Monthly Archives: June 2019

Private lesson

Finally feeling able to re-introduce giros to my dance

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giro

Having called in Julia and Federico to bump my ochos up to a whole new level, and sort out my cross, it was time to tackle my nemesis: the giro.

With ochos, I had a workable open embrace version. They were clear, and I felt I could easily lead them to the music. Things were trickier in close embrace, and there was plenty of scope to improve my technique, but it was a decent starting-point.

With giros, I didn’t really feel like I had that much …

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Not Tango

My trainee tanguero clothing tips for men

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wardrobe

A recent wardrobe re-organisation reveals that a full 25% of my shirts and trousers are Designated Tango Clothing.

Not actual tango clothing – that would feel a bit pretentious at my stage of the game – but clothing almost exclusively used for tango. This includes an unlikely mix of expensive shirts and cheap trousers …

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Not Tango

Mild facial aphasia, or why you have to introduce yourself to me multiple times

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mild facial aphasia

As some of you will know, I suffer from mild facial aphasia, also known as partial prosopagnosia. Since tango people are often curious about it when I mention it, I thought I’d write a brief primer …

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Socialising

When dancing in a pub is an achievement rather than an embarrassment

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Dancing in a pub

Tonight was the monthly Tango Space drinks, when students and teachers get together to drink wine, talk tango and– Well, ok, we pretty much just drink wine and talk tango.

The pub plays a pretty eclectic selection of music, but I’d never before heard any tango music. On this occasion, however, it was playing something that sounded like a pretty convincing impression of a milonga …

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Workshop

Musicality workshop #3 of 4: The delightfully mundane secret to a collaborative dance!

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collaborative dance

Tonight’s musicality class was all about collaborative dance: Response to our partner. To agree, to change, to add.

To me, the transition from me leading everything to a collaborative dance is one of the most exciting prospects. I’d previously seen this as a very advanced skill, one where I’d have to develop my own dance skills to a high level first, but Diego Bado had given me a different perspective on it. Paraphrasing him from a conversation we had …

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Group class, Milonga

Actitude, Pugliese and following the follower

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following the follower

I realised today there’s quite a difference in musicality between what I do in solo practice at home with Mrs Mop, and what I do in milongas. Part of that is entirely understandable: at home, there are few demands on my attention dollar. I normally decide in advance what types of movement I’ll be practicing, so I can spend 50 cents each on technique and musical interpretation.

In a milonga, of course, my partner and the navigation need a lot of my attention, and usually I’m deciding on the fly what movements to lead, but there’s another factor …

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Following, Group class, Practica

Dropping the beginner class, and getting some bonus experience as a follower

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levels

Many years ago, I did an introductory scuba diving course. Known as the PADI Open Water Diver course, it took four days, and comprised about a day’s theory, some swimming pool exercises and then a couple of days of diving. Do that, and you emerge as a certified diver.

Want to become an Advanced Open Water Diver? Certainly: go on to do one deep dive (30m), one navigation dive (following a compass to swim in a triangle) and three other ‘adventure’ dives (eg. a night dive), and suddenly I’m an ‘advanced’ diver – with all of eight days in the water.

Tango gradings aren’t quite that bad, but schools definitely use inflated levels designed to flatter the student …

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Workshop

One small step for man and woman, one giant leap for their tango

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one small step

I love technique workshops, because the changes you make as a result of them are often tiny, but the payoff can be huge.

The seemingly infinite amount of refinement possible with the tango fundamentals is really quite astonishing. The walk is the obvious example, but as today’s workshop demonstrated, the same is true of the embrace …

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Milonga, Workshop

Three workshops in a day – or not winding down quite yet …

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speed

As I mentioned last time, my plan to tone things down doesn’t kick in quite yet. Today had two afternoon Tango Better workshops with visiting teachers Fausto Carpino & Stephanie Fesneau, followed by an evening Tango Space one on the milonga rhythym.

The first workshop was on Connection and lead, which sounded like it could be relied on to be exploring fundamentals rather then requiring me to learn new steps. The same wasn’t going to be true of Milonguero Turns, but they did make learning the steps very easy …

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Workshop

Musicality workshop #2 of 4: Melody and counter-melody

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musicality-2

Although I’ve vowed to rein-in my tango schedule, there is a slight lag as I complete my booked workshops – including the remaining three musicality workshops. Last week was about switching between dancing the beat and the melody, and this week took things to the next level: switching between the melody and the counter-melody …

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Group class, Milonga

A relaxed milonga, and a plan to tone things down

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relaxed

It could be said that a case might be made for the possibility of formulating the bare bones of an argument somewhat suggestive of the idea that I may have been taking my tango schedule to something of an excess.

Mounting a defence against this accusation would be a little tricky in a week in which I was initially scheduled to have nine group classes, a practica and a milonga …

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Not Tango

Practicing energetic tiny steps with 89,999 other people

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fleetwood-mac

Bridgitta had suggested I needed to find my inner 8 year old to give me ideas about new ways to improvise to the music. I’d assured her I didn’t have one, and that I was born aged 40.

However, it turned out I was wrong: it just needed rather specific circumstances to find him …

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Milonga, Practica, Workshop

Momentum in lead and follow

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Momentum

I signed-up for an interesting-looking workshop. I hadn’t made the connection, but this turned out to be because the teacher, Veronica Toumanova, was the author of Why Tango.

The workshop was called Using momentum to lead and follow, and it started well …

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Progress update

Finding my own dance (a lengthy post)

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Finding my dance

This was originally going to be a post about vocabulary. What I have. Where I’m at with it. What more I need. My next, ah, steps from here.

But, as I started writing, I realised it’s about more than that: it’s about finding my own dance …

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Workshop

Musicality workshop #1 of 4: Rhythm, melody & bridge

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musicality

It’s amazing how far being able to walk to the beat and the phrase will get you in your very early days in tango. I struggled with pretty much everything else, but I could land on the beat, and I could do a weight-change to mark the end of a phrase.

It was this, not any aspect of my technique, which led to experienced dancers giving me that famous ‘you’re going to be a really nice dancer‘ backhanded compliment …

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Group class, Milonga, Socialising

One lesson and four delicious tandas

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delicious tandas

Tuesday was the second improver class of the week, with more calesitas. I really like the balance of the Monday and Tuesday classes: the Monday one is always more complex but introduces me to new things, while the Tuesday one is simpler and focuses more on technique.

Tonight, we both entered and exited the calesita via ochos. You could exit with either a front or back ocho. The back seemed to work best when I had enough momentum, while the front was plan B for when things were slower …

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Group class, Practica

Many calesitas, and two volcadas

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calesita

I enjoyed tonight’s Tango Space classes a lot – in large part, I realised, because half the class are now friends. So, at best, we’re going to help each other figure it out; at worst, we’re going to laugh at our failures. Tonight was a mix of the two!

The beginner lesson was on the calesita. The improver class then introduced a couple of sequences that could follow a calesita: the first was a cross-system walk into a cross with a parada and forward ocho to exit, while the second was a volcada … 

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Private lesson

Figuring out the multiple steps to my one-step cross

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the cross

The cross is one of those movements where I’d never felt I’d found the happy medium. If I lead it the way I think I’ve been taught it, then it only works about 50% of the time. And if I lead it clearly enough to get it up to 100%, I really feel like I’m throwing the follower around.

I’ve tried to find a compromise between the two, but that seemed to be the worst of both worlds: it didn’t always work, and it felt like I’m moving the follower rather than moving my chest and trusting her to move herself. So I wanted to devote today’s private lesson with Federico and Julia to the cross, and in particular the one-step cross …

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Milonga

Dancing with the cool kids at the 3D Marathonga

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marathonga

The 3D Marathonga was a 12-hour milonga running from 4pm Saturday to 4pm Sunday. I had no plans whatsoever to still be there at 4am, but the opportunity to do some dancing early on, have some dinner and return for more later seemed like a good plan.

3D is named after the three original DJs: David, Diego and Daniel. I’m told Diego is no longer involved, so strictly speaking it’s now 2D …

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Group class, Milonga

Back on form!

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back-on-form

This week had looked like a solid plan for refining my ocho technique: a 90-minute private on Sunday, beginner and improver lessons on Monday, and improver lesson on Tuesday.

As things turned out, I had to work on Monday evening, so lost those two lessons. Still, I practiced in front of the mirror and it did seem like my side-steps were to the side, I wasn’t collapsing my inside shoulder to any notable degree, and I was giving a nice (if virtual) hand-push for the pivot. All that remained to be seen was whether this was a solo practice fiction or whether it manifested itself with a partner …

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Private lesson

Official tango dancer rating: 30%

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30 percent

Yesterday, I felt 0% competent; today, I was officially declared 30% competent.

I had a private lesson with Federico and Julia, who run the Monday Tango Space classes, and the focus was on my ocho technique …

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Group class, Practica

My delusions of competence left the building

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left the building

You know I was saying I was enjoying my delusions of competence, and expecting to continue to do so until Sunday? Yeah, not so much …

In a group class today, my delusions left the building. It was doubly frustrating, as it was a class I was really looking forward to: Understanding the Vals: rhythm and phrasing – how to keep it simple but ‘vals’ to it …

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