Death to toxic inane sexist talk

Here's a quote which my friend Trud related on Facebook (it's not on her blog) from a follower technique class. She said the class was a very good one and during it the teacher said this:

“Don’t make it easy for the leaders! If you do whatever they want, even if they’re being lazy with their lead, you’re spoiling them.”

The reason Trud quoted this is that she approves of women being encouraged to focus on the quality of their own dance in class. I agree that that's a good thing to do. I don't agree that this does it.

No. What the teacher said is sexist and inane. Saying it at all conveys an unambiguous message to the women that quality in their dance exists to serve the man's, and is not worth attention for its own sake. Which is false, and toxic.

Nobody ever says to the men "Don't heave the followers around with your arms, it will stop them learning to follow". People say "Don't heave them around, it doesn't feel nice (which is bad dancing)". They say "Don't heave them around, you might hurt them (which is bad dancing)". But "Don't heave them around, you're spoiling them so they don't have to follow"? No. Nobody thinks they need to encourage a man's efforts in working on his dance by reminding him how they will improve the quality of someone else's. That would be pointless, because quality in his dance justifies the effort by itself, and he's there to work on his own dance. Whereas the women, apparently, are unpaid class assistants, automatically qualified as such because their own dance is so trivial there is no difference between qualified and not.

And then teachers who constantly remind the women how they can help the men "too", telling themselve they're just mentioning it as a kind of icing on the cake, wonder why the women dance like mice. Because you told them to, and you're contradicting yourself when you tell them to dance like tigers. The message you're not conscious of, that tells us what your beliefs are about our place in the world, will always come through more strongly, because unconcious messages are the ones people really believe. Otherwise they wouldn't give them. Because, by definition, they're not giving them on purpose.

By all means, actively and consciously recognise that women are often brought up to believe that they are there to serve and that every goal and effort must be justified and excused in terms of how it serves someone else. By all means bear this in mind, and how it drains effort and quashes ambition. But challenge it, don't affirm and reinforce it.

Tell the women to dance well. Tell them how to dance well. Tell them to make it a personal ambition, and not to betray it. Treat following as dancing. Take it seriously as something difficult and rewarding that can be done well or badly. Take it for granted that dancing well, by definition, serves everyone it is supposed to serve, and principally the dancer. Talk as though you believe that dancing the best you can is a valid, satisfying and worthy goal for anyone, an adequate justification for persistent effort, that can be allowed to stand alone. Do that by allowing it to stand alone. Refrain from talking as though you don't believe it.

People say this sort of thing all the time, it's persistent and pervasive, it has always annoyed me, from day one, and I ... would like to ask that teachers stop it.

When you hear yourself saying "Don't anticipate or guess, because it's bad dancing and it doesn't do the leaders any good either", just stop after the "dancing". Or, if the sentence still feels somehow painfully incomplete, forgive yourself for feeling like that, and then replace the missing part with something useful, and say "Don't anticipate or guess, because it's bad dancing and you are here to improve your dance, so concentrate hard on whatever happens and do exactly what you feel every time. Pay attention to small differences, which will make you get better. If you don't know what to do, ask for help."

Forgive yourself for having the stupid, toxic assumptions culture and society have put on you. Then kill them.

Oliver Kolker on teaching and learning

This is from November last year, but I think his reflections are interesting:

Oliver Kolker: Teaching and Learning Proocess: ... it was never an issue of getting bored when I had to just walk over and over again.  I knew this was a necessary foundation for the dance and I enjoyed understanding I was building and developing my craft, my footwork, balance, etc… it’s like people approaching this dance with a goal of being good (obviously) but the approach and the goal should be a journey in itself...

This, I think, is important. If you always enjoy where you are, and you also always enjoy improving something, a lot of problems become unimportant, or even fun.

It makes sense to me to think of it as a process of independent research in which you consult, from time to time, anyone you think may have some information that interests you. What works? What doesn't work? What feels good? What depends on what else? In what way is each person's information coloured by their own tastes and limitations, and in how far is it more widely applicable? Like when you study history and you think about primary and secondary sources and their agendas.

You don't expect everyone to say the same thing, and you don't expect one person to give you the whole story. That would be ridiculous. It's not like being at school, where the game is about pretending to do no more nor less than is expected of you by someone else. This is a real thing in the real world, and it's a matter of finding out, rather than studying. If you needed exams and competitions to find out whether you were any good, you'd be doing ballroom.

Kolker (I think he's from New York):

... THERE IS NOTHING MORE SAD IN THIS DANCE AS WHEN LEADERS OR FOLLOWERS DON’T KNOW THEY DON’T KNOW ...

Research - as opposed to just learning - is a process of finding out what it is that you don't know. If that - "what's the next thing I don't know?" is always the information you're looking for, then you make discoveries. This is true no matter what the subject matter. Kolker:

... because at the end of the day when some of us become really good THERE IS NO MEDAL, NO SACK OF GOLD AT THE END OF A RAINBOW OR AND OLD MAN TO HAND YOU A DIPLOMA.

I'm not sure why I would want any of that (although I wouldn't say no to a random bag of gold, I suppose). But, so far, there are lots of very pretty balloons.

That said, there are conditions under which a thoughtful stare and an approving nod can feel like a medal.

I was reading The Economist earlier today; it reviewed a book about people who learn lots of languages. It suggested that those who do this successfully are simply those who find the hard work part of it fun; who enjoy the parts everyone else finds boring. That's probably all the answer there is to this stuff.

Anyway: go ahead and read the whole thing. I haven't presented all his thoughts, nor even the most emphatically expressed.

Dancecraft

I don't usually post anything about forthcoming events, because where would it stop, but I really like Andreas's class descriptions, and this is the sort of workshop that people swear never exists, and tediously moan about the non-existence of. So it just seems worthwhile to post this and point out that it does exist, and you can get it if you really want it.

DISCLOSURE: Andreas is a friend of mine. I usually take his small-group workshops, and I like them, but I'm not taking this one 'cause I'm going to be in Folkestone.

Intensive Small Group Workshop
in London Saturday 6th August 2011:

Dancecraft
A 3+ hour small group workshop (a maximum of 5 couples!) with Andreas Wichter.

Floorcraft should not put limits on your dance. It should enhance, inform and shape your dance. The underlying skill - what I call "dancecraft" - is what allows you to bring your steps to life, change them at will and to improvise freely so you can interpret the music, while being connected to everyone in the ronda.

The "Dancecraft" workshop contains numerous exercises to help free you from the shackles of memorized or ingrained sequences, improve improvisational ability, and incorporate other couples' movements on the floor into your dance in a positive manner.

In this 3+ hour class we will look at integrating floorcraft skills with the demands of expression and musicality. There will be numerous exercises for precise leading and following and variation of turns and other elements to meet the demands of fluctuating space on the floor as well as that of the music.

With the aim of letting the flow of the ronda shape our dance, we will work on flexible turning skills to make and change turns and direction changes on the fly. For shaking off the shackles of routine, we will have some improvisation exercises to enable us to change any step at any time to fit the situation.

Please book with a partner.

Solid basic skills (posture, embrace, walking, parallel & crossed system transitions, turns) are required.

Saturday 6th August
The Room
33 Holcombe Road N17 9AS Tottenham Hale
13:00 - 17:00 (includes short breaks)
max 5 couples, £45 per person
Location Info: http://www.the-room.org.uk/

If you want to take it though, you need to get in touch with Andreas (andreas AT tangokombinat DOT de) immediately. Get on his mailing list or ask to join the facebook group if you want future dates. As I say, this is an exception, I'm not going to announce them here.

I can't decide quite what it is I like about the class descriptions - they're so careful. And in real life he's so funny.

[Edit in response to a comment: in terms of level, my rule of thumb on what the above means would be that if you (as your half of the couple) can't already do a complete turn without needing to open the embrace at all, you're going to be struggling in most of Andreas's small-group workshops. He does always briefly cover posture and embrace at the start, but dancing comfortably in an uninterrupted close embrace is a basic necessary skill in his world, not an advanced skill. If the class is specifically about that, of course that's different.]

Like a princess

"Imagine you're a princess, walk like a queen!"

What exactly am I supposed to imagine, here?

A depressed brood mare leafing listlessly through Vogue? A silly hat? A girl in a pink plastic dress and tiara, trudging grimly back to the car park from Disneyworld? Someone for whom everything goes better on top of a horse?

I realise there are people who admire her Majesty for various personal qualities, but do they really include her walk? I hear Queen Beatrix is good on a bicycle, but I'm not sure how that helps.

WTF?

I mean, what does that even mean? "Princess" isn't filed in my mind with anything useful, beautiful, or even a tiny bit interesting, that doesn't directly require the presence of at least one horse or a minimum of thirty rugby players. The only walk it's associated with, is Sarah Ferguson's when she got married, and that can't be what they're aiming for.

Communication FAIL.

I have heard worse. The "stand like you're proud of your new breasts" is the most memorably alienating and repellent tango instruction I've heard of so far, but since I wasn't actually there (it's hearsay from a friend) I won't discuss it further.

From her mouth to God's ears

Melina's2c: What impact can a travelling teacher have?

... And now comes the part, where I ruin my business ...
... Don‘t invite visiting teachers, if you cannot support their work locally. ...
... All of you, be sensible consumers! It is up to you to decide, how much time and energy you want to invest in Tango and what kind of classes you book ...
...Please, think about what you want to achieve for your Tango community and plan your events, workshops and regular classes according to that goals.

Er, yes. I have nothing to add, and no quibbles. I'd have thought this stuff was obvious, but about six months' experience was enough to tell me that it wasn't. Read the whole thing - there's evidence. If you want to comment, go over there.

Update

Sorry everyone - been a bit busy this week with too much in my head. Meanwhile, TC has posted the other two parts of the translation of Melina's interview - part 1, part 2, part 3. I find it interesting and wise. The attributes she thinks a teacher should have are certainly much the same as what I look for - in anyone I want to learn from, about any subject. And she certainly has these herself. See her dancing at Salon Canning here, and here is their video channel.

Disclosure: I love them as people and I love dancing with Detlef and I love dancing with their students and for all these reasons I have a direct personal interest in more people listening to what Melina says.

A tango class with no dancing

I took a class last week in which we didn't dance.

We sat in a small circle and listened together to mostly-40s tangos, with Adrian Costa playing air-bass and air-piano (I don't think he ventured air-bandoneón) and pointing out the structure of the music, the characteristics of the styles and arrangements, and their implications for dancers. Amanda intervened occasionally to play air-violin, help with explanations, or reel him in if he got off the point in answer to a question.

He talked about Compas, Cadencia, phrasing, double-time, contratempo and traspié, and what sort of music is salón or milonguero and what that means. I got a lot out of it, most of all on how to go about identifying the features of different orchestras, and the points about the relationship between musical structure and dancing style.

And in a little preamble he said "This is the tango class I have always wanted to teach, the real proper tango class the way it should be. I'm really pleased to be able to teach this class." Or words to that effect.

I liked it. It would be nice if more people demanded this sort of class. Or if all the DJs took it.

The other way round

I've just got back from class that turned out to be really interesting. The topic was "renewing the tango" and the point Adrian and Amanda Costa were making with it (and I paraphrase here) was that to make the dance your own you have to take it apart and put it together in your own way - we are not dancing in the forties - but with full respect to the essence of tango, which is a social dance, which means that you dance it with other people besides your partner, and you have to consider them, which means further that you must be much more creative than you would be if you were just wafting about in space. Having a problem to solve makes you creative. That's the idea.

Anyway, the exercises were a lot of fun and people who can't get to a class or don't like taking classes could certainly try them at a practice or at home, so I might as well put it out there.

Setup
Start with a plain old 'salida' - sidestep to the man's left, step, step, cross the woman's left over right. Just that.

Exercise 1 - making a discovery
Find out from first principles how to do it the other way - that is, sidestep to the man's right, step, step, cross the woman's right over left.

Exercise 2 - making it work
Hey, you've invented something new. But it means that the first sidestep goes the wrong way, where you can't see because the woman's head is there. So in its current form, it's completely useless for social dancing. Now find out how to make what you've discovered fit into the rules for floorcraft - i.e. never changing lanes and never going where you can't see. (And generally, he told us, when a teacher shows you something you like, but you do it and it has a problem like this, or like ending up facing the wrong way, ask them how to make it work for social dancing, because then they will stop worrying that you'll leave if they talk about those things).

As those rules are hard to explain in words and can sound rather unconvincing, here again is my little top-view diagram of Adrian and Amanda from my post last Spring. Again we will suppose that the couple are in the outside lane, the wall or seating is to the right, and the boundary with the inside lane is about where the arrow marked 'line of dance' is. And we see that they can go anywhere in the green zone, which is where the man can see, until they get too close to a lane boundary and don't leave themselves enough space to turn. But they can't go into the red zone at all because the man won't be able see where he's going and therefore it's not safe.


Between about a dozen couples I think the class found three or four different solutions to this problem. This was the part that took the biggest chunk of time and the solutions they came up with were all very nice. I'll write what I can remember about them in white ink below - select the next paragraph with your mouse when you're ready to peek.

• A normal salida at an angle to your lane so that it zigs from one side of it to the other, followed by the mirror one to zag the other way. Very simple [and maybe relies on a fairly narrow lane] but it works.
• A normal salida with an extra weight change after which you step outside her on the other side.
• Do it at a corner (if I remember correctly, where the sidestep goes round the woman into the corner).
• Normal salida but with, I think, just one extra walking step. I'm not sure if I understood this one correctly but it looked extremely neat and elegant and original and Adrian seemed to like it a lot. So did I.

Exercise 3 - making it musical
Now find out where it goes in the music.

You probably can't solve all three problems at once but you can definitely learn something by taking them one at a time.

I had brought the wrong shoes, that I was too tired for, and my posture was scrambled, but that class was fun!

Adrian and Amanda Costa - fluid embrace

In case you're still wondering whether to take one of the many classes that Adrian and Amanda Costa are giving while they're here, I've taken a few and this is what I know about them.

• They're very nice and intelligent teachers.
• They give a high priority to basics, to social dancing, and really practical things like advice on how to avoid bumps. I blogged about two of their classes in March.
• Their classes are given in English. Their English is not bad and has been getting steadily better - knowledge of French or Spanish may still be useful to get the most out of a class, I sometimes found myself back-translating to work out what was meant by a word that wasn't the one Adrian had been looking for, but it's probably not necessary any more.
• The advice they give about dancing to the music is clear and definite and a useful place to start - of course there are other ways, but at least you will have had one possible good one explained to you in a way you can work with.
  
• They talk to the women quite a lot more, and more helpfully, than average, and Amanda acts like an equal in the class, not like an assistant.
• They're absolutely beautiful to watch and they always improvise every performance and never look artificial, boring or pretentious. Their performances are worth the time and money.

They dance a particular style which includes a fluid embrace that opens and closes depending on what is happening. For example, you can see in this demonstration video that until 00:35 they are dancing in an open embrace, but by 00:45 it has smoothly and imperceptibly closed and their torsos are in contact. They remain like this for quite a while, except you can briefly see light between them at 01:04, until it opens again for some quick turns at 01:45. And you can see it close at 02:16. (Americans often call this "salon" style - be aware that it's not the same as what is called "salon" style in France or Germany. Here in London the word has no widely-used meaning at all, so if someone uses it you will have to try to find out what they mean).



This is not necessarily my personal favourite style, though it is one of the ones I enjoy, but being able to do this fluid embrace is an extremely useful skill for dancing here in London, especially for women. Men might not need to learn it unless it appeals to them (though if you habitually dance open-embrace it will help you do that better and give you a lot more choices), but as a woman I've found it indispensable. The woman has to be very active about it and know what she is doing, there are a few tricks to it that you should get Amanda to show you if you have the chance, but it allows you to have a successful dance with a lot of different partners in a lot of different styles, and that in itself is something that helps you get a lot of practice and increase your physical skill level rapidly. I've also discovered that this skill is transferable to jive and salsa, so it's very good value for money.

Slow Food tango - Andreas this Friday

Time for my shout-out to Andreas, who occasionally sets me right in the Comments, especially on matters of music. As you may have partly gathered from the comments on my DJ question, he's teaching classes this Friday and next Friday at Carablanca (19:30) - purely social tango with an uninterrupted close embrace. With Monica Lopez, for this occasion. He's also DJing this week. He has a kind of 'slow food' approach to tango, focusing on the quality of the basic ingredients, which makes a lot of sense to me. He also tells me that he talks to the women in his classes ("I want them to improve - I have to dance with them" - and he looked endearingly shocked at my eventual and only about 25%-joking response of "Dance with your students? Who the hell does that?).

Tangocommuter has already written a post with a particularly nice video (not a performance - social dancing at La Crau, with Céline Devèze).

Disclosure: I have danced with Andreas more than once and would like to repeat the experience as often as he feels inclined to cooperate. I'd also like it if more men tried to dance more like him, because it feels wonderful for the woman. So my motivations in posting this are perfectly selfish. Do as you please.

[Update 27th August: I see Danny has linked this from the Carablanca website, so you deserve something a bit more entertaining for clicking through. Here are Andreas and Detlef Engel taking the piss at La Crau. Andreas following (most of the time) - Detlef with ponytail and poker face (all of the time).



Second update 28th August: Tangocommuter describes the class here, with an interesting comments thread. Class 2 of 2 this Friday, i.e. tomorrow.]

Raising expectations

Yesterday I went to the Crypt earlier than I usually would because it was Adrian and Amanda Costa, and I wanted to take the class. Unfortunately I still missed the first third, partly because of the rugby, but mainly because I'd forgotten my Tube route was partially down for some scheduled repairs. It would have been rude to join at that point, and it was also extremely full (good thing, too) so I just watched and listened with a cup of tea. But I was told this:

Adrian had started the class by explaining and demonstrating the rhythmic distinction between milonga, tango, and tango-vals, and how to tell the difference.

And I am pretty sure of this:

This simple, necessary information was new to a large proportion of the students, most of whose faces were not new to me, and most of whom had been dancing for more than one year. And important parts of it would have been new to me, too, if I hadn't happened to take that class with Joaquín Amenábar.

Which — is a scandal. And here I cut two paragraphs of rant: but I think it's a scandal and I don't really give a bugger what the excuses are.

So, back to the class. Adrian gives pretty good quotes and I really wished I had a dictaphone, but in running for my train I had neglected to bring even a pencil and paper. So paraphrases of what stuck are the best I can do.

"If the traspié it is there in the music I can choose, to do it or not to do it. If it is not there I cannot do it."

(The class was working with a tango here, not a milonga, and by traspié he meant what is usually called "double-time" in English, in the sense of double the number of steps, each of them in half the time.)

The class was asked to dance doing whatever they liked, but mostly just walking, and always doing the double-time only when it was there in the music, not always then, and not otherwise.

And the women were expected to listen, too! Amanda assumed that we could figure out ourselves how to do whatever ornament we liked, and told us to do one for the traspié if and only if the traspié was there but the man didn't put a step in himself. The women were not treated as being there to serve, nor were we treated as lawn ornaments, studying to look as nearly as possible like a tasteful display of identical plastic flamingos. It was assumed without apology or discussion that we were there to learn to dance well, for our own pride and enjoyment; that this was a possible goal; that it was worth attaining, without other justification; that we were capable of attaining it, with some work; and that we wanted to do so. Yay!

Towards the end Adrian made the class stand still and listen again to the entire tango, pointing out that it repeated the same pattern, with the double-time in the same place each time, and a suspension (opposite of a double-time) also in the same place each time, and if you missed it the first time, the ability to count to seven and find the start of the musical phrase gave you numerous other chances. He pointed out that this is very common in tango. There are repetitions following some structure that you can understand and predict with fair reliability if you can count to eight and listen as you do. Yay!!

The class concluded with a rather long lecture, and hardly anybody dropped out. They all appeared to be listening carefully. All of it would, if applied, make anyone who heard it dance better. Yay again!!!

"There are two kinds of dancers, dancers and movers. If I don't know why I am doing what I am doing, I am just moving. If I hear it and I choose to do it, I am dancing, even if I am like this [contortions, posture of an old man]. If I choose not to do it, I am still dancing."

That last one reminded me of the class they gave on Friday at Conway Hall, which was about floorcraft, and nothing else.

"If I am this close to him [too close to the man in front] I cannot go here, because he is there. I cannot go here, because the woman is there, and I cannot see. I cannot go this way, because it is a backward step and I cannot see. I have no possibility at all. But if I am this close [leaving a metre of space] I have many possibilities."

Yes! It was made explicit that you do not step into the blind spot. You do not step backwards. You leave space, just like on the motorway. You look where you are going, not at the steering wheel. You do not weave from lane to lane. Whenever you learn a new figure, said Adrian, before you make use of it in the milonga, you have to practice it; and when you do that, you find out which way you'll be facing when it ends. If it's any way other than forwards in the line of dance, or if the figure means that you change lanes, step backwards, or step into the blind spot, it's your responsibility to work out how to start it or adapt it so that you don't have to do those things. You can make your salida diagonal so you don't have to cross lanes sideways into traffic. Women were given advice about posture and footwork that helped to keep everything straight and the couple to move with confidence and safety and control.

I know!! Shocking!!!

And the point was this: if everybody follows these rules, it does not matter at all what style you dance — you can do whatever the hell you want, whatever you think is right for the music, whatever appeals to you, because everybody is respecting each other and giving each other enough space and not taking more than their fair share. Everybody gets to share the love. Everybody gets to see what you create. Nobody has to feel restricted. Again, I wish I'd had a dictaphone, because that's what I heard rather than what he said, but you can ask anyone.

The whole class was made, through various exercises, to follow these rules for one dance, and it was a revelation. Everybody had space; the whole room was dancing together, each couple doing its thing, not a chaotic mess of predators competing for territory, but a large gathering of consenting adults there to have fun.

It only lasted five minutes and it instantly fell apart when we tried to do something else as well, but I can only hope those five minutes left an impression on the participants that the skills of basic respect for your fellow dancers were skills worth aspiring to, worth giving some attention, and worth encouraging in other people. And I at least had fewer bumps for the rest of the evening than I usually do there. I think the total was one and a bit.

And since those little rules of thumb sound more complicated than they are, here is a diagram of Adrian and Amanda, with the green arrows showing safe directions and the red dotted line showing the contrary. Suppose that the couple are in the outside lane, the wall or seating is to the right, and the boundary with the inside lane is about where the arrow marked 'line of dance' is. (For example, you can see that they could rotate a little bit to the right about their centre, and walk straight; or they could go the way they're already pointing and zigzag, pivoting at the boundary; or if they took one step in that direction they could then quite safely do a clockwise turn about the woman's axis).



I don't think A&A are coming here again till October, but I hope they do because this sort of teaching, and the sort of dancing they do, raises people's expectations of themselves, of their teachers, and of each other. More, please.

xx Very Stroppy Phase of Moon Hedgehog

Joaquín Amenábar on Modern Tango

This was a very educational class and I'm just going to summarise what I remember, because it's so interesting I can't shut up. To make sense of it all, you really need example recordings. I don't think this topic is directly covered in the book, so I can only suggest taking the class if you have the opportunity.

The topic was “modern tango”, with special reference to the musical relationships between Pugilese, Piazzolla and what is called nuevo tango. Modern, then, meant broadly “after 1945”.

Pugliese:

During the period of dictatorship where there was no tango dancing in Argentina at all, Pugilese's band played concert tango, for people to listen to, not dance. Passages of strong rhythm are contrasted with passages where the melody stretches and wanders and does its own thing, abandoning the rhythm, which disappears completely. You can dance to the melody when the rhythm goes missing, but you can't rely on your internal clock to predict where melodic accents will come, and you won't be in time when the accompaniment returns. If you want to improvise to this stuff, and represent it exactly with your body, you really have to know the recording by heart. Or you can use it for choreography. (Non-concert Pugilese, however, is fully danceable — I think that means pre-1945).

At this point I think we practiced hearing and understanding the different rhythms and melodies, and walking to them, especially not mechanically. That meant not stepping if the accent isn't sounded. Surprisingly difficult, and an interesting thing to try at home.

Piazzolla:

Piazzolla took a different direction. Contrasts are provided not between rhythm and melody, but by different melodies and their accompanying rhythms, arranged in an overall structure characteristic of tango (the structure was explained in the class I missed, but is in the book). The melody is in charge, just as it is with Pugilese, but it respects whatever rhythm was chosen to suit it, and you don't need to know the piece to dance to it. If the rhythmic accompaniment disappears and you only hear melody, the melody accents you are dancing to will still be in time. You can use your internal clock, and you will be in time when the accompaniment returns.

I may have confused two classes, but I think it was at this point that we spent quite a lot of time learning to recognise and move to the 3-3-2 rhythm used in a lot of later Piazzola, the one that goes PánamaPánamaCúbaPánamaPánamaCúba. We looked at its structure in relation to the underlying four beats, and Joaqín's ingenious visual aids involving the velcro spots with little shoes on them were very helpful here. He mentioned that because Piazzolla uses the 3-3-2 a lot, some people suppose he invented it. In fact, it is ancient and universal and can be heard in the earliest tango recordings. [Another rhythm from the repertoire of the Ur-Busker — examples from flamenco and Arabian music are on the DVD. And in the café where I have my lunch and the Iranian Kurdish family play their favourite music.]

In dancing to either of the above, he said, your challenge as a dancer is to adapt and choose from your vocabulary to represent a rich, varying rhythm or melody or combination of the two. In both cases, the music is giving you lots of lead and lots of different things to do. If you know how to hear these things, and dance to what is there (not mechancially to a beat that may or may not actually be sounded), you're dancing in a way that is very satisfying to the couple. For this kind of dancing you need a vocabulary of fairly simple units, not longer than four to eight steps, the length of a musical phrase. And you need to understand them in rhythmic terms, so you can use them.

I'll note just there that the chapter in the book on teaching explains in detail one possible way that they might be taught in rhythmic terms. It assumes access to a reasonably good multimedia computer and moderate skill in using it, some sort of percussion instrument like a claves, and some equivalent of a box of Velcro Spots.

Nuevo:

It's really too early, in Joaquín's opinion, to make any broad musicological statements about the Nuevo tango. There are only a few groups and it hasn't been around long, so there's hardly any material to look at. Asking us to put aside our personal tastes, and promising to do the same himself*, he played an example (I think it was Gotan) and asked us to listen carefully and consider what was happening musically, in the light of what we'd learned so far.

What was going on, he said, appears to be this: An extremely steady, unvarying and continuous rhythm all the way through the recording, with passages of melody and various sounds whose function is not thematic, but ornamental. They're not in charge.

He remarked that this makes a lot of sense in terms of the history of tango and the kind of dance done by younger dancers in Argentina.

‘Nuevo Tango’ the dance, he said, usually refers to the kind of thing developed by Gustavo Naveira and Giselle Anne, and pupils, since the 80s. At this point, [“and people will kill me for saying this, but it's true,” he added] tango had been entirely dead in Argentina for many years, effectively killed off by a determined government that regarded it as a threat. But it survived abroad, with foreigners who prized it, and with performers who toured mostly abroad**. And with the end of the military dictatorship, people in Argentina wanted to recreate it at home. Naturally, the people best placed to do the spadework on this were professional dancers who came to it with artistic and technical interests in dance for itself, not just as a means to a social or musical end.

For this, such music is ideal. It gives you unlimited scope to experiment and develop the technique, pushing it as far as it can go to see what you can do with it in terms of dance. You have total freedom to improvise whatever*** your imagination suggests and your body can deliver, with highly creative and complex variations, and the music isn't going to stop you. Here the music is artistically subordinate to the dance, not the other way around. The music is not dictating what you do.

Musically speaking, he saw it as a giant leap backwards, all the way to the 19th century — a return to a dance with a fixed rhythm, just like dance music generally has, as discussed in a previous class. Proto-Tango rather than Nuevo-Tango, musically speaking. [I'm not sure whether he actually said “Proto-Tango” or it's just what I understood and wrote down in my notes.]

People argue about whether it's really ‘tango’ or not, but Joaquín wasn't interested in going there, and nor am I, and I ask you not to go there in the comments, either (This Means You). I also ask you not to meta-comment about the fact that you're not going there.

As well as dancers, I think this class would be a help to DJs who aren't also musicians. I think it was new in the programme this year; and perhaps one day Joaquín might design a class with DJs in mind. And I'd be fascinated to hear whatever he said on that subject.

________________________________________
* His band is called Orquesta Típica de la Guardia Vieja — “Traditional Old Guard Band”.
** I think I remember reading what must have been an interview with one of these in a newspaper on a train in the eighties. I remember a mad woman saying passionately “It is with the legs. There is nothing with the head, nothing! It is the legs!!”.
*** Or indeed whatever else(!).

Joaquín Amenábar - music for dancers

I took three of Joaquín's classes last weekend, and there is so much to say about them I just haven't been able to start. But I have just heard that he's giving the same course in Cheshire this weekend; so this is just to say, if you can still get into those, or he is coming to a town near you, GO if you possibly can.

The book and DVD that he's done cover much of the same material, and I've bought two copies because I just know I'll lend one and not get it back.

If you're in London, they'll have some copies of the book and DVD set behind the desk at Carablanca until they run out. It's £33, and included on the DVD - apparently just for completeness, since extracts from them are used in the exercises and demonstrations - are more than forty full-length tracks of tango, milonga, and vals in high quality MP3 format which you'd have to spend a lot more money to collect for yourself. At the end of the book are special chapters on choreography and teaching, and how to make the music the centre of both.

The rest of the book (with DVD in the back cover) is a teach-yourself course for tango dancers who want to hear and understand tango music, but have no musical training whatsoever. Joaquín starts by explaining and showing you what a rhythm is, then how to find it in the music; he shows you how the rhythm in tango music varies, and explains the overall form so that you understand when to expect changes and how to deal with them. He walks you through lots of carefully-structured examples, with exercises to do by yourself or with a partner, and videos of a couple doing them for you to watch. He covers vals and milonga, sets out the history and relationships, and explains why tango music is the way it is. Even for someone with lots of dance experience and musical training, it would still be illuminating. And the exercises are just plain fun.

In the classes - not sure about the book - there's also a discussion of what's happening, musically, in 'nuevo' music. But anyway, the skills you learn would be equally applicable to whatever music you personally like.

I'd recommend the course and the book for anyone who wants to understand what “dancing to the music” really means, and how to do it. Plus DJs.

Why am I saying all this - it would really make me happy if lots and lots of British dancers took the classes and read the book. They'll dance better.

[Read the comments on this one - it's not just me. Also more about the book and experience of using it here, and a list of all relevant posts here.]

Geraldine's Women's Technique Class

In Tango-in-Action's latest series with eminent visiting teachers, was a women's technique class with Geraldine (Rojas) Paludi. If you don't know who she is you can read this (in Spanish) or if you can't read Spanish, just look at the videos there and be told that she is generally regarded as a tango goddess. And since she was only passing through and I am only a tango hedgehog, I took this class. For my future reference and your curiosity, this is what happened. I'll just relate it as I remember it, and from my notes.

Geraldine speaks practically no English, although she obviously understands quite well, so everything she said had to be translated by Ezequiel and Stefano Fava. I understand some spoken Spanish, but I found her hard to follow. So what I relate will be a paraphrase, at best, and when I quote, the words are not hers, but an imperfectly-remembered combination of my translation and and somebody else's. So take with pinch of salt. My descriptions of what she physically did are limited by my powers of observation, which are not that hot. Interjections purely from me are [like this].

Geraldine is small and pretty with very black hair and dark eyes, a strong tendency to laugh, white-olive skin and a pleasing, rounded figure; if you saw her on the Tube you might take her for Persian or Turkish. She resembles Maria strongly in the quality of her movement, especially the perfect centredness and neutrality of her steering when she dances with Ezequiel, and a dignified air of physical self-confidence. I think of it as "Yerwhatness" - a slightly dangerous expression of the whole body and face that says "you lead me, I do it, deal with it!". She has no hesitation whatever in declaring the difference between Right and Wrong; she did not hedge, because she does not need to.

Prerequisites:
This class was billed as "all levels", and I think that was correct. I don't think you really needed more than minimal tango experience to benefit from it, but very experienced dancers and teachers could and did benefit too.

Exercise 1
Stand with feet together and lift first one heel, then the other, off the ground, putting them down gently and always leaving the toes where they are. She moved up and down while doing this, but only slightly.

Advice and instructions: use your knees, and toes, and most of all the ankles. Don't make a loud noise with your heels.

Exercise 2
From standing with your feet together, move one foot forward so its heel is just a little forward of the other toe. Then, keeping your weight or centre of gravity in the middle, not moving forward or back, lift first one heel, then the other, off the ground, putting them down gently, just like in the first exercise. [This was an exceptionally useful exercise for me, and I don't remember ever having seen it before - nor indeed the first one.]

Advice and instructions: Keep your weight in the middle and your toes flat on the floor. Use your knees, ankles and feet. You dance with your legs.

Exercise 3
Start with your feet together, then cross one foot over the other at the ankle, putting your toes flat on the floor, then return it quickly to its former place. Keep doing this movement. Then repeat the movement, gradually bringing it off the floor into the air, and up to knee level, on both sides.

Advice and instructions: This movement is from the knee and with the ankle, not "where you shave ...." (pause) "... if you do." Don't squeeze your thighs together! When you cross, you cross at the ankles. The ankle crosses first and the knee stays in front. You feel like you are dancing with your legs apart (ungainly demonstration, laughter) but you aren't, it's just a feeling, ignore it. The standing leg is important, think about the standing leg. If you feel you are losing your balance, push down on the standing leg. Don't worry about collecting.

Exercise 4

Draw a circle on the floor with the free foot.

Advice and instructions: Don't make it too big. Don't push down so it makes a noise. It's in contact with the floor, that's all. Move with the knee and ankle and foot. The standing leg is important. It's not bent or straight [locked], just "normal", ready to go.

Exercise 5

Ochos forwards.

Advice and instructions: Think about the standing leg more than the free leg. Push with it. Manage the weight change just like before [referring to exercise 2. There wasn't exactly what I would have called a weight change there, but I think I get it.] Step within yourself - don't displace [i.e. move from side to side] when you are practicing ochos alone! This is not your business, it is the man's business! Don't do it! Just do ochos on the spot. (Demonstration with Ezequiel where he stands still and she does ochos within the space of his embrace, without displacement, then again where he moves a little from side to side and she goes with it - "Now we displace".) When you are practicing alone, don't try to dissociate your upper body - don't try to keep facing the front. You dance with your legs.

Exercise 6

Ochos backwards.

Advice and instructions: Don't try to collect in the middle of the movement! You are all trying much too hard to collect. You are doing it in forward ochos as well, but it's much more obvious in backwards ochos. Don't pass through "position zero" where you stand with the feet together. The free foot just goes round the standing foot. (She demonstrated repeatedly - a quick and vigorous sweeping motion in which the free foot does go past the standing foot close by, but doesn't pause or appear to stick to it.) [Much emphasis and repetition here; and fairly general consternation among students who have been told to collect every other week since they started doing tango. Everybody's ochos wobble all over the place, and fall apart, and we all develop panicky or absent expressions while we try to put them together again without tripping over or kicking each other.]

Further advice and instructions in response to questions

Don't try too hard to dissociate your upper body. The staying in front of him, the connection, is in the mind. You're not exactly square on all the time. If your upper body doesn't follow your legs, doesn't turn at all when you do ochos (demonstration of pivotless ochos), the man can't tell which foot you are on. (Demonstration of pivoting ochos in close embrace, with the upper body rolling gently from side to side).

You dance with your legs. Your free leg swings freely from "where you shave" but the movements are with the knee and ankle. Both legs are alive all the time. Don't try too hard to "relax" your upper body, either - you can't possibly go floppy, that makes no sense - do what's natural and obvious.

Push down on the floor with the weight-bearing foot and manage the weight change like in exercise (2) above. Energy flows right round your body through your feet and to and from the floor. Tone not tension.

"It's a social dance, it's evolved from a social dance, anybody can do it, you don't have to be a ballerina". [I don't know whether this should have been translated 'ballerina' or only 'professional dancer'. Either would make sense.] Movement should always be natural. Anything artificial is right out.

At this point the people who'd paid for the room next hour started moving chairs in, so there was a round of applause, a general exchange of concerned and impressed looks, and we were all thrown out.

My Results

At the end of the class I did not feel exhausted, I did not feel stressed, and my lower back was absolutely fine. I felt that I had a lot of work to do, and that my ochos had imploded, but also that I'd been handed the tools to do the work if I chose. Exercise 2 was very useful to me, though it seems so simple, and also the transition from that into doing ochos. So were all the demonstrations about how the body moves as a whole, and just watching. In general I felt reassured about my own possibilities, and that I had a much better idea of what to explore next if I wanted to improve. This was just the class I needed. I also felt newly immunised against the pussyfooting stagey soulless triple-refined aenemic pretension that can so easily creep in if we don't watch it - Geraldine moves like a woman, not like a flamingo on coke.

A quiet practice session at home with my video camera revealed that I could produce a recognisable, if clumsy, imitation of the exercises - except for the ochos. But I'll keep trying.

Take this class if you ever get the chance. It was illuminating, and at £20 per person, good value. I got a lot to think about.

Hoisted from Comments

In response to my post about the classes next month with Ezequiel and Geraldin Paludi, Sophie (on behalf of Tango in Action), said:

Henceforth couples rotation will be enforced in the workshops, although those who have come to work specifically with their partner will be invited to mention it at the beginning so they can be left alone.

So if you were thinking about booking, now you know. Many thanks to Sophie for taking the trouble.

[Edit 1st Jan 09: it didn't happen, though, or at least not always. I took one of the all-levels couple classes, and there was no rotation, and no attempt to rotate. No one piped up and asked to rotate, either. Luckily for me, I'd booked with a suitable partner.]

Geraldine in London, and the single booking

If you were searching for "Geraldine Rojas in London December", like quite a few people are right now, the site you need is tango in action, and you'll see the link to the booking page on the right. Booking is cheaper, and the requirements are more flexible, than last time.

I'm interested in the women's technique class, and I'd expect it to sell out quickly. It also occurs to me that this might possibly be a last-chance-to-see, before the new immigration rules really kick in and make it much more difficult to book visiting teachers who don't have European passports, no matter how eminent. I imagine that Mr and Mrs Paludi don't. So anyway, if you want to take that one, it probably makes sense to get a move on.

I'm also interested in "Variations on Walking Patterns - Different patterns based on walk (inside, outside, parallel walk, crossed walk) (ALL LEVELS)", and in "Fundamental Concepts for Turns (Giros) - various combinations of giros on the left and on the right (INTERMEDIATE)". I want to know what Ezequiel and Geraldine think it's important to say about these subjects, and perhaps you, dear reader, would like to know too. And I'm interested in the Milonga class, for the same reason. The "Fantasia" and advanced classes, not so much.

But for any of those, I would need to arrange the right partner. I would book alone if I could assume that the class would rotate. If it rotates, a follower can at least find out if she has any problems with the material that she needs to fix, and look for advice on how to fix them. If it doesn't rotate, it's very difficult to distinguish her problems from the leader's. If it rotates, the leaders' problems will vary, which is fine; if it doesn't, she might get stuck with someone whose particular quirks or difficulties totally prevent her working on the content of the class at all, or put her on the wrong track. The same problems apply from the leader's point of view, if not so acutely.

But these kinds of classes don't always rotate, and they're even less likely to if most people book in pairs. People get risk-averse, and avoid rotation. To be on the safe side, then, it'd be wise to take someone I can dance a whole class with, without creating new problems for either of us. Ideally, not the same person each time, because then I'm just learning to dance with him, and he is just learning to dance with me, which is no better.

It's a puzzle. Even for the single lady who's lucky enough to have options, it's a puzzle to deal with it.

Or, I suppose, two or three couples taking the same classes might arrange to rotate between themselves even if it's not enforced. I wonder how that would work?

[Update 20th Dec 08: see here for my report on the women's technique class. I also took one of the couple classes, in which there was no rotation and no attempt to rotate.]

A nice performance

I saw a nice performance tonight by some teachers who were visiting London.

In the tango, there were some lifts and some splits, which are the kind of thing that makes me laugh; and because the performance was to some extent at least improvised, they looked a bit rough. But I found that appealing. I liked it as a whole - it was playful and not overwrought. The daft bits are just fun if they're not taken too seriously, which they weren't.

The milonga was great, and functioned as a very good advertisement for their milonga workshop tomorrow (later today, actually - oops).

The Beginner's Questionnaire

Suppose that you've never done a partner dance before. You take a deep breath and you jump in. You don't know what's normal or where you are going, but you are intrepid. How do you know if you've been to a good class? What should you have expected? Did you waste your time?

Well, I know what I think a good class is, and here's my handy Beginner's Questionnaire.

Answers with high numbers are better. Some of the questions won't make sense if you've only taken one class, because there isn't time to deal with what they mention in an hour. Other questions will help you make a decision right away.

However, what I've written reflects my character, experience, and opinions, and you have no way of knowing if I'm right. In fact, Everything below reflects my character. Especially the bitchy bits.

Approach, content, and outcomes

Were you told what to do with your soul, or to imitate the action of a tiger/kitten/river/snake or any other animate or inanimate object whose relation to yourself was purely metaphorical?

1. A lot
2. Sometimes
3. Once or twice
4. No.
   

Were you told clearly what to do with your body?

1. No
2. Once or twice
   
3. Sometimes
4. A lot.
   

Were you taught about the line of dance?

1. No
2. Mentioned briefly
3. Mentioned repeatedly
4. Emphasised and acted upon.

Were you given advice on floorcraft, for example, that the leader should protect the follower, look where he is going not at her, never step where he can't see, and the follower should be careful with her heels?

1. No
2. Mentioned briefly
3. Mentioned repeatedly
4. Emphasised and acted upon.

Were you given advice about how to behave and what to expect when dancing socially, for example, how to request, accept, or decline a dance politely, what and how long a tanda is, the meaning of 'thank you', or even what to wear?

1. No
2. A few tips
3. Yes, lots of useful advice
4. Yes, with encouragement to dance at one or more specific places or times.

Were the mechanics of the embrace explained at all?

1. No, we just watched and imitated what we saw
2. Once or twice
   
3. Sometimes
   
4. A lot, with different possibilities discussed.
   

What (if anything) do you think you were taught about when the follower should cross?

1. She should remember to cross at a specific point
2. I think she is meant to know when to do it, but I'm not sure how
3. Not sure - I'm confused about this
4. Do whatever steps are led.

What (if anything) do you think you were taught that the follower is supposed to do in a turn?

1. Once the first couple of steps are led, she should remember to keep going back-side-forward until stopped.
2. Basically keep going back-side-forward, but I think it might be different at a more advanced level.
3. Not sure - I'm confused about this.
   
4. Do whatever steps are led.

Were the followers taught to follow, and were the leaders taught to lead the various movements?

1. We learned steps seperately and then worked on synchronising them
   
2. We learned the steps seperately, but the followers were told to wait for the lead before doing them, and the leaders were shown how to lead them
   
3. We learned the steps and then broke them down into leading and following simpler movements
   
4. We were taught to lead and follow simple movements, and we built up the steps from there.

Followers: were you given useful general advice on HOW to follow (as opposed to just where to put your feet and in what order)?

1. Not sure what this means
   
2. Not really
   
3. A few tips
   
4. A lot.
   

Leaders: Do you now believe that you could lead whatever was covered in the class with a more experienced follower you had not met before?

1. Maybe if she'd taken the same class
2. Not really
3. Yes, some of it
4. Yes, a lot of it.

Professional and conscientious teaching

Did the teacher(s) single out any student(s) in a way you felt was less than kind?

1. Yes
2. Maybe
3. Only as a means of managing attention-seekers
4. Never.

How much did the teacher who did most of the talking, talk about him/her self?

1. A lot, it was all about him/her and I was annoyed/bored with it
2. A lot, but it was useful/funny/informative/I liked it
3. A little bit - just to be friendly
   
4. Not much or not at all.

Did ANY of the teachers appear to be doing ANYthing in class other than teaching to the best of their ability, whatever that ability might be?

1. Yes, leching the students or sleeping off the dope
   
2. Yes, showing off, leching each other, or manipulating people to gratify their vanity
   
3. Yes, something else (are there other possibilities? My goodness, I've got to hand it to them for imagination)
   
4. No.
   

Did the teachers observe the students while they were practicing, give feedback, and make themselves available to answer questions and resolve problems?

1. No
2. A little bit, or only some of that, or not very kindly
   
3. Yes, but not very intelligently, there was a bit of autopilot there
   
4. Yes, and they treated the questions with respect and thought about how to answer them.
   

Did the teachers check your progress by dancing with you personally?

1. Never
2. Occasionally
3. With some students/when necessary
4. With most or all students.

If the teachers did dance with you once or more, and setting aside your own embarrassment and nervousness, do you think you learned from this what tango is supposed to feel like?

1. Don't think so
2. Maybe
3. Yes, I think so
4. Wow!

After the class, did you feel good about having been there?

1. No, I felt bored/mystified/discouraged/ripped off
   
2. Not crazy about it, it was very stressful, or I had a few mishaps
   
3. It was fun or interesting, I felt all right
   
4. I felt good.
   

You're not going to get all the 4's in an hour, and you could get some 1's in a good class. But if you've got a good score, you landed OK.

[Edit 19th Oct - added 'feedback' question - thanks for reminding me!]

Progress, practice, motivation

Back in May, I was looking for the next step in my dancing. I wasn't unhappy with it. Things were improving steadily with practice, but the usual kind of intermediate class had stopped making any real difference to them.

I was also very upset, and I'd be lying if I hid that. Telling the tale would bore you and anger me, but the upshot was that I found it very hard to continue with any dancing at all. I certainly had to change my habits. But I didn't want to lose this good thing from my life, so it motivated me to fight back, get around the problem, and keep going through the difficult time by pushing myself a bit more.

My first step was to stop taking group intermediate classes and dance more, socially, with people who dance better than me.

You can go a long way in group intermediate classes. As a follower you always have to be self-motivated, and to a great extent self-taught. Once you stop doing anything visibly bad, most teachers just ignore you because the leaders' problems seem more pressing. My method in group classes was to have a mental queue of improvements I should work on, and do that conscientiously with as many different leaders as possible in whatever context the class content provided. If something new came up or I found a problem, I'd work on it, make a note of it, and put it in the queue.

But there are things the follower just can't work on if the same move is being constantly repeated to the same music, or the leader has not mastered what he's trying to do. What can happen then is that you stop improving, and spend your time learning ornaments, which you repeat pointlessly, by rote. I think this is a dead end, and a distraction, and eats away at musicality. If I see an ornament I like, I'd rather puzzle out how to do it naturally. I don't want to ever do one unless I feel inspired. I think teachers put them in to make the women feel they're getting equal time, but I think it makes me dance worse.

I'm sure lots of you have encountered the same problems, and found your own solutions; share them in the comments, if you feel inclined.

So I stopped going, and I danced more. The result was a rapid improvement, especially to my embrace. And I mostly danced with people who value me as a person, who encourage, support, or praise me, who are kind to me, and who do things to make me feel better if I get hurt. Generally, I didn't find a shortage of those.

So, that's the background. I was less at a dead end than I had been, but I needed a bit more. Next: my first class as a leader, and how it went.

A good class and a happy hedgehog

I've just been to a class that made me feel inspired and motivated all over again, so that I was thinking about what I'd learned, making notes afterwards (just like I did as a total beginner) and doing little dancey movements on the train home.

I felt happy at the end, and I know that hearing the same music again will bring the feeling back and make me want to dance. I imagine myself dancing, and there is no cloud in the picture.

It gave me a challenge, and a personal boost, and I'm already looking forward to the next one (next week). I'll tell you what the class was about and what I got out of it specifically, another time. But just for now I'll say that Leandro and Romina's unforced, infectious, confident cheerfulness is a big, big help to a saturnine creature like me. And their approach suits my cognitive style, so I don't waste too much effort processing instructions.

I feel noticeably better about the dancing thing as a whole than I did yesterday, and I think probably better than I have - except now and then - this year. Hooray!