I’d had an absolutely wonderful following private with her at the summer Feast, but was too slow to grab a slot this time. I asked Fernando to let me know if a slot magically became available, and he said that if there were not enough takers for a scheduled follower technique workshop, then I could have that time.

Given how good her last one had been, this seemed a long-shot, but each time I checked the sign-up sheet my luck was holding, and that happily remained the case …

Though I was tempted to focus on following again, I wanted to work on leading interrupted steps – or check steps, in her terminology. Although I’d done this with Diego long ago, and do lots of it in my solo practice sessions, I still lacked the confidence to do too much of it in milongas. All the more so since switching to dancing in sustained close-embrace, because as wonderful as it feels when everything is working, it feels far less forgiving of any technique failings.

I danced a song with Mabel, and, as she did before, began with an enthusiastic endorsement of the parts that worked. She told me that it was perfectly musical (flattering me by saying I must be a musician), that I had a playful approach, that my embrace was lovely, and there was a great chest connection for really clear communication. The good news out of the way, she highlighted the four things I needed to work on:

1. My points of contact between my foot and the floor
2. The timing of the interruption (or, more precisely, the point at which I started signalling it)
3. The size of my movement
4. My level, depending on what I was going to do afterwards

Points of contact

In the follower technique lesson in the summer she talked about the three points of contact between the foot and the ground: the little toe, the big toe, and the heel. She said that in check steps it was important to establish all three.

Dancing a song with this in mind, the difference it made was incredible! Dramatically so in side steps, but very noticeably so in forward steps too. In both cases, my heel was my missing point of contact.

I realised that this resolved a dilemma. There seem to be two schools of thought with check steps, some teachers saying that you should begin signalling ahead of time that this is not going to be a full step, and others saying, no, you must begin it with the same commitment as if you are going to actually take the step, so that the interruption is a surprise – and that’s what gives it the texture.

But Mabel completely solved this. She said yes, you need to subtly signal ahead of time that the step will not complete, else less experienced followers will already have taken it. However, ensuring all three points of contact give the movement the feeling of commitment right up to the point at which it stops.

Signalling the interruption

So that brought us to the second point. Just as you need to signal to a follower that a step will end by collecting instead of continuing a walk, we also need to signal that a step will not complete. She said some teachers teach you to bend the knees for a check step, but it was better (and clearer) to think of it as having the rib-cage sink. Yes, a knee-bend will follow, but this was like Diego’s idea that a step is a consequence of a transfer of weight in a direction – you think of transferring your axis, not the step itself. Here, Mabel was telling me to think of bringing my rib-cage down, and let the knees take care of themselves.

A lot of the time in tango, I find the key is the right mental image. That image doesn’t have to reflect the physical reality of what I do, but is something which triggers me into instinctively doing the right thing. The ‘esa!’ moments I got from Mabel were when I mentally imagined holding back my torso – even leaning back a touch – while fully committing with my foot. I’m absolutely sure there was no back-lean, but that mental image generated the right impulse.

The size of the movement

The size of the movement was next. A check step is usually going to complete in double-time, so the movement should be half the distance of a full step. Especially for milonga con traspié, aka fast double-time interrupted steps, that’s key to keeping it achievable in the time.

My level

Finally, I hadn’t thought that I was doing two different types of check steps, as I was dancing instinctively, but Mabel pointed out that sometimes I was interrupting the step and bringing the foot back to collect, and sometimes I was interrupting it and then continuing the completion of the step without returning first.

That variety is great, but it’s important to signal to the follower which I’m going to do. My level was again the key to this. If I’m going to interrupt and then complete the step, remain at the same level (rib-cage down) until the step is complete. I found I didn’t need a mental image for that: as soon as she said it, it was obvious.

Putting it into immediate practice!

Mabel, like other skilled teachers, has the miraculous ability to dial down her skills on demand! There were times when she would tell me she was going to be a 2-year dancer, and other times a 1-year dancer, to see whether my lead still worked.

The real test, of course, would be on the dance floor. I still felt somewhat hesitant to inflict my minutes-old check step technique on unsuspecting followers, but plucked up the courage to do so, and … they worked. Beautifully. Every time.

I’m still at the stage of needing to consciously think about the technique issues, but it feels so obviously right that I think a few hours of practice ought to be enough to embed it into muscle memory.