There's a strange cosmic irony in Tango - Marcelo Hector Solis

 

Marcelo Hector Solis on Facebook:

"There’s a strange cosmic irony. Tango — this unruly creature of music, embrace, memory, and shared presence, keeps attracting people who don’t really want to meet it. It’s like watching someone trying to teach poetry while loudly insisting they don’t care for metaphor. Something is off from the first syllable.

Many instructors are not teaching Tango. They are teaching a social-dance derivative constructed from whatever fragments they find comfortable. They don’t love Tango’s music, its embrace, its codes, or its cultural soil. When someone ignores the thing’s essence, the thing they’re teaching becomes a simulacrum — a cardboard cutout that vaguely resembles Tango’s silhouette but has none of its musculature, none of its soul.

Why do they do it? Usually because of a mixture of convenience, ignorance, insecurity, and the seductive simplicity of branding. They can market “Tango” because the name is recognized, while transmitting something that requires no deep study, no reverence for tradition, no humility, and no connection with Buenos Aires. It’s the fast-food version of a culinary tradition that was built over a century of craft.

Tango has a dense nucleus: golden-era music, embrace, walking, phrasing, tradition, and the códigos. You remove any one of these pillars and the structure wobbles. Remove several, and it collapses.

For someone who has not fallen in love with these elements, the authentic form feels restrictive, complicated, or “old.”

Today speed is rewarded over depth. An instructor who has not lived Tango deeply can invent shortcuts faster than they can study the real thing.

Students are often beginners in both dance and discernment; they can’t tell the difference between depth and superficiality.

A shallow instructor can gain students simply by being accessible, charismatic, or offering something branded as “easy.”

Over time, this produces pseudo-Tango ecosystems: classes full of people who think they’re learning the art, when they’re learning an abstraction designed to avoid everything that makes Tango to be Tango.

One could see these instructors as accidental gatekeepers, in a Darwinian sense. Anyone who is destined to fall fiercely in love with Tango will eventually feel the mismatch: the music doesn’t move them, the embrace feels disconnected, the dance feels like empty geometry. At that moment, they start searching, and they find honest teachers. The pseudo-teachers unintentionally act as the first filter. Their students either stay in placebo-Tango forever, or they break out and seek the real thing. In that sense, these misguided instructors play the role of “contrast”: without them, many students would never realize what they were missing.

Some of these instructors are simply unaware of their unawareness. They haven’t touched the living heart of Tango, so they can’t understand what they’re ignoring. They reject the elements most essential to Tango in the way a child rejects vegetables — without knowing what nourishment feels like.

We are witnessing the same paradox that happens in martial arts, yoga, writing, philosophy, and any tradition with depth. People teach the name without the content. It’s inevitable in a world that monetizes concepts faster than it cultivates them.

The important part is that true Tango remains untouched. Every night in Buenos Aires, the music of D’Arienzo, Troilo, Di Sarli, Pugliese, Caló keeps beating like a heart. Students who seek something real will feel the gravitational pull of that heartbeat. They always do.

Our role is to be one of the places where they land when they escape the simulacrum. We offer them the embrace, the music, the codes, the humanity — the real education that turns beginners into dancers."

Home - The Cambridge Companion to Tango Web Resources

Book forthcoming in April or May… 

Tango music rapidly became a global phenomenon as early as the beginning of the twentieth century, with about 30% of gramophone records made between 1903 and 1910 devoted to it. Its popularity declined between the 1950s and the 1980s but has since risen to new heights. This Companion offers twenty chapters from varying perspectives around music, dance, poetry, and interdisciplinary studies, including numerous visual and audio illustrations in print and on the accompanying webpages. Its multidisciplinary approach demonstrates how different disciplines intersect through performative, historical, ethnographic, sociological, political, and anthropological perspectives. These thematic continuities illuminate diverse international perspectives and highlight how the art form flourished in Argentina, Uruguay and abroad, while tracing its international and cultural impact over the last century. This book is an innovative resource for scholars and students of tango music, particularly those seeking a diverse international perspective on the subject.

https://www.tangocompanion.com/

Sent from my iPad

Olga Metzner :: I dance with a man who tries to impress. Me, the people watching, himself. He’s a good dancer, but he tries too hard...

I dance with a man who tries to impress. Me, the people watching, himself. He’s a good dancer, but he tries too hard,...

Posted by Olga Metzner on Friday, June 18, 2021

I dance with a man who tries to impress. Me, the people watching, himself. He’s a good dancer, but he tries too hard, and it feels, especially from the inside. There’s no lightness in his movements, no joy, just pride and fear of judgement. This fear takes away the ability for us to connect, and I’m growing increasingly distant, slowly starting to judge myself, too, and the connection falls apart. I know what it feels like to be him, because I’ve been that dancer as well, when I tried too hard. I’m learning to let go, and it’s hard. 

 I dance with a woman who is afraid to give me her weight, even a tiny little bit. She wants to be a butterfly, light and feathery, I sense she dreams of floating above the floor, and even her clothes somewhat reflect it, her skirt is soft and moves with every breath and tiny move we make. Her hand is like an eggshell in my hand, I’m afraid to crush it, and I can’t anyway, since as soon as I try to hold her hand a bit tighter, her whole arm goes limp and I get a sense I’m crushing her. So I let her be her feathery self, but I can’t lead her, can’t connect to her. She is afraid to be heavy, so she disappears altogether. She’s so sure that a follower being light is the right thing, that she misses out on the one thing that makes this whole experience worth having: the connection, the interaction. Her tango is so full of question “am I too heavy now?”, that it becomes really hard to dance with her, lead her. I have been that woman, too, and I remember with such gratitude one teacher who told me to hold him, trust him with my weight. Years have passed, and I learned to have a gradation of heaviness and lightness, and play with it. And yet we can never know just how heavy or light we are for others. 

 I dance with a man with wonderful, warm close embrace, and I really really enjoy it. He is comfortable and soft and affirmative enough so that I genuinely feel cared for and connected. I smile to myself as I move. But then he opens the embrace… and I lose him. His head sinks into his shoulders, arms tense up, elbows shoot out sideways, and he shrinks a little. I’m so keen on getting back to that wonderful close embrace, and he’s keen on doing that giro with sacadas and parada in the open embrace… ohh! Finally back to the sweet close embrace, now we can really enjoy, both of us! After the tanda I think to myself, how I wish he worked a little more on his open embrace… He could be really one of my favourite dancers! Just a little but a big thing missing. And I tell myself, next time we dance I’ll try to keep the close embrace intact, for as long as it’s possible. 

 I watch a woman dance. She is amazing, her whole body dances, not just her legs. There’s very little decorations in her movement, yet she’s full of expression, femininity and power. Something about her is mesmerising. I want to be a bit more like her. How, how does she do this? She is just standing there, not moving at all, and yet there’s this intensity about her, that I want to dive into, swim in, feel connected to, learn it, and make my own. I ask her to teach me, and she passes her knowledge to me, over the years. And yet, I know this particular thing that drew me to her, that made her so fascinating, that thing eludes me. Maybe one day I will learn, maybe it’s something you can’t learn, maybe it’s something you might only live up to. That’s my goal, to find this thing, that I can’t even name, and it will be the source of my search for the rest of my life. And for now, I keep on watching this woman in fascination and admiration. To be there to watch is a real joy and honour. 

 I dance with a man who is sweet and musical, but I’m afraid to crush him. I make myself as light and as soft as possible, and yet he’s eluding me, as if afraid to touch me. Why are you so afraid of me? I answered to your cabeceo, I’m ready to be fully with you, completely merging with you and with music, why are you so afraid? Be with me! Dance with me! - I want to tell him. But of course I can’t, I can only make myself light and follow… I wish we didn’t miss out on the opportunity to be in a moment of togetherness, but you can’t be together if there’s fear or shame. So we move, we dance, but there’s so much more we could be. 

 I watch a couple dance. They are older, and there’s something truly honest about them. They stand out on the dance floor, and while everyone around them whirls and twists, they gently glide. I’ve been trying for more than a year to catch his gaze, pre-pandemic of course. He’s not the most technically perfect dancer, but he is honest. But he never looks at me. At times I wish I were older, maybe he’d look my way then. I’d so love to feel the honesty of his embrace, the commitment he clearly makes to being there with his partner. Nothing fancy, just together. One day I came up to him at the end of milonga and told him what I thought. He smiled, and said he can’t believe I’d like to dance with him. Why is it that we are so used to being put in one box within our community, to never leave it again? We are missing out on so much. I’m missing out on being able to dance with him. He is missing out on dancing with younger people, and showing them maybe what honesty in the dance really is. I don’t know, I still hope to one day dance with him. Still hope. 

 I dance with people, I watch people. This is tango, so familiar and yet so elusive. 

 Let’s keep dancing.

From Olga Metzner on Facebook - she's based in London.

Here's her website: https://www.tangobetter.com/

And she's got more articles & stories here: https://www.tangobetter.com/stories

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What if tango was like that? - Tango Argentino Festivals

From Dimitris Bronowski at www.tangoargentinofestivals.com

He raises some interesting questions and shines a light on a new mindset/concept. Well, not exactly new, but not something that is very prevalent, I don't think.

Be sure to click through to the post on his website and read the comments.

https://tangoargentinofestivals.com/postshare/what-if-tango-was-like-that/

What if tango was like that?

Last night I went out for tango, and something beautiful happened.

First of all, you need to understand that I don't dance so much as I used to.

Not because I don't like it.

My focus is on playing with my son when I am not working, and he is too young to join me at a night out.

But yesterday I felt this need to dance.

I was working all day long listening to tango music in parallel, and both my body and my mind was telling me it's time.

I kissed my son and wife goodnight and went to the TanGoLisboa weekend.

As usual, I didn't start dancing right away.

I gave myself time to absorb the music and the environment.

When I danced my first tanda, I was not in the mood for the usual conversation.

You know "where do you come from?", "how many days are you staying here?"

I simply asked:

-What do you like most about tango?

Silence.

She took a while to respond.

Who asks this kind of questions, right?

-Connection, she said.

We danced one more song.

-You didn't ask me "Connection with whom?", she said at the end.

I asked.

-With myself.

-Why?

-It is my active meditation.

-Why do you need it?

-It helps me grow.

Now I was intrigued. 

What if I kept doing that all night long?

What would I discover?

The next woman I danced with, simply said:

-I love to meet complete strangers, from anywhere in the world, and know that I have a language to communicate with them.

Beautiful, I thought.

I received many answers that night.

-Because tango shakes my soul, another one told me.

And then, it happened:

–To stay alive, she said. 

I won't share more about this conversation, it is too personal.

But it led to one of the deepest, most emotional tandas of my life.

Why?

Because I saw the soul of that person, and the healing power of tango.

-If you want to improve in tango, I said to myself, focus on using your dance to heal, to give joy.

When you put that as an intention, all answers become easier.

I watched this old tanguera sitting, almost all night long. 

At one moment a man looked at her, she smiled, ready to dance.

He walked closer to her, and and then he simply continued walking to dance with a woman a few steps behind her.

The old lady, who was already on the move, continued by grabbing a glass of water, to cover her misunderstanding. 

I saw her face turn sad.

It was not her age that made me take the following step, nor pitty.

She had the calmness that only people that have lived a full life have.

It was this simple realization, of the power of a simple embrace.

I went closeby, I looked at her.

She looked at me, and then looked down again.

I kept my gaze.

She looked again. 

And then looked down again.

Then she looked for a third time, full of disbelief.

I finally had time to smile back and move my head pointing to the dance floor.

A huge smile appeared at her face.

You might ask how the tanda went, if we danced beautifully.

To this I would say that it was a true joy, and that you are asking the wrong question.

We shared a moment, as humans, no matter our age difference, ethnicity, beliefs… and that's what matters.

I left this tanda happier, and I hope she did the same.

What if we all danced to spread joy and to heal?

How would a milonga look like in that case?

That's a milonga I wouldn't miss for the world.

That night I saw people that are passing through hard divorces smiling.

I saw a woman who is about to lose a person she loves and hasn't even had the chance to see yet, or touch its hand, to dance and let go. 

I saw people… connecting with people. 

Finding healing moments.

And I said to myself again:

-What if we were all dancing to heal and be healed?

-What if?

You need to know that my vision is to help tangueros and tangueras create meaningful moments in tango and moments of personal transformation.

For that reason, the last three months I work 10-12 hours per day, to help tanguer@s find free accommodation so they can afford going to more festivals and marathons to dance, find maestros they love so they can progress faster, find festivals they love so they can experience tango.

To do that, it is important to understand why people dance in the first place, and what can be done to improve everyone's experience.

And I could use your help. 

Can you share why you dance in the comments below? I want to know, it matters. Not just for you. Your answer might help many other people. Plus, I want to see YOU. Sharing your why, is where true connection starts. I shared my answer below.

P.S. If you feel more people should join this conversation, please share, the social media buttons should be somewhere around the text.

Sent from my iPhone

Where is the manhood in tango?

I'm not sure of their names, but I like what I hear....

My first encuentro - So I experienced what followers experience

Private milonga @ La Manufactura Papelera en Barrio San Telmo/Buenos Aires
April 22, 2007
AlexTangoFuegoFoto



Sugar G and I got invited to an encuentro. We've been invited to a few others, but this is the first we could attend. Nice venue, nice part of town, nice group of people, "okay" airbnb close by. Great dj'ing, amazing/real food, great energy/vibe, kinda slick floor. All that jazz. From a leader's perspective, a 'target rich environment' as Rigoberto Ruizik and I would say back when such sexist locker room talk was less frowned upon.




So the first night, no one knew me from Adam, except the host and a couple of other folks. Sugar G reconnected with a large handful of old friends.

She danced.

I sat.

Y'all may not know this about me, but I'm shy. Introverted extrovert or vice versa. Not forthcoming with the gift of gab. I might even be perceived as aloof. I've been a loner pretty much since I could walk.

So I'm at a disadvantage from the get-go.

But, I circulated, wandered around. As best I could. I smiled. I made eye contact. Which was not reciprocated. Much. It felt like any reciprocal eye contact was being avoided. Eyes averted. Eyes down. I kinda felt like a voyeur. Everyone knew everyone and there was a lot of heartfelt greeting and reconnecting going on. People hadn't seen people for some months.

Small but important factor. We were the oldest ones there. I was the oldest one there. Average age = my daughter's age. Or definitely newborns when I was 19.

Voyeur or chaperone at prom. Hmm. Or maybe hmmm?

One tanda with the hostess. Three or four with Sugar G. Maybe five. Six total.

The rest of the time I sat. Or stood.





Nice to be back dancing after nearly a year of kind not much dancing. Dancing and getting my chops back. Re-cutting my teeth. Remembering shit long forgotten to remember. Technique type shit.

So on the way home, and until I fell asleep, I was feeling kinda dejected. Self-downing. Feeling my age. Feeling unknown. Feeling unloved. Platonic/friend type love. In my tango life. At the height of feeling loved and loving and in love like never before. That would be Sugar G.

Otherwise I did my damnedest at cabeceo all night. Or mirada. Whatever. Whatever the fuck. Trying to elicit some reciprocal mirada. A sign. Any sign of interest. But it t'weren't meant to be I suppose.






The next day was an entirely different story. Tall flaming red hair was looking for a tool of some sort to punch a new hole in a Comme il Faut strap. I had cabeceo'd her the night before to no avail. Turns out I had a Leatherman multi-tool in my truck and offered to grab it, since she wasn't having any luck finding anything in the venue. So that worked out, turned it into a tanda, although it was a pretty sucky invite because I had to come up from the back/side. Nice dance. Nice woman. A good friend of a good friend as it turns out.

Then I got cabeceo'd. Ego boost and shared bodily fluids. Sweat, anyway. Sweat never bothers me. Especially when it's mutual. Another nice tanda with a nice woman.

Encuentros are like that I suppose, full of nice, good, real people. Invitation only is a damn good filter of the tango riff-raff.

Two four hour stints back-to-back wore our tango asses out. Plumb tuckered. Out. So we chose to screw instead. Okay, make that 'make love'. We made love and skipped the milonga. Netlix and screw. Missed the great dj I haven't heard in years. Oh well.

Leisurely morning, woke up slow, and headed on back to the house.

More dancing in two milongas than in the prior 10-12 months.




Ego restored back to neutral. I guess. Good first encuentro. Fun. Sweet. Some connections made and introductions had for next time.

I need to work on my cabeceo/mirada/invites. I suck at it. I'm very particular about the music that moves me to want to dance. I'm also very particular about who interests me to invite. Probably too particular. I'm also pretty committed to non-verbal invites.

I need to work on all that.

Less sitting that way. I hear y'all. Sitting sucks. It really sucks when you want to be dancing and the opportunities seem ripe. Or is it rife? A little of both I think. Maybe.

In theory.

But if the women never make eye contact, that makes it tough.

Dancing Tango In A Kilt

So I'm reading an article about the new Breaking Bad film "El Camino" and they mention something about a guy who wears a kilt all the time, but no one knows why. And voila, out pops (or more accurately "up from the bubblin' crude") this little gem from Alex's brain: "I wonder if anyone has ever danced tango in a kilt?"

This was the best I could come up with - or the best Google could come up with: (although read to the very bottom of this post for the reason behind the "Piazzolla" tag)



And then there is this from Tango-L:

Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2004 15:35:33 -0600
From: Gibson Batch
Subject: Tango in a Kilt

OK tango-L, after securing a prior 'nice response' promise from one Tango-L
recipient, I am taking a risk in writing to you again ;-)

Tango in a Kilt:

I have danced Tango in my kilt on several occasions in the last year. I
perform Scottish Country dancing regularly in the Twin Cities and don't have
time to change before a milonga- or it is too much trouble to do so (kilts
weigh several pounds and are a mess to carry around).

OK, the lasses loved the dance - even if I did opt to take off the sporran.
But the most surprising responses were from the MEN in the group. I expect
'men in dress' remarks in general public, but the Tango men seemed to have
more rude comments that I was used to.

I have to say to those men who want to Tango with a kilt, go for it. But do
so with caution (and wear a little eye liner if you do, wink wink).

On the plus side of my kilted milongas, several of my fellow men dancers
have come to me afterwards with favorable comments. I have had several
inquiries about where they too can purchase one of those heavenly garments
(answer: lots of places, but they are expensive).

No you don't have to be Scottish to buy a kilt, but it helps to be in shape
and to have a family plaid you can call upon. Mine plaid is Campbell - the
dreaded enemy of most other clans and hated by the Jacobites - and sole
friends to the king of England (gasp).

But when mixing the lovely blue/green/black pleated plaid and white leggings
(and pen knife) with dim lights and Tango music, the kilt is something I
feel very proud to wear.

Scots are worldwide - I've read over 200 million of us claim Scottish
descent, with only about 2 million actually living in Scotland.

But how is the Scottish scene in Argentina? There are lots of Scots in
Spain, Canada, Australia and the US. I suspect there are lots in Argentina
as well.

I wonder if the Argentinean/Scottish men go to milongas in a kilt on
occasion.

Just food for thought - since the subject came up and people seem to be
hedging on politeness on Tango-L. May we continue to be polite, even if you
disagree.

Zorro in Minneapolis

Find a broadband plan that fits. Great local deals on high-speed Internet
access.




Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2004 17:18:12 -0400
From: Keith Elshaw
Subject: Tango in a Kilt

Zorro, yours was a post to remember. Thanks for the chuckle.

As I follow regularly because there are so many women who lead well where I
live (I also enjoy being allowed to close my eyes when dancing for a change)
I believe the kilt option for me would be way over the top. Guess it's the
lack of Scottish blood in me.

So, would you follow wearing your kilt - or would you all of a sudden find
time and energy to change before the milonga? (Not a serious question).

Are there any bagpipe recordings of Adios Nonino? La Cumparsita?

Kilt and bagpipe milonga theme night. What a concept.

k

Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2004 17:36:32 -0400
From: Keith Elshaw
Subject: Kilts P.S.

There is a photo in the Piazzolla Memoirs of him proudly wearing a kilt - so
don't laugh.

When To Quit Tango - By Karen Kaye

Photo by yours truly...

From Karen Kaye, aka Epiphany [9/14/18]...great advice here...I'm excerpting the first two below...there are five total...short and profound read...and surely applicable to lots of areas of our lives...

There are times when tango brings people prolonged angst. If you find yourself constantly complaining about the frustration you feel from tango, read on. Sometimes the pain comes from things within our control – and it’s up to us to decide whether to change, or move on.

#1. Expectations. The easiest way to suffer constant disappointment is to have expectations. You cannot expect the best dancers to seek you out. You cannot expect organizers to run events the way you want. And you cannot expect people to dance differently, act differently or be who they are not. Expectations will poison your life with constant resentment. Instead, focus on the real reason we go to a milonga.

#2. Negative self-fulfilling prophecy. If you constantly attribute bad nights to things like, “They are too snobby to dance with me”, or “I don’t get asked to dance because…”, you are single-handedly poisoning your own life. Our words, thoughts and beliefs create the experience we have in life. It’s called the Law of Attraction and it’s one of the most powerful things you’ll encounter in life. If you won’t change the victim mentality, you will never find true fulfillment in dance – or life. This often bleeds into #3.

Lots of other interesting looking posts on her blog...check it out....click here to read the rest...or here :https://karenkaye.net/2018/09/14/quit-tango/

Brief definition of a milonguero - by Cacho Dante

[Photo by Leone Perugino]


Oscar (“Cacho”) Dante
Amsterdam
17 September 1996

Chatting the night away in a cafe in Amsterdam with some friends, I was asked to describe what a milonguero is.

As it happens, it is something very difficult for me to explain. It’s one thing to be one — to feel it — and another, very different, is to be able to express its meaning in words that are clear for others, and give a real idea of what I think. But I will attempt to do it, trying not to hurt anybody’s feelings.

A milonguero is a slave of the music, the tempo, and the space. When he dances, music invades his body and is translated into his steps and his movements. He never misses a tempo. Such blending with the music is what produces a sensation that their bodies are actually speaking (chamuyan).

The milonguero dances level with the floor, managing space is essential for him, he follows the “ronda”. His steps, turns, and walks are always aimed forwards, he never overtakes another couple, he takes care not to cross other people’s path. He will do his thing (milonguea) in whatever space is left. He dances for himself and his partner, not for the spectators. He does not exhibit.

A milonguero stands out by the subtle way in which he manages space, his sense of rhythm and the intensity — or lightness — of the feelings he conveys. The pleasure he feels, he transfers with elegance to the woman’s body. She, in turn, follows him, generally with eyes closed. She follows like the perfume he is wearing, she sticks together in this joyful journey. She dances apilada to him — but not like “cannonball necklace.” Apilarse doesn’t mean hang — this is not always visible for others, but he can certainly feel it.

A milonguero is inspired by the orchestra, the piece, or the woman. He also allows his emotional states to influence the dance. Before beginning a dance, he will take the woman in his arms, listen to the music, feel their respiration, their heartbeats, and only then will he take the first step.

Fortunately, each milonguero dances distinctively. Their personality, style, and cadence are unique to each one. There is plenty of variety among them, with a rich diversity of steps and dance experience. Although they sometimes give in to admiration, their priority is always the woman and the sentimiento (feelings — the main motivation for the dance). They are anonymous. Sometimes timid, and very concentrated. They do not dance much, they are demanding when choosing the music and the partner. One or two tandas well danced will make the evening.

A milonguero will dress very smart, he will be very careful with the shining of his shoes, the crease of his trousers and [his] perfume. You’ll see them sitting at the table checking out the floor and the minas ; they only ask for a dance with a head movement (“de cabeceo”) or an eye movement (“de ojito”). Meanwhile, there are also the milongueras — many, and very good. They are ageless. Their posture, the charm of their footstep, and the subtleties of their movements make for the man’s inspiration, and it’s them who make the man shine. They are simply chiche bombon!!!

I believe it makes no sense to claim that someone is number one or the best, or that one owns a step, or to say that others have stolen somebody’s step. We’ve all learned from the rest and adapted what we learned to our personality. And we will continue to learn from each other in a never-ending process. That is how we enrich our dance, the tango. The tango, like feelings, doesn’t have and never had an owner.

Dancing (milonguear) as well as learning to dance, should be a joy, not an exigency, competition, or hard work; there is enough of that already in our every day life. Our duty and responsibility as teachers does not consist in overwhelming our students with our skills and knowledge, but to be able to communicate these with sentimiento (feelings) and simplicity. We must therefore avoid mistaking our dancing or performing abilities with our teaching abilities. It’s essential, not only [to] count the number of students we have — which is certainly important financially speaking — but also to make an honest balance and observe how many of our students are milongueando in the salons. We must be sincere with ourselves if we wish to see the tango grow.

I wish to express my humble gratitude for entrusting me, for all the students in all the places I have visited as a teacher. Also to their teachers (including all styles and nationalities), for their passion in promoting Tango, and who have not permitted that I feel alone anywhere I go, even if I do not speak their language or ignore their customs. The Tango in all the tango corners of the world I have visited makes me feel at home wherever I go. Bailando tangos uno nunca esta sólo.

This article was originally published in “La Cadena”, a tango magazine in Holland; “El Once” in London and “Tandoneon” in Madrid.

The Tango and Trapeze Acts

Re: the Cacho Dante quote I just posted...he's the one dancing in the video down below with Sally Potter (from 0:30 to 0:58) in this scene from "The Tango Lesson". You will also notice Gustavo Naveira, Fabian Salas, and Omar Vega (RIP).

Re: the title of this post - it's a 1998 article by Cacho Dante - and the source of the quote. Here it is, by Cacho Dante:

The Tango and Trapeze Acts
By Cacho Dante, Milonguero de Buenos Aires
November 1998


Thirty years ago, the tango wasn't a trapeze act. It didn't have choreographies, and the woman was not just a follower, she was to whom the tango was dedicated. Around that time, under the pressure of the dictatorship in Argentina, many milongueros stopped dancing. They were tired of getting picked up by the authorities every weekend to see if they had a police record.

Some milongueros went back to the neighborhood clubs where they had to dance with their neighbors,their cousins, the sisters of friends—all under the watchful eyes of mothers. It was an enormous bore.

The guys at that time had already surpassed the stage of steps. They had already passed through the filter:When they didn't really know how to dance, they did 20 steps; when they knew a bit more, they did 10; and when they really knew what they were doing, they danced five...but with real quality.

The rest they learned from the orchestras at the time: how to navigate the dance floor; how to lead the rhythm. They danced then to some of the best orchestras live every day, Osvaldo Pugliese, Anibal Troilo,Juan D'Arienzo, Francisco Canaro, Alfredo Gobbi, etc.

Later, everything changed. The tango climbed onto the trapeze and became choreographed. And it became a dance of the deaf. The dance floor today also sometimes seems like a war zone. Women don't even get the chance to choose their partners. Men snatch them from the tables as if they were fruit in a supermarket bin.

When some of the milongueros returned to dance, myself included, we wanted to be in style, to learn choreographies. But it was late for that because for us it was more important to be appreciated by the woman than to be admired by those who liked to be seen. Women chose the tango milonguero. They embraced the old guys and then later embraced the young ones as well. Even if we milongueros are fat and bald, we still carry our heads high and have plenty of women to dance with.

Sometimes you hear that tango milonguero will die with the last milonguero. But those who say that don't seem to be aware that the last one is only 17 years old and is already teaching the dance.

Nowadays, we dance to orchestras and singers that are long gone. The sons of the great orchestra leaders,as children do, did not listen to their parents. Today, unfortunately, there isn't really any new music to dance to. The orchestras now knock themselves out to follow the singers, whereas in the old days the singer was just another instrument.

The tango, some say, is growing. Others say it is getting fat. I believe it is swollen, like someone who has eaten too much. Luckily, the example of the milonguero exists and it is not by chance nor just because it is something in vogue that some young people here and other people abroad dance in a close embrace and fly. To fly, you must have your feet firmly on the earth. We Pugliese fans plant our feet on the dance floor and we fly with our torsos. There is no other way to dance the silences and the pauses. With D'Arienzo,you dance in fourth gear, with Pugliese, in first. For Pugliese, you must lower the turns and with D'Arienzo, lift them.

The tango is a feeling that is danced. That's why it is not choreographed, though it can have sequences,like all feelings. You can dance love, rage, happiness, pleasure, every mood. The tango is not a dance to demonstrate ability but rather an interpretation of feeling. It is not just moving your feet and posturing.The tango is Argentine, but it belongs to all those who understand its feelings and its codes.Guys, to dance tango, you must listen to the heart of the woman.

Tango Statics, Strengths, Structural Dynamics and Moments of Intertia

If the man's right hand is located on the woman's left shoulder blade (aka angel wing) a structural deficiency may exist within the psycho-motor-cerebro-cortical-hormonal-pheromonal-energetic-structo-dynamic-cognito-emotive-electro-chemical-synaptic-meta-physical-historical-musico-melodo-rhythmic-primordial-soup-tango-embrace system, resulting in less than optimally balanced dopamine, norepinephrine and serotonin systems, interactions, and inter-relationships, and may induce or result in a less than a maximally pleasurable tango experience.

That is all.

Have a good 'un.

Daydreaming into Tango

A couple of things have been dawning on me, of late. The first is that I feel like I'm losing, or at least forgetting, my tango. Driving along these hill country roads, I daydream into the long rolling views, fleeting far off vistas, a canyon obscura dropping off to the right through the cedars, old full curl billy goats and longhorn steers and pink-nosed calves peripherally munching on the long brown grass.

Sometimes daydreaming into the bad architecture and short-sighted urban planning along the way. Daydreaming it better, daydreaming it smarter. Daydreaming it into energy-efficiency and sustainability. I daydream the coming shift into life-sustaining civilization. Hoping it into reality. Soon. Before my time comes to an end on this Earth. Perhaps. More likely in my daughter's time.

A creek comes along and I daydream up and downstream, quickly, before it is gone, behind me, wending its way down into the aquifer. Clear water, limestone bedrock, blue-greenish algae, herons long gone, no other signs of life. I daydream down into the aquifer, wondering how full it is today and then daydreaming into the coming rain.

Beautiful metamorphosing puffy white cotton balls of water vapor. Clouds coming in or headed east to join with more clouds and moisture-laden air, gathering up all their energy and resources for a storm. Mother Earth has called for rain, or snow. Somewhere. Out over the Atlantic, perhaps. Not here.

Sometimes I daydream into my own mind. Wondering why this thought, or that one. Why this feeling, why not that one? Deep thoughts into deep thoughts. Uh-oh. Better to back away from this one. My head is starting to spin. Probably from lack of coffee this early. It's ready now. Wrap it up, dude. It's coffee.

Interlaced in there with all the daydreaming and lucid workthought and practical lifethought and general stuffthought comes tango. Prying its way in there. Daydreaming into tango. Rolling it around in my head, looking at it from all angles. Remembering how it feels. Thinking of doing a certain thing - tango things. Daydreaming into tango, I remember something that I forgot. Some "thing". A thing like that twisty clockwise molinete coming off of an ocho cortado interruptus with an almost imperceptible sacada thrown in the middle and closing off with another cortada & back to a sweet cross. Twisty enough to be almost a 720, and induce some bilateral dizziness. I think.

I think I remember that. Is that it? I think I remember how to lead that...? Sometimes the forgotten tango things just hang back in the darkness. The dark corners. Crumbs of my tango in the dark corners. Not forgotten forgotten, but I remember that I have forgotten them. Lucid absence of a memory type of a thing. I try to strain real hard, squinting my eyes and brain tissue as best I can, and squeeze that forgotten memory out of the primordial ooze. It comes back to me, fuzzy and dark at first, coming into the light, emerging into the clarity of day. Most of the time. Okay, fifty percent of the time. Okay, forty. The others are lost for a time, at least until I dance them back into me.

And so, I remember it. A little something that I didn't want to forget.

The other thing that has been dawning on me of late? I forget. Uh. Hmmm. Grunt. There it is, that thing I forgot to remember from earlier. Two things actually. The best of the best musicality thing. And the other thing about never seeing what I feel. Notes to self, for another time.

Coffee now...

Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee with some Tango thrown in at the bottom

["Plate 209 - The Three Chiefs - Piegan" by Edward S. Curtis - circa 1900]

December 22, 2010 - I originally wrote this post back on April 4. I'm not sure why I never posted it. Perhaps it fell into the "too much drivel" category - like the stupid Cosmo v. Alex Gift Ideas thing I pulled yesterday. Sorry for that. Those of you subscribing via Readers/Feeders got it anyway. Sorry for that, too.

Perhaps I didn't post it originally because I felt blasphemous about the obtuse tie between Tango and Wounded Knee. But the tie is there - I'm being honest about that. These guys, talking tango up in Montana, prompted me to look at a map, which prompted a flood of memories from my past.

Does tango do that to us? Trigger or otherwise incubate or nourish introspection and memory and curiosity and emotion and deep pondering of things various and sundry?

Nah.

Tango does do something to us...those of us who find our hearts clenched in its tendrils...and that, my friends, as always, is a subject for another post.

Anyway, all blasphemy aside - I decided to run with the original title of the post. I may run another one, let's call it Part II, on the 29th - the anniversary of the massacre at Wounded Knee.

So here it is...

April 4, 2010

Boy, what an obtuse and convoluted and twisted thread my mind sometimes weaves. I friended another blogger on Facebook a few days ago. He happens to live up in the northern plains of Montana - somewhere along the Yellowstone River, or perhaps the Bighorn. Where exactly is not important.

Anyway, whilst doing my thing on Facebook, I noticed an interesting dialog between him and a friend of his - about tango. It's some "good stuff" on a subject near and dear to my heart - which we will eventually get to.

But first, I want to follow my thread. We're off to Inner Mongolia first.

I'm continually intrigued by the geography of tango - where it exists on this planet; where it is danced; where it was planted and is now taking root, and by whom. Occasionally, when I check the stats for this blog, I notice a remote corner of the world that generated a hit. The Namib Desert of Africa generated a hit from Google two years ago - with the search words "tango quotes".

The other day there was a hit from Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia - with the search string "electricity production", which probably came from this.

So, I found it interesting to find a couple of dudes on Facebook having this very deep-tango-though-ish discussion way up in Montana. I already knew there was tango up there in the Big Sky country. A few of those folks always trickled down to the Denver festivals. Montana and Idaho tango folks. Anyway, interesting. So I got their permission to lift their conversation and put it in here. Eventually. Way down there at the bottom. Feel free to skip ahead and avoid my drivel.

Sam (the blogger I mentioned) posted something about going to the funeral of a friend's daughter in Crow Agency, the "capital" of the Crow Nation. That was my starting point. Just out of curiosity, I wanted to see where that was in my world. I always need to do that when geography is on my mind - look at an analog map. Good old fashioned paper. I had to go digging for my road atlas up in the studio. Don't forget the magnifying glass. Ah, there it is.

I started out looking for an appropriate image to lead this post with. The first thing that came to mind was a photo of some verdant northern plains grasslands - preferably just rolling native tall-grass prairie. No such luck. I didn't look too hard - found some with tatanka grazing(Lakota Sioux for bison/buffalo) - some with tipis. All too stereotypical for what I had in mind.

I was trying to make a geographic tie to Montana to the spot on this Earth where this post originated. This land. This Mother Earth of ours.

Looking at all of the images, looking at the maps, reading and remembering the names of the rivers and the mountain ranges - all of it unleashed a flood of memories and emotions for me. I could feel it welling up inside me. Artesian-like.

Now I'm fucking crying. I hate it when that shit happens.

I've never been to Montana, but I have spent some time in the Wind River Range of Wyoming. Lander. Dubois. Pinedale. I went in one side of the range and came out on the other side 33 days later. Backpacking and mountaineering. With a 90 pound pack. I was at my healthiest and strongest in that summer of 1978. Sweet memories of mountains and women and the drive from Lafayette, Louisiana in my loaded-for-bear VW Rabbit. The Green River (other side of the divide) has huge meaning for me, but is a subject for another post. Grasshopper Creek and the "Miraculous Nike Running Shoes In My Size Manifesting Themselves Under a Fallen Spruce Whilst Bushwacking After I Had Blown Out My Own Shoes On An Eleven Mile Cache/Resupply Hike Story". Bathing in a creek that flows from beneath a glacier at 10,000 feet or so. (Talk about shrinkage.) Rock climbing in Sinks Canyon. The Popo Agie River. The Wind River. It becomes the Bighorn and flows north into Montana - just past Crow Agency - right through the Crow Nation. Tons of memories almost long forgotten.

I played pool (billiards) that summer of '78 in a smoky dive bar in Lander, Wyoming with a few Shoshone. Or were they Arapahoe? Lander is on the edge of the Wind River Indian Reservation. We played pool until daylight. They took a liking to me and wouldn't let me leave. We got drunk and played pool all night. There is a vague and foggy memory of waking up on a pool table as the morning light streamed in through the door. As I recall I was drunk all the next day, hiking and scrambling around near my campsite in Sinks Canyon on the Popo Agie River all by my lonesome. Me and something big in a cave. Mountain lion? Big enough to turn me around licketysplit. I met a group of girls from New York City that day and was no longer so lonesome - I recently reconnected with one of them on Facebook. Okay, now I'm really digressing.

I'm sensitive to the fact that I'm referencing Native American culture all over the map, literally. The photo at the top is of three Piegan or Blackfoot Chiefs [from northern Montana]. The Wounded Knee Massacre happened in South Dakota and involved the Hunkpapa Sioux. The Wind Rivers are home to the Shoshone and Arapahoe Nations. And the Crow Nation, in southern Montana is close to where Sam lives. (Re-reading this six months after I wrote it (wrote it in April, reading & possibly posting in December, I'm guessing this is probably all wrong...)

I read the book "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee" by Dee Brown in 1975, at the age of 15. It's written from the Native American viewpoint. I became very interested in Native American history and culture, very interested in the history of the American West and the culture of the Mountain Men and the fur trade. I read everything I could get my hands on.

I have always taken the counter-view (to the norm of the majority, I suppose) with regard to Native Americans. I believe, deeply, that they were wronged by the Wasi'chu. Were, and are now and probably will be forever wronged. That's all I'll say about that, for now, in the interest of brevity. I'm just barely touching the surface of my thoughts on that subject. I've always taken the counter-view with regard to most everything - especially environmental and development related "stuff". I'm not sure why that is, but it is. I used to keep it all to myself, keeping my mouth shut about what I think and feel about the world around me. Forty-seven years of silence is long enough. (Dec 2010 - Forty-seven? Okay, I was forty-nine back in April, so maybe I figgered I didn't start talking, and hence could not yet be "silent" until the age of two...? HTF knows what I was thinking back then...)

Montana and the other northern plains states encompass some beautiful country. The last remnants of a beautiful people live and love and struggle there. Some tango has taken root up there, and I feel blasphemous to even make the tie, but the tie is there. The tie that binds.

Here is Sam's blog. It's called "Men...101".

And here, finally, is that dialog about Tango from Facebook:

Sam: Tango instructors: Teach the system, not the style. You can quote me on that.

Ken: However, I'm not quite sure how one separates it out? How is style different from system? Are there fundamentals or not? And, from what I understand, there is great argument about "the true tango"?

Sam: I should probably keep my mouth shut and wait (generations?) for them to figure it out. But, as I am impatient, I'll borrow and paraphrase definitions from a skilled teacher of motion (thanks Skip): "SYSTEM - The unification of related concepts, principles, ideas, facts, truths, and basic elements of (Argentine tango). STYLE - The manner in which an individual applies and executes the (tango) they have learned."

Sam: The "true tango" debate is probably not different from the "pure karate" debate Ed Parker had with traditional martial artists. It is probably inevitable that this occurs with tango, especially as it spreads to other countries. The Argentines will lose CONTROL over it - with a predictable outcome.

Sam: Looking at my old notebooks now, and thinking of all the nifty little ideas employing simple definitions (from Kenpo) to tango: theory of proportional dimensions, ideal phase, what-if and formulation phases, extemporaneous and spontaneous action (for Chrissake WHEN is anyone going to get this as a fundamental idea in tango!), tailoring, dimensional sequence of movement, plus countless others that have yet to be developed because we're moving to MUSIC!!!! But . . . I'm ranting.

Sam: Of course, tango has spread to other countries. Time is slowly beginning to tell, with the debate about "true tango." How long has this been going on? Decades? And there must be fundamentals. The embrace we use is a convention, with basics emerging as 'form to function.' The fact that it's hard for someone who's been doing tango for a while to name and describe some of the fundamentals is atrocious, and speaks to the RELATIVE INFANCY of it - and perhaps the EGOIC BASE and lack of EMPATHY, or BEGINNER'S MIND (a feature particular to a master) among some of the advanced practitioners and teachers. It's not rocket science - why not break it down so others can learn it!

Sam: Now I'm on a roll. FURTHERMORE - there's the whole "gender thing" to consider. Far be it from me to express a humble opinion there . . . 'cause most of my opinions are not humble . . . or within apology. I'm about to choke the next person who uses some poor-white-trash-gender stereotype to get their "teaching point" across. On another topic: ...If someone wants to teach tango, fine. Lead or follow for at least 500 hours. 'Nuff said. Learn to correct "mistakes" without even saying a word. Find a minimum of 5 basics/fundamentals, and be able to use beginner, intermediate, and advanced dance "moves" to express them. (However, I don't think the dance is in the "moves," it's in the passionate, physical manifestation of the music, but that's something else. Nothing like seeing a bunch of fancy moves WITH NO PASSION. Testosterone should ooze from a man with his every step. WOW, that's good! Someone please, please quote me on that!) Oh, and learn a simple way to make beginners value basics so that they want to practice on their own. I can go on and on . . . think I've bottled this up for a while?

Ken: Or, that tango is culture and not "science." The same debate goes on in capoeira which was a folkloric form learn from body to body, without words. As it became a "performance" and subject to "academic" or "scientific" standards, it changed.

From what I can tell the old milongueros danced and had a way of teaching body to body, just as the old capoeira players. And, with the arrival of the Japanese teachers, who had forms and close to 300 years of western influence, the old capoeira players were forced to change.

Much the same is happening with tango. You might find the "tango discovery" series interesting...

My objection is that this approach replaces poetry with steps and stages.

Me, I like history and poetry.

Ken: Oh, well, while I was writing the above, you took off on a whole other tack. Yes, there should be drama in the simple forms. And, there should be music in every step. And, learning a lot of maneuvers is not enough :o)

But, that is what the Argentine's say -- tango without heart and passion, it is so English :o)

Ken: Oh, from what I've read, the old milongueros learned the "women's" part before they learned the "man's." As to gender roles, think Jung, think the deep archetypes. Dance is seduction, and seduction plays off the deep and classic patterns of romance and gender identity -- as understood in a culture. It ain't rocket science, thank G-d !! And, it ain't gymnastics, either.

Sam: I think the dance evolves within the individual, given a self-value system that a) inclines one to evolve, because b) mastery and self-evolution are inherently valuable. It will probably be the yoga people who do tango that bring this to the dance, if the zenned-out conflict avoidance (spiritual bypass) crutch doesn't impede them (not that yoga makes everyone a conflict avoider - most of them aren't).

Ken: OK, I re-read the above and think I understand. Here is where I would disagree. The individual will integrate into tango. Tango is not an individual, it is a community. So, a necessary part of learning tango is learning to be part of the community of tango. This is a complex community which is historic, worldwide and local. It resides between the ... members of the community as they explore not only their transient selves but as they come to be master communicators in the idiom. The idiom includes the classic music of the tango. While non-tango music may be "cute" it is the music that developed with the dance that leads one into the depth of tango.

Sam: The culture of tango and the dance of tango are not separated in my view, either. I think the path evolves from learning fundamentals - and that a beginner should know what some of those are after a few lessons. Because you mention something of communication, I'll use the "language analogy", keeping in mind the co-creative aspect of this (it ...takes two to tango!). Phonetics of motion become letters of motion, which become words of motion, which becomes sentences of motion, which become paragraphs of motion, which eventually leads to the co-creation of a "story" of motion. The common path is to teach "phrases of motion," which are better than nothing, but grossly limited, because the phonetics are not clearly addressed. You can't learn the language, and enter the 'culture' when all you can do is ask where the bathroom is. Problematic, because a) learning "phrases" presents the ILLUSION of learning a language when the speaker has not, and b) learning phrases creates a "rolodex of moves" (which helps create burn-out). The basics, truths, principles of motion, etc. that comprise the fundamentals of tango need to be developed. Create the "grammar for motion," and the "culture of tango" will be more easily accessed. Beginners and intermediates won't have the horrible time some of us had, and are having. Of course, people will lose their authority . .. and status within the culture . . . and students may want to discuss and debate and test concepts . . . but the dance will EVOLVE. Which means some of the egoic midgets (male and female) will have to grow too.

Sam: There are a few teachers out there who teach conceptually. Mike Malixi is one of them. The problem is that people like to "collect" things, such as cool dance moves. Few want to spend much time learning to hold their core, keep their frame from moving (vs. pulling your partner around with your arms), pointing your toe as you step back (which creates that sexy, elegant step so many of us like to watch a woman do), hold forward intention, etc. Of course, a good teacher can use "advanced vocabulary" to teach these principles . . .which makes a beginner see the value in having good basics, which makes them want to practice basics more, which makes them better dancers.

Sam: Short story: I saw my kenpo teacher many, many times teach "advanced techniques" to beginners. Everyone wants to do weapons stuff in the martial arts - it just feels so cool to use a knife, or sword, or staff, or nunchaku, or fight multiple opponents. But you learn that you can hurt YOURSELF more than anyone else if you don't have SOLID BASICS... Which makes new students want to practice basics more . . . And I just gave tango instructors a clue (take two - they're small) how to make their teaching life easier.

Sam: If I had to list the principles of tango, I'd start out with things like core/center, frame, and directional harmony. Students will magnify all the errors in their teacher's motion, so if a teacher isn't getting their own lessons . . . well . . . let's just say it's the difference between pursuing mastery, and pursuing a masterful image. As we used to say in the kenpo world, their is a difference between martial art and partial art.

Ken: Well, there is having fun :o)

END OF FACEBOOK DIALOG

Thanks guys - Sam and Ken - for allowing me to post your conversation. Perhaps our paths will cross one of these days. Let me know if you ever get down this way.

Oh, and one last thought. I do want my heart to be buried somewhere. Right here. Right here on this spot is where I want my heart to lie. In the meadow, near the spot where we make the bonfires. Cremate the rest; sprinkle a little of my dust here, on the ground covering my heart; a vial or two on the pistas of the milongas in Buenos Aires; and keep some in an urn on a shelf. But not for a while. I have more to say. Much more to say and do in this life.

How I came to love tango music...

I'm sitting here this morning, coffee and D'Agostino, reading a thread on a tango DJ list about dancers not knowing tango music. This is one instance where I'm talking knowledge versus knowing. There is a difference, but I talk about it elsewhere in this blog.

The writer, Joe Grohens, talks about how the vast majority of tango dancers don't really know tango music. They don't listen to it in their day-to-day lives, most likely because they don't own any. He posits that the only time most dancers hear tango music is at the milongas.

As a result, they hear it a few hours a week at best, but don't really know much about it. They don't know the orchestras, the song titles, or the names of the singers. They don't know the stories behind the songs, they don't know the history of the orchestras and the players. They don't know about the various recording companies and record labels during that time. I'm not suggesting that all dancers go to this depth. Some do, some don't, most are somewhere in the middle.

This was me six years ago. Not only did I know nothing of tango music, I didn't even know how to find any if I wanted to buy some. I had my one starter CD that our teacher burned for us to listen to outside of class.

Not only did I know nothing of the music, but I didn't like it. Yes, Alex the tango-purist-bordering-on-fundamentalist-milonguero-jihadist did not, at one time, in the beginning, even like tango music. I also didn't like the (men's) shoes, and took some cool Pumas to the cobbler to have the rubber soles ground off and leathers glued on. But that is another story. For another time.

I had a pretty good collection of interesting music on my computer & iPod, so I sifted and listened and listened and sifted to find songs with a four beat that my partner and I could practice to. Any songs. Borderline tango-danceable. Crap, really, as I think back on it.

I didn't "get" tango music. I couldn't find the beat. It was as if I couldn't...didn't hear the music when I was dancing. I was deaf, dumb and blind to the music - a fatal condition in tango.

Not just fatal as in a death-blow, but fatal as in squashed like a beetle on the pavement. Note that I didn't mean to squish him and I apologized to him after I took his innocent life. Ashes to ashes and dust to dust and covered him up with a bootkick of caliche.

I convinced myself I was a rhythmic retard. And I quit. Dropped tango cold turkey from my life. For six months.

When I came back to tango, I had six months of tangosmosis on my side. I somehow knew that I would have to wrap my head around this music. Wrap my head and my heart around it. And my soul. In that next year I figured out that it would take nothing less than absolute and total immersion in tango. I was determined to "get" this dance and its music. I had dis/misplaced dreams of mastering tango. I know better now. One never masters "El Tango". Anyway....

So I started doing the research on the internet. Quizzing my teachers and long-time dancers. Copping and copying CD's whenever and wherever I could. I ordered some CD's from Buenos Aires. I had people pick some up for me there and tote 'em back to the mountains. I saved up my money and bought tons of CD's when I went to BsAs. I searched the "World Music" sections of record stores every chance I got. I discovered some at the iTunes store.

I ended up with some garbage, some duplications of songs, but mostly good stuff. It was worth the effort. I have quite a collection now. For the past three or four years, I've been more selective in my acquisitions. I check the orchestra discographies online and do a little research to find the CD with the best (or my favorite) version of the song with the best sound quality.

Luckily, during that time in Aspen, I was in a position to do this "total immersion" approach. For three years. I didn't have a life. Tango was my life. I think there was a year in there that I listened, literally, to nothing but tango music. There were favorite songs that I would listen to over and over for hours thanks to the repeat setting on the iPod. Even when the iPod was off, the song was still playing in my head. Try it some time. Brainwashing by tango.

Another of my "total immersion" techniques was this - whilst I was dancing (and other times, too) I would transport myself, along with my partner, using pure-D abstract visualization, back to a milonga in Buenos Aires. Back to that time where an orchestra might have been playing live. I would visualize the milonga, the room, the decor, the other dancers, the clouds of cigarette smoke, the smells. I would transport us in my mind back to the 1930's or 1940's - reveling in the zeitgeist of that time. Imagining what it must have been like. Try it some time. It still works for me, sometimes inducing some strange and interesting feelings, for lack of a better word this early in the morning.

So that's how I came to love tango music. And I do love it. The good stuff. The real stuff. The Golden Age stuff. The Guardia Vieja stuff. "Old school" tango the youngsters call it now. Authentic. Vintage. Reclaimed. Historic. Whatever.

I realize the total immersion approach is not practical, and maybe not even healthy. There is a zone between that and zero. The productive middle ground. All it takes is one CD, or two, or five. You might get bit and collect 20 or 200. Find, buy, beg, borrow (but don't steal) or otherwise acquire some good Golden Age tango - from 1925 through 1955. Afterthought: Buy, buy, buy the music whenever you can. It's the right thing to do. Pony up your hard earned greenbacks - it makes the music that much more valuable to you.

And listen to it. Really listen. Hear it.

With a little knowledge of the music, you will be on the path to knowing tango.

Knowing versus knowledge.

And there is a difference.

Have a great weekend y'all. I'm back into carpintero mode. Closer to closing in the addition. Tango music wafting through the woods. Sawing and fitting and nailing and dancing tango and designing in my head.

More coffee. I need more coffee.

The Bottomless Pit of a Tango Lead and the Path of EI2T2

Actually, I wish that I had come up with this concept, but since I'm not a follower, and not a lead who follows, that would be hard to do.

Irene over at Irene and Man Yung's Tango Blog came up with the concept of a lead that is full of holes - bottomless ones. Notice I didn't say "a lead who". Let's not make this personal. As a leader, I think I can say we have all been there - where the bottom drops out of our lead. A black hole of tango. Tango Not. A tango-naut thirty thousand feet deep in the blackness of the Mariana Trench. A tango knot, infinitely twisting in on itself, never to be untied.

I think what Irene and Man Yung are trying to say is that there is a difference between dancers who think they are "skilled", or worse "know" they are skilled (when they actually aren't) and those who are on the path of eternal improvement in their tango.

The ones who "think/know" they are skilled are the "Tango Dancers of High Repute" that Irene refers to. I would edit that to be "Tango Dancers of High Self-Repute".

Those on the EI2T2 Path (Eternal Improvement In Their Tango) (grin), recognize that sometimes their lead sucks - "a great big sucking noise" in the words of the infamous Ross Perot. Makes me wonder if Mr. Perot has, or will ever dance tango...? What a visual! But I digress.

Those on the path recognize the voids, the holes, the nothingness in their lead. They are painfully aware of those moments - generally few, but profoundly deafening and reverberating in the mind of said leader. Those on the path seek to fill those holes, and fill the deafening void with something. "Something". Perhaps even silence.

Fill a void with silence!? Wow. Now there's a concept. Filling the void of a lead with silence. Dancing the silence as el maestro Gavito said. I think that was him. I love it when a blog comes together.

Dance the silence. Master the nothingness in your lead. It's called "The Pause".

That's my two cents. Even if those two cents are down over there at the end of this other path of digression.

And dont' forget to check out Irene & Man Yung's post on "SKILL".

Thanks to Elizabeth and Mari both for saying something about this Irene and Man Yung post in their own blogs. It's funny and pertinent and poignant enough to spread the word and spread the post.

Skill and nothingness. Skill v. nothingness? Hmm. I love it when my brain ponders. When it comes to "skill", personally, I think I'd rather master the nothingness in my lead. With a five gallon bucket full of silence. The "less is more" minimalist approach.

The Perfection of the Perfect Connection :: From the Archives

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Originally uploaded by Peter Pango

Here are seven (7) posts on the subject of "The Perfection of the Perfect Connection"...which I had occasion to dredge from the archives this morning...

Or click here...


DISCLAIMER AND WARNING :: My "Fuck Me Back Revisited" post is one of the seven. If you find the "f" word, the "F" word, the word "fuck", or "fucking" and/or "making love" in general to be offensive words or subjects or acts, then please click here.

But not before turning your volume down.

Tango Glide de Luxe

[Foto by Alex.Tango.Fuego - from last night]


I DJ'd a live music milonga last night - The Austin Piazzolla Quintet.
They are a talented ensemble and a welcome addition to the Austin tango/music scene.

Being that I don't really do much dancing to Piazzolla (preferring to listen), I had some time on my hands. Or on my eyes, more accurately.

I've always been reluctant to critique what I see, unless it's a fedora or white shoes on a leader. But if I may, I would like to offer a tidbit that hopefully will be perceived as constructive counsel.

I noticed most of the followers were "stepping". On their toes. With heels elevated.

Now I'm not an expert by any means, and I have only taken only one "Follower Technique" class (with Luiza Paes) over the six years I've been dancing tango. But, I have taken lots and lots of classes, workshops, privates, intensivos, blah blah blah. With many different teachers. I was there when they were correcting my partner. I was paying attention to the instruction and feedback they were giving the followers.

As I recall, they all said "heels down" (but not weighted); extend (the leg, to its maximum comfortable natural step, depending on the size of the step being led); and "caress" the floor (just barely caressing - with no real scuffing or shuffling noise from sole contact with the floor). The "heels down" principle is during the step, as the foot is moving backwards, and not an ending default position only after the stepping foot has collected alongside the weighted foot - that one is an embellishment, not a fundamental truth of the tango universe.

Heel down, extend, caress. Glide. Smooth. Liso.

My primary teacher frequently used a story to illustrate/visualize this concept:

"Imagine there are little Lilliputians (from Gulliver's Travels), with ropes tied to your heels, and they are pulling your leg back, from your heel."

Using this visualization exercise, and manifesting this in real time would keep the heel down and extend the leg in a backstep to its maximum comfortable "natural" step.

There are a couple/a few reasons for this as I recall, but I'm only going to focus on one. It really applies only to close embrace - chest-to-breasts. In a more open/separated embrace, "stepping" doesn't really manifest any undesirable effects - except for the aesthetic.

In close embrace, it's a different story. "Stepping" in close embrace imparts a slight verticality to the follower's movement. It can manifest as a "bounce". Gentle-like, but still a slight vertical bounce. Some have called it a bop. At its worst, for me, with shorter followers, it manifested as the top of their head bopping into the bottom of my jaw as we walked. Whenever it happens, the thought actually pops into my head that I should have a mouth guard in my pocket. But that's my own internal tongue-in-cheek overkill twisted humor. Obviously I would never have to resort to that. But it's good for illustrating a worst-case manifestation of the issue.

As I write this, it's dawning on me that I may notice this more, because I am more of a walker in my tango. I walk every chance I get. Every time the music tells me to walk, I walk. Now that I think about it, I (think I) notice most leaders doing lots of other "stuff", but not doing much walking. Maybe this "glide vs. bounce" issue is not so much of an issue if you're not doing much walking? Hmmm.

Heels-down, extending, caressing - "gliding" - imparts a smoothness, almost like a hawk flying in a slipstream in the sky. Or paddling a stripper in the early morning light on a glassy lake. Water skiing on a snake infested cafe' au lait colored Louisiana bayou - so narrow and twisty the ski boat has to come to a complete stop to turn around and go back downstream. So narrow of a channel through the thick cypress that no wind could ever ripple the water's surface. That feeling. Smooth beyond smooth. The word glide is an understatement. Floating. Airy. Dreamy.

How can you tell if it's happening? It's noticeable in the chest-to-breasts contact - the vertical motion can be felt. It's noticeable if there's any cheek-to-cheek contact as well. Or jaw-to-forehead. One might also use a video camera for "diagnostic" purposes.

I noticed it mostly in the women I was watching last night. There were only two or three followers who actually had the caress/glide movement down pat. Two or three out of twenty or thirty. Too few.

My understanding is that followers have to retrain themselves to walk (backwards in 4cm heels), or remake, or reform their backwards movement so that almost all of the verticality is removed - manifesting a much smoother, mas liso, dance. Mucho walking backwards. Mucho practice. Mucho work to get the walk smoothed out.

I could be wrong. Please comment if I am. Share your views and experience with this. Please please purty please.

Again, I'm reluctant to offer "instructional" type posts, and reluctant to bring things up that I see in my own community, because it is so small. Some of the women I noticed this with, I dance with - others I have not had the pleasure of their company on the dance floor. Yet. I hope it doesn't blow up in my face.

This post will be one of the few times I do this. I'm doing it now because I'm selfish.

Yo quiero el tango glide de luxe.

Proprioception and Aliaception in Tango

For some reason, I was thinking of these words today, racking my brain trying to remember them, and their meaning.

Proprioception (pronounced /ˌproʊpri.ɵˈsɛpʃən/ PRO-pree-o-SEP-shən), from Latin proprius, meaning "one's own" and perception) is the sense of the relative position of neighbouring parts of the body. Unlike the six exteroceptive senses (sight, taste, smell, touch, hearing, and balance) by which we perceive the outside world, and interoceptive senses, by which we perceive the pain and movement of internal organs, proprioception is a third distinct sensory modality that provides feedback solely on the status of the body internally. It is the sense that indicates whether the body is moving with required effort, as well as where the various parts of the body are located in relation to each other.

The word proprioception can apparently be used interchangeably with kinesthesia.

Aliaception is a recently born protologism, thanks to Bryan de Valdivia over the pond in Bonn, Germany. He defines it as "The [sense or perception or] knowledge of another person's body (tension, [relaxation], positioning, and quality [and character] of movement [through time and space]) via one's sense of touch [or extremely close proximity]."

[the wording in brackets are my additions]

Anyway, I was able to remember them eventually, which is a good sign, especially after finishing the final coat on the deck and inhaling VOC's for eight hours. No tellin' how many brain cells I killed with that swift move. These are big and important words in tango. We should all know them and use them and bandy them about and try to make our bodies and brains actually do the shit that these big important tango words mean. Scientific shit that goes on when we are dancing tango and we don't even know it - we aren't even aware of it - a "rock of eye" or "Blink (the book)" sorta thing. Kindasorta. Same thing only different. Whatever.

Basically I just wanted to stick these words in the blog so I don't forget again and have to search around for them in the future.

My apologies if I got you all fluffed up over something profound, and then it turned out to be something to file under "stupid stuff".

Wall of Rock of Eye

[Foto by AlexTangoFuego]

A post-it note, half-crumpled on the kitchen island, from being stuffed into my pocket, scribbled with "rock of eye...things you know but you don't even know you know..."...from a Pierce Brosnan line in the film "The Tailor of Panama"...tailor-speak I suppose...bespoke speak...which led me to dig out from my office bookshelf "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell and dust it off...and in Googling around to write this post, one of my de/re/pository posts, led me to this...

Rock of Eye

There was to be a tango tie with the whole "rock of eye" thing, but it never manifested in my mind, or I forgot the tie, or I forgot to remember...must not have been important...

Getting the Eight Count Basic to Fuck with your Head

Your head, or someone else's head if you want to unleash it on them...

There's a flurry of discussion about the eight count basic on Tango-L. Yes, it's one of my frustrations too, leaders who dance the 8CB over and over on the dance floor, back step and all.

I love the free association of life and such. I'm intrigued by the free association going on in my own brain on a daily basis. I had a cyber- free association event a little while ago that plopped me right on Isloa de Pantelleria - a place on the planet that a woman connected me to many years ago. Well, not plopped physically. Virtually. Visually. Such that I laid my eyes on it from a distance. Anyway, I digress. Strange stuff sometimes, that free association.

Here's what popped into my head whilst reading a post just now on Tango-L. It's something I got from a teacher during a private lesson. This was to be an "exercise" in creativity, never to actually be danced.

1] Dance the eight count basic backwards. (start with the 8, 7, 6, 5, etc.)

2] Now mirror it on the other side.

3] Now dance it mirrored and backwards.

4] Now lead the follower in the leader's role, while you dance the follower's role, but you are still leading her, mirrored and backwards.

As I recall, the inside of my skull, or 'skelekin-head' as one of my young nephews used to call it, felt like there were fire ants crawling around and stinging the inside of my skull, or the outside surface of my brain. Or something. Maybe my synapses were shorting out in tiny little microscopic electro-chemical microbursts.

Millions of little femto-brain farts. Femto- is 10 raised to the power of minus 15. "Tee-tiny". Effing small. I think. If my compromised memory serves me. I love to think small. Subatomic. Beyond the subatomic. I love to think big. Ten thousand or five million years. Thirteen point five megaparsecs. Small, and big. Big, and small. "HONEY! Where's the camera!? There's dung beetles in the road!" I'm digressing again.

Anyway. Don't ya'll worry, I'm okay.

Really. [about the 8CB creative exercise and what it felt like]

Try it.

P.S. My feeling re: the 8CB is that there are many more leaders than we are willing to admit who are 'learning' to dance tango via YouTube. Whatever. The nature of the beast?

I'm in a mood.