian and Amanda Costa talking to Claire Loewe

I'd like to see more of this kind of thing. Old milongueros talking are fascinating, but they're not available to teach us, so it's nice to hear teachers who are available to us from time to time, and are young and likely to remain available, talking about what matters to them and what they think they are trying to transmit. Here, Claire Loewe asks Adrian Costa to summarise what tango is to him. He does good job of that, and then Amanda adds her own nuance.



I would have liked to hear the rest of what Amanda says at 02:35 that starts "not a fight, but, we convince ..." (What I think she's saying sounds like a good plan, but it fades out to their performance before I can be sure).

Thanks Tango South London for doing it and posting it.

Good writing about good writing about clothes

Anne Hollander in Seeing Through Clothes, which is about the history of representations of the body and clothing in Western art:

[George Eliot] speaks of the kinds of bonnets that “were then the fate of women,” and she magnificently describes the way a lady sobbing in the transports of deep distress must yet contrive, with a nicely calibrated blend of instinct and calculation, to rush through a narrow door without crushing her wide buckram sleeves. George Eliot must herself have seen it done in the enormous fashionable sleeves of 1830, when she was an observant eleven-year-old girl.

Present in progress

Present in progress
Originally uploaded by mshedgehog

I've recovered, at last, from the blue thing, and I'm starting to be more productive. Here's a present for the next baby in my knitting group. At the moment it's just a striped tube with bobble eyes, but it's going to have interesting feet.

Generous dancers

Something a few of my very favourite male dancers have in common is not a particular style or technique, but a great personal generosity in their dance, especially when the woman is not very experienced, or is someone they don't know. (I'm sure lots of women are notable for it as well, I just don't know because I don't dance with them).

One of them was the person who danced a vals with me at my very first milonga and made it seem perfectly straightforward and tons of fun and gave me enough courage to keep on with the classes despite the fool who, fifteen minutes later, persisted with the vague leads, pained looks, and incomprehensible verbal instructions until I could no longer hold back tears.

You dance who you are, up to a point, and I have always assumed it must be a reflection of character. But I don't really know. Even if it is, you probably need a certain level of skill to express it successfully. I don't know exactly which skills are important, but Ampster has written a beautiful piece about that, and the rewards of gaining them.

But I can tell you what it feels like. It feels like a reflection of someone who not only likes women as people, but actively enjoys the idea that we're not necessarily perfect or under control.

I don't ask this quality of everybody's dance. There are lots of ways to be a lovely dancer, that's part of the interest, and this is just one. But if you see that possibility in yourself, wherever you are, cultivate it, because it will be a real contribution to your scene.

Corrientes

Time I updated this one. I never normally go to Corrientes because the location is awkward for me, but my previous review is based on a festival and doesn't do it justice. It's at Chalk Farm, two Saturdays in the month.

The Class: I skipped it. Usually Mina and Giraldo, sometimes guest teachers. On this occasion it was Adrian and Amanda Costa, who are great, but I was busy elsewhere.

Layout and Atmosphere: It's inside a large, modern, well-equipped school. You go in past all the usual notices about reporting to reception and buzzing to be let in. The table where you pay is visible from the door. After paying, follow the corridor to your right for the dance hall entrance.

The floor is enormous and excellent. There are small tables and chairs around three sides of the floor, and on this occasion there was enough seating and there was a reasonably effective division between seating and dance floor. The fourth side of the floor, on your left as you go in, is occupied by a curtained stage across the whole width of the room, which is opened up for dancing for special events only. The DJ has a table at the far left hand side, and when there's a band that's where they go. The refreshments are in the near right hand corner.

I walked in and stood at the entrance for some time, looking around and wondering where to put my coat. Giraldo, who doesn't know me from a bar of soap as far as I'm aware, approached me in a serious, proprietorial manner that seemed only faintly ludicrous in one so young, airkissed me on both cheeks and pointed out some free chairs in the far corner. It was nice of him, I felt welcomed.

The lighting is rather uneven, with a lot of light on the floor and some very dark areas in parts of the seating, especially against the right-hand wall. The temperature is also uneven, hot under the lights and chilly near the fans. I was glad I had a shawl with me for warmth; it was also dark coloured, and by wrapping myself in it and sitting in my dark spot in the corner I could practically disappear, which I actually rather like to have as an option.

The atmosphere was quite nice considering that it's a giant box which looks like a school, and smells like a school. The lighting and arrangement of tables were reasonably good and the person at the desk was mildly welcoming, Giraldo more so. People generally seemed to be having fun. I think it mostly comes from who turns up.

Hospitality: OK. Nothing is included in the price, but bottled water is a routine £1, and the taps work so if you ran out of money getting in, you wouldn't come to actual harm. And nobody tries to stop you bringing in your own, as far as I know. Bottled water, glasses of wine around the £2/£3 mark, and I think other soft drinks are served from a table in the corner. No food. There are some shelves for your things at either end of the back wall, but if there isn't enough space on those you'll have to put them on a chair, as I did. They were fine. The loos are what you'd expect from a school, a bit rickety but clean and just about equipped and working. To find them, continue along the corridor past the entrance to the hall. The door marked Ladies leads to a baffling anteroom with several unlabelled or oddly-labelled doors, all looking just like the inside of the one you just came through; one of them is in fact the Ladies, but I don't remember which. I think there are also showers and changing rooms but I didn't manage to work it out.

Anyone or anything interesting that turned up or happened: It was a normal night, very nice. Except that Adrian and Amanda were there and I really like watching them dance socially out of the corner of my eye - they also do a very cute salsa.

What I thought of the DJing: I thought it was better than average until they had some problems with the sound system, and then changed DJs, after which it was average and carried on with the same sort of thing till 2am rather than changing with the evening. The sound quality is very good all over the very large room, as you'd expect from a room of this kind.

Getting in: I think it was £9 (I've left it too long and forgot to take notes, but the website says that this weekend is £10, or £9 after 10pm, which agrees with what I remember). I was expecting a performance and so were a few other people who went, but there wasn't one.

Getting there and getting home: It is two minutes walk from Chalk Farm tube. Left out of the exit, left again, cross the road and enter the building made of giant orange and green rectangles. The problem is that it doesn't really get going until after the last Tube you could possibly use to get home, and the location isn't that central. You can get an N50 night bus to Euston outside the door, and you can wait at Euston for another night bus to get home. Consult TFL for night bus routes. I stayed to the end, and getting home took me over an hour and a half, taking a taxi for the bit to Euston. It isn't really worth it to me unless I can get a lift with someone going my way; if you were driving it wouldn't be a problem.

The website: http://www.corrientessocialclub.co.uk/ Pretty. Lots of flash. Ignore that, click "what's on" and keep scrolling down till you find the When/What/How Much bit. It's usually open on two Saturdays a month Tango-UK or the Facebook group will probably tell you which ones without the Flash and scrolling.

How it went: There were lots of people there who I wanted to dance and socialise with, and who wanted to dance and socialise with me, and I had a really nice evening. I knew quite a few people there, and the presence of Adrian and Amanda happend to have attracted a mix of people that worked out well. I'm not sure it would be the best choice if you didn't know anyone, unless you have a lot of experience. I passed up an early lift home because I was really getting into it. Most of the dancing was pretty civilised, the floor is huge, and I don't think I got any bumps at all. The music was all right. It's Saturday. I'd probably go there whenever it was on, if I had a way of getting home that didn't take an hour and a half in the cold with all the drunks.