Beginning Argentine tango can be fun: basic building blocks and improvisation II

Learning Argentine tango has to be fun, or students will give up before they even taste the dance. There is a belief that the dance is hard to learn; it takes time to get good, but I can teach the fundamental ideas in an hour or two, and survival skills in about ten hours of class. I've been dancing tango since 1995, and I still am working on making my dance better. My point is: the individual chooses what level of tango they wish to reach; my job as the teacher is make that wish become reality.

I try to make every class have elements of fun, even if we are working hard on technique. There are at least ten minutes of each hour class that deal with pure play, fun and connecting with other people. After all, what do we want for our tango community? I want folks who are fun, who like to play and experiment, who pay attention to their surroundings and the people around them; joyous, kind folk who I want to dance with!

Yes, of course I want to train dancers who are the best in the world, with perfect technique, but maybe not everyone wants to be that dancer; private lessons are the place to do that deep training.

Back to group lessons and teaching beginners to have fun with tango. This is Part Two of this series. You can read Part One before or after this; there will be at least a Part Three, and perhaps more later on.

Pauses and adornos

One of the hardest things for new dancers to do, is to incorporate pauses into the dance. I start work on this the first day of class by providing a REASON to pause: adornos (ornaments)! Until dancers know the music well, there is a tendency to step on every beat, making a very monotone, flat-line kind of dance. Adding adornos in gives the dancers a chance to feel how pauses enrich the dance; it also makes folks feel like they are "dancing"--very important if you want them to head out to the dance floor with confidence.

It takes new followers at least a few seconds to realize that the couple has really paused. Then, there are the seconds devoted to thinking, "Hey! I could adorn here!" After that, time is needed to decide which kind of adorno to do. Only then does the dancer start to actually adorn (the time is shorter for the leader, as that person KNOWS the couple is going to pause).

Unfortunately, most leaders tend to pause for very short amounts of time. By the time the follower figures out there is space/time for adornos, the leader has already begun to move. So, how can beginning followers get practice doing adornos?

On the first day of class, I only show one adorno. That way, the time devoted to choosing an adorno is eliminated. I have everyone stand on one foot and trace their name, in cursive script, on the floor. I encourage them to think that they are leaving a deep mark in sand so that the leg is relaxed and heavy on the floor; this better approximates adorno technique that they will learn later. This also allows all dancers to stop worrying if they are performing the adorno correctly: they ALL know how to write their name (OK, with the hand ;-)). This way, they are able to add an element of personal style to their tango immediately, and a bit of PLAY, which makes everyone smile and keep dancing.

Energy and connection

This is the CENTRAL idea in tango, not a nice thing to add in after you know where your feet are moving. In fact, the steps can emanate from a strong flow of energy--some people never actually learn many steps, but tune into the partner and just dance (this is more successful for following, but it also works for leading).

I build energy exercises into at least every other class, to make sure that students have tools to use to connect with their own body, their partner, and the space in the room.

Self: Axis and breath exercise

Most of my energy exercises are done with the eyes closed, as I find that helps most dancers imagine how energy moves without getting distracted. For people who struggle with balance, don't require them to close their eyes.

Imagine that you have a hollow body, and can breathe up from the floor, through your legs, hips and torso, into your lungs, and then exhale out the top of your head, like a whale spout. Focus on the open cylinder of your body, and fill it with breath. Each exhale, even if you can't feel the energy follow this path, imagine it moving up your body, into your lungs, and out the top of your head.

Now, imagine the path reverse: breathing in the top of your head, expanding your lungs, and exhaling through your feet, as if you are pushing a magnet away from the underside of the floor with your energy (this is an image Oscar Mandagaran taught me, ten years ago).

Feel how the ENERGY of your body, and the BREATH, can be a column straight up from the floor, even though your body has curves and bends and joints. That continuity of energy and breath helps keep you grounded and contributes to your balance while you dance.

Partner: Force field exercise

This exercise usually yields the most immediate results of any of my energy exercises. For many dancers, close embrace tango is scary because "there's not enough room for my feet!" Each person is so aware of their own axis and body, that they forget to connect to the partner with their ENTIRE body.

Now, obviously, it is impossible to touch from head to toe while dancing. However, it is necessary to connect with energy from head to toe; this exercise facilitates that.

Pick your favorite color (i.e., red), or energy source (i.e., electricity), or element (i.e., water, fire) or implement (i.e. laser), and direct it THROUGH your partner, to the opposite wall. I personally like red, laser-beam-like fire; others like blue water, gold bubbles, purple lightening, etc. 

I add this on after the axis exercise. Have dancers face another dancer, close enough for their personal space to touch, but not actually touching. Leave at least 6 inches to a foot between the couple. Close your eyes, unclench your hands, relax your feet and knees (you may need to repeat these instructions during the exercise, as folks tense up sometimes).

Now, every time you exhale, send the [red laser fire] energy THROUGH your partner, to the opposite wall. As the dancers breath, I gradually add additional points to send energy through, until the entire couple is a person-shaped force field directed at and through the partner:

  • toes (add one thing every 2-4 breaths)
  • knees ("Toes, knees.")
  • hips ("Toes, knees, hips." etc.)
  • belly button (to make them laugh/relax)
  • ribcage
  • neck
  • head
  • whole body

Watch the group, and see which points of focus improve dancers' connections, and which make them revert to old habits. It will give you (and hopefully them) insight into what parts of the body need more/less energy to help balance and connection work best. I've found that often "Toes!" helps 3/4 of the followers: instead of trying to escape from the leader's feet, keeping the energy TOWARDS the leader, helps the follower avoid being stepped on, and is key to many followers improving their balance.

When all the body has been engaged, I do a second part of this exercise (sometimes, I stop here, and do the second part the next time we do the exercise). Without opening the eyes, move towards your partner until you are touching. Make an embrace (practice or actual, depending on level of class). Keep doing the force field exercise, but on each exhale, MOVE somewhere in space (one step). Inhale. Do it again. Everyone is moving slow motion, so there are few collisions. Encourage folks to do this with their eyes closed, rather than to cheat: it changes how they use their force field, extending it AROUND the couple like a bumper!

Group: Solo-couple exercise

Getting into the flow of the dance requires the couple to tune into the energy of the entire room. If that doesn't happen, collisions reduce the enjoyment that comes with tuning into the partner. To facilitate that, I teach a game I call solo-couple.

First, all the dancers move around the room IN ANY DIRECTION, swirling around with the music and tuning into the physical space. If someone is in the way, instead of stopping or changing direction, the dancer will simply turn in place until there is a space to move to. Arms and bodies need to stay relaxed in case of collision (I tell students to exhale if hit, so the impact will be reduced). I encourage dancers to actually LOOK at each other :-)

When I yell COUPLE! everyone grabs the nearest other dancer WITHOUT STOPPING, and keeps moving in space, turning in place when there is no room, and otherwise moving to new spaces. When someone stops, or the traffic starts to get congested, I yell SOLO, and we go back to the first part.

Although in real life, tango does not float around in space without pauses, I have found this exercise very helpful for new dancers. The ongoing nature of the rules imposes moving without forethought, thus removing the analytical block a lot of new leaders have, to responding to the music and available space to make a dance. Also, once this exercise works, a dancer learns to tune into the movement through space of the group as a whole, making it easier to navigate comfortably as more complex issues arise (such as a couple in front pausing for a long time).

Naughty Toddler

Naughty Toddler is my favorite game right now (since I thought of it about six years ago!). It offers benefits to both leaders and followers that allow a complete beginner to get out on the dance floor, have fun, and not hurt anyone else ;-)

Just as it is difficult for the average adult to convince a toddler NOT to do something, but easy to divert their attention to another activity, it is easy for a leader to divert the follower's energy into more positive, tango-like activity, rather than to wrestle the follower into submission. Usually, a follower's mistakes come from not dancing perfectly, rather than not paying attention, but the leader experiences those moments as being out of control. What if we use those moments to reassure the leader that, no matter how badly the dance goes, s/he can make a good/safe dance from the chaos?

Not only that, but a lot of

In Naughty Toddler, the person "following" is NOT following. That person can do anything s/he likes, whether it is to do adornos for the whole song, turns, ochos, walking; or even dancing badly on purpose--hanging on the leader, not waiting, being noodly or too tense, etc. I have NEVER met a dancer who didn't come to love this game; it's a good stress-reducer, too, if folks are frustrated about their dance.

The "leader" hangs on for dear life. I suggest holding firmly to the "follower's" shoulders, just in case of malfunction :-)

Traffic

It is of paramount importance to accustom new leaders to the reality of dancing with people in the way. I start this in my beginner's class with the traffic game. For beginners, I usually incorporate this game into solo-couple, or into the Tete exercise (see Part One). I pretend to be the "bad" dancer on the dance floor, staying in one place for too long, backing up into traffic, cutting across the dance floor randomly, etc. (this also helps beginners understand what NOT to do on the dance floor).

Next, I designate half or a third of the class to be "traffic" and obstruct the other dancers. If the room is too big and folks can escape, I have them use only part of the room.

As the space gets smaller or the amount of traffic increases, the dancers get better and better. This happens in every class. I think that the game helps new leaders turn off their brains and just dance as they are forced to make decisions based on other people's decisions/behavior.

Another variation of this game, is to do the same thing, but with a ring of chairs in the middle ("the doughnut") that prevents dancers from floating across the center of the dance space.

New leaders emerge from this exercise with new confidence (as in Naughty Toddler) because they overcame obstacles and did well. New followers learn the importance of keeping their heels near the floor and staying on axis to allow the leader to deal with traffic; and trust the leaders more.

Alignment

This is the hard part of dancing: not the steps, but standing and moving efficiently.  I teach this along with the fun pieces, one or two ideas each class. In more advanced classes, I cover the same material again, with more drills, more explanation, etc. In beginning classes, I try to help dancers understand that this should feel easy/comfortable/less difficult than what they are doing. For many of us, this will feel "strange" but not wrong.

Nitty gritty about body alignment (skip this if you are just going for the meat; read it if you really plan to get good at tango):

  1. The bones of the body hold the body up, with minimal help from the muscles. That leaves the muscles to dance/play.
  2. The connection with the floor (hopefully, your feet!) is grounded, relaxed and balanced. Half the body's weight is over the ball of the foot, and half over the heel. The toes are released, not gripped for balance or fear ;-)
  3. The ankles are relaxed!
  4. The knees are relaxed and slightly flexed. They are used as part of the "spring" from the ground, up through the pelvis, that allows you to move in a balanced way.
  5. The hips are back so that the head of the femur is tucked into the pelvis. This allows the bones to do the work, rather than the ligaments and muscles across the front of the hip joint. In other words, the opposite of the North American slouch. This is the hardest part of basic alignment to learn as a laidback, slouching "yankee" (what norte americanos are called in Buenos Aires by guys like Tete).
  6. The lower back is elongated and soft: the hips are moved back at the hip joint, NOT by curving the lower back.
  7. The whole spine is elongated, so that the solar plexus opens towards the partner, creating an energetic, lively connection.
  8. The head is relaxed, balanced on the spine.

Remember, keep the fun factor up, along with the time for each person to really DANCE, and you will enjoy your classes more, along with your students.

New classes start this week! Argentine tango and more . . .

All classes are six weeks long. All start THIS week, but are drop-in.

Couple Dance 101

Would you like to ease into couple dancing? This class will teach you how to: lead/follow, identify the music, move with a partner, and help you "survive" on the dance floor.  It will give you a taste of several dances--salsa, swing, rumba, waltz, tango, etc.--to help you decide what dance(s) are for you. Come learn to feel comfortable dancing with partners!

  • Tuesdays 7:30-8:30
  • Krakow Cafe, 3990 N. Interstate (they have coffee, food and beer!)
  • No experience needed, no partner necessary
  • $60/6 wks, $12 drop-in (summer special: $100/couple)

Milonga traspie and Tango vals: musicality, flow and improvisation

This class is designed for intermediate and advanced dancers who want to improve their milonga and vals. We will do new patterns each week, but the main focus of the class is to make your dances feel magical to your partners through improved musicality, technique and style.

  • Wednesdays 8:15-9:15 (and then let's walk over to Norse Hall to practice!)
  • Om Studio, 14 NE 10th (between Burnside and Couch)
  • No partner needed
  • $60/6 wks or $12 drop-in
  • Warm up for Oscar Mandagaran and Georgina Vargas' visit the last week in August! They will be teaching vals and milonga classes, so get ready!

Tango Fundamentals: connection, energy and play

This class is designed for beginning students and for continuing students who want to focus on the fundamentals of Argentine tango. We will do new patterns each week, but the main focus of the class is to make your body into a tango-dancing piece of poetry! Breath, posture, balance, axis--attention to the fundamentals brings a connection to the music and to your partner that raise your dance above the ordinary. We'll play tango games to make your dance fun and improvisatory, right from the first hour.

  • Thursdays, 6-7 PM
  • Om Studio, 14 NE 10th (between Burnside and Couch)
  • No partner needed
  • $60/6 wks or $12 drop-in
  • Warm up for Oscar Mandagaran and Georgina Vargas' visit the last week in August! They will be teaching classes for all levels, including the basics; get ready!

Continuing Tango: creating magic through dance

This class is designed for continuing intermediate and advanced intermediate students who want to build a powerful, sensuous and elegant Argentine tango. We will do new patterns each week, but the main focus of the class is to find the magic of YOUR dance. Each week, you'll walk out of class with more confidence and beauty in your tango, ready to spread YOUR magic on the dance floor.

  • Thursdays, 7-8 PM
  • Om Studio, 14 NE 10th (between Burnside and Couch)
  • No partner needed
  • $60/6 wks or $12 drop-in
  • Warm up for Oscar Mandagaran and Georgina Vargas' visit the last week in August! They will be teaching classes on lead and follow technique for intermediate and advanced dancers, so get ready!

Questions?  Call me at 541.914.4812 and I'll see you in class!

Beginning Argentine tango can be fun: basic building blocks and improvisation I

One thing I learned when I studied with Alito Alessi to prepare for Danceability  workshops in Eugene, OR, was to focus on the main idea of a movement. What is the essence of this move? That way, no matter what skill level each dancer reaches in class, the main ideas walk out of the studio with each person. Everyone succeeds and everyone has fun.

In tango, the essence of the dance is walking, pausing, changing direction and turning (with some fancy stuff thrown in), in tune with another body/soul. Tango is merely a particular style of moving while doing those activities. That is what I teach in my beginning tango class, rather than a lot of specific tango steps. If a dancer is deeply interested in tango, there will always be time to learn more steps later on. Over the past fifteen years, I've explored many ways to teach tango.  Now, I have changed my teaching style to make tango less serious, more fun, and more based on improvisation right from the start.

I started this post a few weeks ago, and finally realized that I need to publish it part by part, so that I eventually finish it! Here's the first part of what we did in the beginner's class last session.

Getting started

I do encourage new dancers to tell thepartner which foot to start on by shifting themselves (and their partner) onto one foot, ONCE. I don't think that treading in place is good way to start a dance; instead, shift weight one time, and then walk. That way, the first step of the dance is smooth, traveling line-of-dance (LOD) and relaxed, which paves the way for a more successful dance.

Walking

My main teachers, Oscar Mandagaran and Georgina Vargas, walk like big cats. When you lead Georgina, you can FEEL the purr of the cat, or the engine, or whatever it feels like to you as the leader. When you follow Oscar, it's almost impossible to make a mistake because his walk has so much power and connection that you are drawn into the dance. What they say is, "Walk like a tiger, not a kitty cat!"

Walking in tango is easy: it's like walking in real life. If you walk heel-toe when going forward; toe-heel when backing up; and remember to breath, you have 75% of tango already! A lot of what I do in private lessons focuses around repatterning the student's body to more efficient, balanced locomotion and stance. In group classes, I introduce the elements of posture and movement, but one-on-one is limited by class size.

Right, left, right, left . . .

You have one choice when stepping: the foot that you have free from weight. You have four choices of direction: forward, backward, right and left. 

There are two systems of movement in Argentine tango: parallel and crossed systems. In parallel system, the leader steps on the left when the follower steps on the right. In the crossed system, the leader steps on the right when the follower steps on the right. It is the changing from parallel to crossed system that gives Argentine tango so many choices, because it is the orientation of the leader to the follower that creates the matrix of possible steps in the dance. For some folks, the plethora of available steps is what makes tango a bit overwhelming at first, rather than freeing.

I encourage new dancers to get into the flow of the music and experiment with intention: tell the follower where you want them to step, using your energy/intention. Don't worry a lot about which foot the other person is on at first; just keep breathing and keep moving. With practice, it becomes much easier to figure out which foot the follower is standing on, and to actually LEAD the follower to take a specific step in time/space. For now, think about accuracy of direction in space and let the follower respond to that.

Changing directions

There are a lot of reasons why tango is made up of direction changes. Most of these reasons are called the dancers in your way in front of you, behind you, and next to you ;-)  Seriously, the dance floor is often crowded, and the beauty of the improvisation that is tango, is that you can make a tiny little dance, almost in place on the dance floor, and REALLY dance! Rebounds (traspie steps, rock steps, check steps, whatever you want to call them) and ochos are basic ways to change direction in tango.

Rebounds

A rebound is any step that returns to its original position on the dance floor. This requires that the dancer move to a new space, release the foot into the floor with weight over it, and then move back to the original foot. For example, if the leader steps forward on the left foot, the rebound brings the leader back onto the right foot, ready again to use the left foot. I think of steps like these as: front/side/back rebounds, named by the original direction of the first step. Other people call these traspie steps, check steps, or rock steps.

Yes, this is technically two steps, but I think of it as one motion; I find that helps most beginners get the main idea: making changing directions easy (whether for navigation, fun, or by accident).

The ball analogy

When you bounce a ball, as the ball encounters the floor, it compresses and widens into the floor, in preparation for rebounding up. Just like bouncing a basketball, the energy/weight of the step needs to press through/against the floor before returning: you can't bounce a ball and have it rebound BEFORE it hits the floor! It's the same idea with the body. 

Stopping the body early, or by tightening the muscles, is like trying to get the ball back before it hits the floor. Use the follower's body (and the leader's body, of course) to gauge the best moment to rebound. Make the step work for you. Playing Naughty Toddler (see below) is a good way to get used to how easy it is to make the rebound work FOR you.

Ochos

Ochos are rebounds with a twist. Front ochos consist of the follower doing two consecutive front steps, making a figure eight in front of the leader; or two back steps (much harder). However, the basic idea is to change directions (here, from right to left, or vice versa), and return to the original location.

Note: This is the same outcome as a rock, but happens if the follower is on the "other" foot and has to cross over to go in the requested direction. That way, the follower has two possibilities to respond to the leader, both of which work, and both of which achieve the needed direction change. If the leader knows what foot the follower is on, s/he can lead more successfully, but if not, the follower can "survive" and still look good.

More on ochos in another post.

Turning

There are only two directions to turn: right and left.

There are three kinds of turns. You can turn in place, around the leader. You can turn in place, around the follower (not usually called a turn in tango). You can also turn while traveling down the floor.

Tete's turning exercise

Years ago, I had the opportunity to take weekly classes from Tete in Buenos Aires. He had an exercise where we walked around the room and did half or whole turns while continuing to travel around the room; he would yell, "Turn!" and we would. He encouraged us to practice turning right and left, and returning to facing forward both by continuing to turn the same we started, and by reversing to the other direction. No specific turns were taught: the followers were expected to keep upright and step as needed to maintain balance.

It turns out the there are only two outcomes of such a turn: the couple is walking in parallel system (leader's right, follower's left, for example), or in crossed system (leader's right, follower's right, for example). That means you are exiting either in traveling back ochos, or in parallel walks. Simple--as long as you don't panic about what feet are being used.

As a complete beginner, most people do this fine, but start stumbling when they realize that the follower is on the "other" foot. Quick fix: turn again! You have a 50-50 chance of ending up in parallel system. If you can hang in there with the unstructured state of this exercise, you will see that there is an organic quality to the movement that works, even when both dancers are beginners, and not sure of what is happening. I encourage that tuning into the flow of the dance: that's what makes dancers look like they know what's happening, and eventually, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy! At some point, the leader DOES start to know what foot the follower is on and vice versa.

For those of you who are more structured (or for the purists in tango), this might make you tear your hair out. However, I'm finding that my students hit the dance floor a lot earlier, and with as much success, as folks who are carefully studying steps and learning forms, but who are too scared to go out dancing. Knowing that it's OK to not know 100% of what is going on, can be very freeing.

A lot of my beginners are afraid to go tango dancing because they feel that everyone is watching, and will judge their dance. I send them to Portland's Wednesday night alternative music dance--and go to dance with them--because that is seen as the least judgmental venue for new dancers to explore tango. I myself notice that I am willing to experiment more to alternative music, while traditional music brings out my best technique; of course, I'm used to the "everyone is watching" feeling :-)

The duende of tango

I think of "duende" as the "passion" or "soul" of something.  Merriam-Webster defines it as "the power to attract through personal magnetism and charm."

What is it that attracts people to tango, and then holds them in tango's embrace?

I don't think it's the steps of tango, or the music, although I am hooked on both myself. I think it is tango's demand that both the leader and the follower must interact with another person's energy and spirit, in order to dance well. To dance tango, you need to take an emotional risk and open yourself to another soul.

Beginner's mind

What made me think of this was a joyous, laughing beginner who tore up the floor last night at my lesson.   When I fired up my Naughty Toddler exercise, he flew around the dance floor with a more experienced follower, and led her in moves that I KNOW he does not know. He put his entire heart and soul into that dance, and it was breathtaking. 

Now, tango is not a solo dance, so you need a partner willing to risk all as well. Last night, a quiet, sweet follower turned up the volume, met this beginner's energy, and did the best dance I've ever seen her do in a year of dancing. She looked phenomenal; she took risks I've never seen her take, and it paid off.

It looked FUN! It had passion, it had groove, it had soul; for a moment, the duende of tango peeped out.

Maintaining beginner's mind

All of the tango beginners who showed up quickly got the idea that the shared energy counted more than perfection of steps. As we explored, the more shy dancers started to play, smile, risk more, and began to dance with energy, with spirit, with soul.

More experienced tango dancers were less sure. I saw the skeptical looks exchanged by the "experienced" dancers (something along the lines of "I think she must be nuts" as far as I can read facial expressions). A teacher is telling us that it doesn't matter how well we do the steps?!?!

Some of those dancers did not walk on the dance floor with an open mind. When I left, they were practicing dance moves--without any spark of connection. Well, you can't change anyone's mind except your own :-)

One more experienced dancer took the challenge. Over the course of a few dances, I watched tentatively try out "misbehaving" as a follower. She started to smile. Her dance improved, but it was not easy for her. I honor her for daring to step out of her comfort zone.

My job as a teacher

I used to think that teaching perfection in each step was my primary job as a teacher. After twenty-four years of teaching dance, I no longer believe that. In the past two or three years, I have come to realize that I needed to relearn how to teach, in order to serve my students better.

My job is to release joy, confidence and pleasure into the world; to facilitate personal fulfillment.  For some people, that does mean reaching perfection in a dance style, and I am happy to share my expertise (and my anal retentive nature!).

However, for most of my students, I find that their goal is NOT perfection. They have different goals: find a boy/girlfriend; spend time in our unconnected lives to touch other humans; to express themselves to music; to build balance and flexibility in order to dance into old age; etc. For all of them, they seek those magical moments during a song where two energies meet and two souls touch. Perfect dancing should be perfect connection. Tango entices because it offers an opportunity to reach that perfect connection every dance.

That is what I try to teach. Ask me about the Tiger Growling exercise sometime! Or, come to the Eclectic Dance at Norse Hall on Saturday night (lesson 7:30) and experience it for yourself!

New classes start April 14th at Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center

My new classes start next week.  Here's a preview, and hope to see many of you! If you haven't tried my classes, come the first night and check it out! $60/6 weeks, or $12 drop-in. Address: 5340 N. Interstate Ave.

Tango Fundamentals (6 PM to 7 PM): Beginners and intermediates

This next six weeks, we focus on using steps that rebound ("rock" steps, ochos, etc.) and combining them with traveling steps, to make your dance more confident, safer on the dance floor, and more musical.

New to tango? Great! We'll have you up and running in no time! Come to class and then to to Norse Hall to put it all into your dance right away!

Intermediate dancers: Take some time to review what you know, polish it, and dance better with more people! My small group classes give you a lot of one-on-one time so that you REALLY learn the moves. Warm up in this class and work on your fundamentals, then stay for the next class and learn more material!

Creating the Magic (7 PM to 8 PM): Intermediate and advanced dancers

  • Energize your tango for incredible dance experiences.
  • Learn new, fun moves that WORK on the dance floor.
  • Improve your musicality so more of your vocabulary fits into the dance.
  • Hone your connection skills.
  • Play with the energy of your partner to create new versions of moves.
  • Have more fun with tango.

For me, the difference between an intermediate and advanced dancer is not the number of years dancing tango, but the ability to create an energized, musical, magical experience for the senses. We'll play games and do exercises that make that happen, mixed with new material to incorporate into your new dance!

Tango vals (8 PM to 9 PM): Intermediate and advanced dancers

This six-week session, Robert Hauk and I will teach tango vals instead of milonga. Come work on your vals (a glorious dance!). We'll focus on musicality and making the music help you get in the groove, as well as steps that work well in vals.

Classes start on January 6th! Come dance!

Happy New Year! It's time for class again, time to work off those holiday cookies (for me, at least).

All classes will be held at the Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center, 5340 N Interstate Ave. (Killingsworth MAX station)

$60/six weeks or $12 drop-in

No partner needed, no pre-registration needed; just show up!

Not sure what section you should come to? Drop-in to all of them on Wednesday to make a decision!

Levels and description:

Tango Fundamentals/Beginning Tango

6-7 PM Wednesdays, IFCC

  • Great for diving deeper into the dance, or starting off for your first tango class.
  • This class will focus on correct posture, balance and energy to make tango easy on your body
  • We will learn (or polish) basic tango steps: walks, turns, ochos, the cruzada, etc.
  • Musicality: Make your partner swoon with your amazing use of the music!
  • Navigation: Just in time for Valentango! Learn how to avoid crashes and have fun.
  • FUN: Tango is an improvisational dance. Although there's a lot of technique involved, there is also a lot of room to play, break rules, and mess around!
  • Tango culture and etiquette: how do you ask for a dance? What is a tanda? As a dance anthropologist, I teach not just the dance, but the cultural rules surrounding it.

Intermediate Tango

  • Topics for this session include volcadas, ganchos, and tango vals--and anything YOU need/want/desire.
  • As usual, we focus on deepening body awareness, improving posture, balance, energy and connection with the partner.
  • Musicality: This session, we'll work on vals timing vs. tango timing; really using the music to make the dance rock.
  • Energy: What really makes a dancer intermediate or advanced is their use of energy and the clarity of that intention to the partner. We'll work on building energy levels to make your tango more sexy, powerful, more GRRRROWL in your dance.
  • Improvisation: Tango is not just about set steps. We'll look at connecting steps, finding new patterns, and playing with the dance.
  • Navigation: With Valentango coming up, we'll play some navigational games to make cool moves work in small spaces with less angst.

Milonga Traspie with Robert Hauk and myself

  • Robert Hauk and I are again combining forces to offer a milonga class.
  • New moves! This session, we'll be doing traspie/rebound moves, ocho cortado, saucy stuff I've learned in Bs As, mixed with Robert's horde of repertoire.
  • Navigation: Learn to tailor the size of your steps to the room you have, not cut down your vocabulary just because it's crowded on the dance floor.
  • Come get your milonga on for Valentango!

Elegant walking in tango

My teachers, Oscar Mandagaran and Georgina Vargas, have a sinuous, elegant, sexy walk. They call it "walking like a porteno" but I call it "walking like Oscar" to avoid all the arguments about how portenos do and do not walk. In Buenos Aires, everyone agrees that there are many different ways to do tango, but here in Portland, we seem to spend a lot of time arguing about the one way to do something . . . 

In Tango Fundamentals, we've been working on this walk a lot, but many questions have come up that I think are more easily answered here.

1. How many "tracks" do I use for the "porteno" walk?

Don't you hate the "it depends" answer? In this case, there are two tracks for dancing, but the leader is on one, and the follower on the other. Compared to the "two track" walk, the leader is actually slightly offset compared to the follower, but not enough to be leading to the cross. As each person walks in a straight line, each person steps in front of him- or her-self.

This walk works best in a slight V embrace, close embrace, but not square to the partner.

2. Why is this better than two-track walking?

This walk is simply more elegant than what I see on the dance floor most of the time. Two-track walking is not wrong, but it doesn't look as nice. I'm not going to walk up to you on the dance floor and ask why you aren't doing this ;-) Your walk is a personal choice; mine is to do the walk this way when possible.

There are as many ways to walk in tango as tango dancers. The reason I teach the version of tango that I teach, is that this style uses the body efficiently, and reduces injuries, as well as allowing me to dance for hours with less fatigue and foot pain.

3. But what if the person I'm dancing with tells me I'm not walking right?

What I am teaching you is not what "everyone" is doing in the tango community. You will find people who think that different=wrong. You have two alternatives: improve your dance, or conform to local habits of dance, whether or not they are good dance choices. I like to think that, in a few years, we will all be dancing better and more fluidly, and many more people will be doing this style of walking. I've noticed that all of you who are in my classes look more elegant and balanced. I get a lot more comments about my good dancing since I've switched to this style.

By the way, when I am offered unsolicited advice on the dance floor, I respectfully suggest that I will ask for feedback when I want it.

4. What is all this about contra-body motion?

Part of walking like a porteno is using natural body locomotion. When you walk, your body uses a slight rotation around the spine to help shift the weight of the body from leg to leg. You can see this if you walk and pay attention to how your arms swing gently as you walk. When your right foot is going to step forward, your body rotates slightly to the right BEFORE you step; when you step with your left, your body rotates to the left first. When you step backwards, your body twists away from the free leg.

Using natural contrabody motion also allows you to stay connected to your partner. If the leader is stepping forward with the left, s/he rotates counter-clockwise before stepping. The follower steps back on the right, also rotates counter-clockwise to the left. That means that both people move together, allowing both more freedom of movement AND more connection in your walk.

5. Why do I have to move my hips to make this walk work?

When you walk down the street, your hip releases slightly to help you shift weight from one foot to the other. The hip shift moves your weight directly above your support foot without grabbing with the muscles that surround the hip--more mobility, less work! This is an active, lifting movement, not like doing the "bus stop." This is one key part of having a lithe, sexy tango walk.

To find the right amount of pelvic movement, stand in front of a mirror. Locate the inside edge of your hip joint with your fingers, and move your pelvis until that point is over the center of your foot. Each person will have a different amount of movement here, as a woman with wide hips will move differently than a woman with narrow hips or a man. Instead of copying the look of your favorite dancer, take time to figure out what is right for your body.

6. Why did you tell me to stick out my butt?

Many people stand with their pelvis tilted forward, but the femoral joint (hip joint) works better if the pelvis shifts back further. This settles the femur into the hip joint and helps use your bone alignment for balance so that you use

7. How can I find out more about my body and how it moves?

There is an excellent reference book, designed for the average person, that shows the bones and muscles of the body, as well as explaining what motions the body can perform at each joint. I HIGHLY recommend Anatomy of Movement by Blandine Calais-Germain (ISBN 0-939616-17-3 for paperback). It has great pictures and lots of information without being overwhelming.

Basic tango pointers: notes from my Tango Fundamentals class

This session of Tango Fundamentals, we've been working on building balance, connection and energy with our partners.  We've also worked on starting and exiting turns in different ways, as well as spiffing up our traveling back ochos. Here's what we've covered in the first three weeks of class:

Balance, connection and energy

  1. Energy flow drill: This drill teaches you to be aware of the energy and motion of everyone dancing in the room. As a good leader, you must know this in order to successfully and safely lead the follower around the dance floor. As a follower, being aware of this helps you be a responsible dancer (i.e. limiting your boleo height, restraining big adornos in a crowd, etc.). In the energy flow drill, we all move through the available space (in any direction), and try to remain constantly in motion. If someone is in the way, we turn, rather than pausing. If there is space somewhere else in the room, we go where there is space. In "real life" tango situations, there are cultural rules that prevent us from having this much freedom: we dance counter-clockwise in the room; we don't pass the couple in front of us; we maintain "lanes" of movement. However, by remaining aware of the space around us, and how the entire room of people is moving, we can plan ahead better and avoid accidents.
  2. Solo-couple drill: This game teaches you to get connected to your partner quickly. Once the energy flow of the room is working, we move through the space in couples. In Solo-Couple, the teacher calls "Solo!" and everyone does the energy flow drill. When the teacher calls "Couple!" everyone grabs the nearest dancer, and WITHOUT STOPPING, continues to dance around the room. Again, in "real life" tango, there is time to cabeceo, approach the dance floor, take your space, embrace your partner, and then start dancing. However, in festival situations, there is no space to spend time on all of this, and you need to get on the floor, connect, and start dancing within about 30 seconds if you don't want to be run over! This drill gets the dancers to tune in to their surroundings in order to successfully survive joining a tanda in full swing.
  3. Energy bunnies and energy vampires: This game helps you maintain your energy on the dance floor throughout the evening. I don't remember which of my students at the University of Oregon named this game/drill, but I've kept the names because everyone laughs when we do this! Obviously, this is an energy game: take energy from the people around you if you are tired, or give energy to the room/your partner if you are energized. On each dance floor, there is a level of energy present. Sometimes, the room's energy gives the dancers energy; sometimes not. In this game, we move through space in any direction, and make sound effects/motions to send energy to everyone we pass. Then, we move around, taking energy away (little sucking noises and vampire faces seem to be the favorites). I have found that everyone in the room has a higher energy level after this game, and use it in class to wake folks up; on the dance floor, I use this energy-building skill to be able to keep dancing, hour after hour (I don't make the noises and faces then!).
  4. Naughty Toddler: This game helps the follower give energy to the leader, and teaches the leader to use the energy as a way to improvise on the dance floor. Just as it is easier to divert a toddler than to stop unwanted behavior, it is easier to redirect a follower than to wrestle with them. The follower does not follow in this game: s/he does whatever moves come to mind, tango or non-tango. The leader holds on with both hands, and tries to use the follower's energy to get around the dance floor without collisions. As the leader figures out how to steer the "toddler" this game becomes "my chi is bigger than your chi" as the leader reads the energy and PREVENTS the "toddler" from misbehaving by leading clearly with the energy present in the dance: by the end of the game, the leader should feel mostly in control AND the follower should have felt led, but not wrestled.
  5. Posture work: floor, sitting, standing. We start lying on the floor, feet flat on floor and knees up (in skirts, face a non-mirrored wall). Feel how relaxed your spine and hips are! Feel how your spinal alignment works when not fighting gravity. Now, sit up (cross-legged on floor, or in a chair if you lack flexibility). Try to recreate the same alignment as on the ground. Third, stand up and again recreate the floor alignment, adding the complexity of adjusting your pelvis for standing. The more you do these three steps, the more your alignment will remain relaxed AND in position when you move in tango.
  6. Breath work: axis and force field. I do the axis drill after completing the postural work. Standing in place, alone, on axis, close your eyes. Breathe and imagine the air can come up from below the floor, up through your body, to your lungs. When you exhale, send the breath back down through your feet, as if you are pushing a magnet away beneath the floor. After a few breaths, change the exhale to go up through the top of your head and up to the ceiling. Third, exhale and inhale with the same amount of energy and breath coming in from the feet and head; and exhaling 50-50 as well. In the force field drill, face partner close enough to be in their personal space, but not touching. Do the axis drill, but when you exhale, also send energy/light/electricty/your favorite color/etc. straight out your toes, through your partner, and to the wall beyond them. After a few breaths, expand that to a rectangle of energy from the toes and knees; expand to the hips; add up to the belly button; now up to the ribcage; next, include the shoulder blades and collar bones; finally, the entire body sends a rectangular force field through the partner, to the wall beyond. When this is in place, move in to an embrace and dance with your partner, eyes closed. On each exhale, move. On each inhale, pause. Keep the force field working.
  7. Energy work: directing movement from the solar plexus. We moved across the floor, met a partner, and kept sending our energy across the room, slightly up and through the partner (there were interesting interpretations of this, but we'll leave that for later ;-)). In order for you to NEVER step on your partner's feet, you need to send your energy forward into their body. The solar plexus should never point down, or your partner's feet will suddenly be in your way. Followers: remember to send the energy TOWARDS the leader, rather than "escaping" away; it will save your toes!

Steps

Turns: Last session, we concentrated on turning after reaching the cross (la cruzada).  This time, we expanded our ways of getting into a turn.

  • right (clockwise, CW) after side step (follower's first step of the turn is a front or back cross step with the right foot)
  • left (counter-clockwise, CCW) after side step (follower's first step of the turn is a front or back cross step with the left foot)
  • right (CW) after rock step (follower's first step of the turn is a front cross step with the right, across the leader's body)
  • left (CCW) after rock step (follower's first step is a front cross step with the left, across the leader's body)
  • rock step and left (CCW) turn (follower's first step is an open step around the leader with the right foot)--this is NOT the same as starting the turn FROM the rock step. Here, the leader leads a rock step so that the follower's RIGHT foot is free; thus the turn starts with an open step for the follower.
  • at the cross (@X), right (CW) or left (CCW) turn (follower's first step is either a front cross or an open step, with the right foot.

Traveling back ochos: There are many ways to do this step.  I advocate a smooth, elegant, sexy version that allows the follower to pivot slightly and adjust in the hips, while the leader basically walks forward.

  • Get into crossed system: I prefer stepping forward-together-forward, rather than side-together-forward here. I feel that the follower gets a clearer signal if the first step is line-of-dance (LOD), rather than sideways.
  • Leader walks in a SLIGHTLY wider stance, but keeping the V of the feet facing LOD and the hips facing LOD. This is not a time to start waddling ;-)
  • The leader's chest moves in a natural, cross-body motion in order to walk. No more motion is needed here. If you tend to be rigid in your torso, you may have to work on this rotation around your spine in order to make your walk more elegant and easier on your body.
  • The follower's body also uses cross-body motion in order to walk backwards. Because you are now in crossed system, the follower's free leg NATURALLY crosses behind the other leg. The hips adjust and pivots slightly, as do the feet, to make this look pretty and to remove stress on the spine. Take care not to overturn in this move (in open embrace, a bit more rotation can be used for a more zig-zag style of ocho, but I personally prefer this one.
  • To exit, walk to the cross in crossed system, resolving at the cross. Alternatively, you can exit by turning CW or CCW into a turn. I don't usually lead back into parallel walks to exit because it isn't very elegant. Also, when do you ever have space to walk traveling back ochos and then keep walking? :-)

This week, we'll be adding walking to the outside track, in parallel and crossed systems, and playing with the "forgotten" side of tango.  See you in class!

"Good" vs. "bad": cultural baggage about posture and learning to dance

Recently, I have had many discussions with students about how hard it is to move in a new way. They feel embarrassed, awkward, uncomfortable, and sometimes even dizzy as they try to adjust posturally to salsa and tango. Although a new movement may not feel natural, why do some people have such a strong reaction to new ways of standing, walking and dancing?

We are taught by our culture and our families that there are "good" ways to move and "bad" ways to move. "Good" movement fits with our ideals of how men, women and children should be. "Bad" movements are those that are done by "other" people, or people who don't fit into that particular cultural ideal.

In the United States, there are many different cultural groups.  Many of my students are white adults who grew up in the United States. In this case, I am mostly discussing their struggles against learned "good" cultural behavior, in order to learn salsa and tango, and to find a more aligned body along the way. If the new movement resembles movement that the dancer learned was inappropriate, then not only does the body fight to learn, but the mind must move past old judgments about what movement is "good" or "bad".

What have we been taught?

  • "Good": "Stand up straight!" This means pull our shoulders back, our stomachs in, our hips under and raise our chin; the military look.
  • "Bad": Relaxing the spine so that the natural curves work, the shoulders release, the hips relax back, and the chin lowers. 

Why is this bad? Because it looks suspiciously like "lazy"; the Puritans would turn in their graves! North Americans have a cultural ideal of looking busy, trying hard, and putting effort into what is done. Relaxing feels and looks too easy to be right ;-)

Another example:

  • "Good": "Be a lady!" This means tuck the hips under to hide the buttocks, release the shoulders forward to make sure you aren't flaunting your breasts, and hold your hips in a straight position so you don't call attention to your sexual/sensual body; walking like a "loose" woman. I find this is true more for the 45+ women than the younger women, but many young women from conservative families still have this issue.
  • "Bad": Using your hips the way they were created, with side-to-side swing, makes you look like a "bad" girl, encouraging male attention. Letting your hips move back into a more relaxed position gives your body sway and your butt sticks out a bit. Almost all of my female students tell me that they feel as if their butt is REALLY too far out behind them, while I see their hips still tucked forward! Lifting at the solar plexus makes it impossible to hunch over and hide your chest: if you are well-endowed, then so be it! That really makes some women quake.  An entire sector of N. America has learned to hide their bodies, rather than to enjoy their bodies, and I am pushing all of their unconscious buttons while trying to remedy poor alignment issues.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, but I think it illustrates how hard a person has to fight to learn new movement that they have been taught is culturally inappropriate. Is it culturally inappropriate to dance salsa and tango? Is it wrong to go against cultural information you learned as a child or young adult? Why do we have certain actions that are culturally accepted or condemned?

I would like to hear your comments about what you find difficult/awkward/uncomfortable about learning tango and salsa and other couple dances. I'll write more as I receive your comments.

Fall classes with Elizabeth Wartluft

All new classes start the week of September 15th.

Beginner/Advanced Beginner Argentine Tango

Thursdays, 7:15 PM
Riverside Performing Arts, 1108 Main St., Vancouver, WA
$72/6 weeks, $60 students, seniors and continuing students

This class will cover: walking, basic salidas, the cruzada, basic turns and front ochos; musicality, navigation, connection, energy, and the embrace. For advanced beginners, I will provide more complex variations and more focus on musicality and connection. As always, my focus is balance, alignment, efficiency of movement, to create an elegant, sensual and playful tango.

Intermediate Argentine Tango

Wednesdays, 8 PM
Dancing Soul, 4315 NE Garfield Ave., Portland, OR (or nearby: I'm in negotiation for a larger space)
$72/6 weeks, $60 students, seniors and continuing students

I design this class to be taken a minimum of three times before advancing to the next level, so I cover different topics each six weeks. We learn the technique from the ground up for paradas, sacadas, ganchos, adornos, quebradas, calesitas, planeos, etc. Continuing from my beginning classes, we will learn harder variations of turns and ochos, combining them with the new repertoire. As always, my focus is balance, alignment, efficiency of movement, to create an elegant, sensual and playful tango.

If you are unsure as to whether you belong in intermediate or advanced, please contact me for an evaluation.

Advanced Argentine Tango

Tuesdays, 7 PM
Dancing Soul, 4315 NE Garfield Ave., Portland, OR (or nearby: I'm in negotiation for a larger space)
$72/6 weeks, $60 students, seniors and continuing students

For those of you who knew my classes in Eugene, this is my Tango 3 class. Pre-requisite: you should already know the technique for the steps listed above in Intermediate class, and be ready to pull out the BIG guns: overturned ganchos, colgadas, volcadas, boleo combinations, shared axis turns, crossed system grapevines, leg wraps, etc. (one of my Eugene students called it "crazy sh**"). The focus will be integration: using these steps on the social dance floor safely and elegantly. Every week, you'll leave class with new material for your dance.

If you sign up with a partner, you may stay with that partner for the class, but you will learn more quickly if you switch around. If you come to the class without a partner, I expect that you will be flexible about dancing with any other member of the class, in order to best learn the material.

Milonga with Robert Hauk and Elizabeth

Wednesdays, 7 PM
Dancing Sould, 4315 NE Garfield Ave., Portland, OR (or nearby: I'm in negotiation for a larger space)
$72/6 weeks

Robert and I will be teaching a milonga class together. We're really excited about it! At this time, the class is full, but we will be able to open it up if we get a larger space, so let me know if you want to be added to the waitlist.

Beginning Salsa

Thursdays, 8:15 PM
Riverside Performing Arts, 1108 Main St., Vancouver, WA
$72/6 weeks, $60/students and seniors

I've been teaching salsa since 1993, but haven't had a chance to teach it in the Portland area yet.  By the end of the six weeks, you'll have enough material to go out and tackle the dance floor! Lead/follow technique, basic moves and improvisational extras will all be covered. Tango folk: come learn a dance that has that same improvisational possibility, but with hips and saucy music!

Private lessons: $50/hr or $200/5 hours

I strongly suggest combining private and group lessons for optimal dance learning. A group setting allows you to practice your technique and meet other dancers socially. A private lesson focuses on technique on a deeper level than a group class allows. Even one private lesson every few months will help your technique. For the serious student, a weekly private lesson plus group classes and/or time on the dance floor, is the most efficient way to learn tango well. If private lessons are not in your budget, consider finding someone to share lessons to split the cost, or contact me re: barter.

Postural information for dancing Argentine Tango

This is some of the work we've been doing in my Tango Fundamentals class this summer. We are six weeks into this class, with four more to go. I usuallywait and post the review as a page, but I'm going to post this much on my blog so that you all read it before coming to class this week ;-)  I'm working on the steps we've done, and will post that ASAP, with updates until the end of classes.

Postural information

Hips

The hips needs to be positioned correctly both from front to back, and side to side. From front to back, the hips have to be aligned in such a way as to take stress off the lower back, while tilting slightly back. This alignment really comes from using the psoas and other core abdominal muscles (I think this will take another blog entry, so hang onto that thought for the moment) to lift and stretch the entire back, so that each vertebra can rotate slightly, with ease.

The way that Georgina got my back into the right position (the first time) was to lift me from my rib cage, until my lower back relaxed, but I had a very lifted, stretched feeling in my abs. Once you find this position, it doesn't vary, but remains uniform throughout the dance.

The side-to-side motion of the hips changes with each step, in the shape of a pendulum. The pendulum motion aids in changing weight and staying on balance. The point of the hip motion is to position the hip joint above the foot arch to maintain balance more easily. It is NOT a hula motion and it is NOT Cuban motion. It helps the dancer to use ALL joints for movement, from the neck to the foot, rather than the knees.

The same motion (both forward/back and side/side) is used by men and women, but it looks different because the pelvic bones are shaped differently. Similarly, a woman with wide hips and a woman with narrow hips will do the same motion, but it will look VERY different. The point is that there is not a correct LOOK, but a correct ALIGNMENT: don't try to make it visually match another dancer whose body is not similar to yours.


Knees

Keep both of them slightly flexed. This aids in balancing the body. Try not to put extra stress on your knees and quadriceps. Keep your knees as together as possible, but focus on keeping the ENERGY in between the knees, whether you can touch them together or not. If you are feeling a lot of work going on in your quads, adjust your hips further back. I've noticed at the milongas that a lot of people dance while crouching a little bit. Tango is not tennis ;-) and we need elegance as well as balance. Remember to stretch up the entire length of your body WHILE keeping the joints released.


Feet

Your feet stay in a V, with the heels together all the time. The "free" foot keeps contact with the floor for energy and balance. In heels, the ankles touch each other, big toe down on the floor. Guys, think about your big toe maintaining connection with the floor in the same way (it will look different because of the heel height). I think of this as a "kick-stand" that provides extra balance. 

Oscar and Georgina say 1% of the weight is on the "free" foot.  I'd agree with that. The weight on the foot is balanced, 1/2 on the ball, 1/2 on the heel. The weight is also balanced down the center line of the foot, although the ankle energy focus is towards the other foot. If you tend to roll in, think about connecting with the outside edge of your foot. If you tend to roll out, like me, focus your attention in, towards the big toe.

Forward steps are ALWAYS heel toe (do you walk down the street toe heel?). Side steps: the heel usually hits right before the ball of the foot, but it depends on the step. Backwards, the foot hits toe heel. If you relax your ankle right before you step, the correct, "normal" anatomically efficient movement will usually happen in all directions.

Solar plexus

Keep your solar plexus lifted all the time. It does NOT tip up and down; it remains the same during the dance. When I lead, I aim my solar plexus a tiny bit above straight ahead. If I tilt my solar plexus down, the follower's feet suddenly get in my way, because I have directed their energy down, rather than out.

The energy of the dancer connects the partners at the solar plexus, even when dancing in styles where the solar plexus is not always touching. I prefer a small V embrace, where the dancers are not facing each other squarely. I still keep my energy towards my leader. When I dance open embrace, I follow all of these postural rules; the dance doesn't change when it opens up unless we get sloppy and sacrifice posture and connection for (poorly-executed) fancy steps.

Contrabody position

Contrabody position, where the solar plexus and hips rotate slightly away from each other, is not a big movement. It is small but occurs in every movement, just as it occurs in your normal walk (if it doesn't occur in your normal walk, we need to work on your non-tango locomotion for improved efficiency off the dance floor ;-) We worked more on this in the intermediate class (for those of you taking both levels), so I'll focus more on this in another entry.

Reminder: next session of classes will begin in early September, both in Portland and Vancouver, WA. If you'd like to sign up for a few private lessons between sessions, now is the time to do that. If you have never studied with me before, I am offering a "first class special" of $10 off my regular rate for one private lesson; as always, if you buy four at a time, you get a fifth one free!

A new tanguera experiences Oscar & Georgina--and you can, too!

Oscar Mandagaran and Georgina Vargas are not just for the advanced tango dancer.

After only a few months of tango, one of my students and friends in Portland, Sarah, told me she was headed for Buenos Aires. "You MUST study with Oscar and Georgina!" I told her, and connected her with them. Here's some email she sent me this spring from Bs As:

Email #1: I'm studying with Oscar and Georgina!!!!!!!!!!!! (I think her original version had more exclamation points than that, but I can't find the email to cut and paste)

Email #2: After that first email, I asked her to comment on studying with Oscar & Georgina:

"I´m in BA right now studying with Oscar and Georgina three times a week. Oscar and Georgina are exceptional, and if I could I would insist that anyone learning Tango must learn from them. They exude the essence of tango in their own bodies and dance (it really takes your breath away to see them), but are the most delightful and enthusiastic teachers that I have met.  I am a beginner, but they not only have patience and give me excellent instruction, but they genuinely seem to care about me. In teaching they combine the ability to give highly skillful and timely instruction, demand a high level of participation ("no holidays!", as Oscar loves to say while smiling at the beginning of class), while somehow making you feel like what you are doing is important and good. And to anyone who is intimidated by how completely mouthwatering and delightful and passionate their own dance is to look at, you might take comfort in knowing that I was at a Milonga last night with them where they dance among all the other Milongueras to refuel and be at home. I highly recommend grabbing the opportunity to study with them in Eugene or Portland, with the only reservation being that I will have to share them with you!"

Email #3: Sarah emailed me to say that she had more to say:

 
"Georgina and Oscar developed a way to dance tango that creates a pain free, organic, and natural feeling dance. Since I didn´t realize that about their teaching method before I came to Buenos Aires, this was not why I chose to study with them.  So, it came as a surprise to me to notice over the last three weeks that the pain in my feet and my low back have slowly disappeared.  Because I´ve back pain for years I had no expectations of relief from it.  But I find that I feel more freedom in my body, and well as I said...very suprisingly.. no pain at all when I dance."

Walking your tango: Irene Dowd's article about "Standing on Two Legs"

Walking seems like any easy thing to do. After all, we learned to do it as tiny children. For many people learning to dance, however, walking turns out to be more difficult than learning new steps. Why is this?

Many of us use our bodies in ways that are inefficient. When walking inefficiently, we put more stress on our bodies than we need to. If more stress is placed on the body, it wears out sooner. Learning to move efficiently enables us to be active longer in life and to enjoy less chronic pain as we age.

With so much energy being expended to maintain balance and posture,less energy and focus is available to deal with the dance itself. Therefore, learning to walk efficiently makes learning to tango much easier. Irene Dowd's article, "Standing on Two Legs," explains how the foot, leg and pelvis are constructed, and provides several excellent images that might help tango dancers move with more energy and less stress.

The foot

The foot is the base of the body, connecting with the earth. In order to stand and walk efficiently, we have to use the foot correctly. Dowd says that

The foot itself is composed of lengthwise and crosswise arches so that each foot is somewhat like a dome with a triangular base. Ideally, when we are standing still, the weight of the leg transfers from the ankle equally forward and back, one half of the weight going through the heel and one half going through the ball of the foot. (p. 30 in Taking Root to Fly)

I further spread that awareness of weight and balance to the four corners of the foot: ball of the big toe; ball of the pinky toe; inside edge of the heel; and the outside edge of the heel.

Walking in space

Using the foot correctly makes it easier to move through space with less effort. That means that more effort can be applied to balance, breath, musicality, the partner, etc.

When we are moving through space, this arch functions as a powerful spring to thrust us forward from one foot to the other through the action of a multitude of muscles on the sole of the foot and back of the leg. When we put the foot back down again, all these muscles relax as long as our foot is pointing straight ahead so that our weight is again supported by the fundamental arch . . . (p. 30)

Now, this seems to not jive with the idea of being slightly turned out in tango. I have pondered this for some time, and I feel that the main point is that the foot must be in a natural position. Most of the dancers that I teach naturally have some degree of turn-out. I believe that what Dowd means by straight (and I have not asked her personally, so apologies Ms. Dowd if I have mis-read!) is your natural turn-out. 

Other joints: ankle, knee and hip

Dowd stresses that  ". . . the aim to keep in mind is allowing the joints to come easily into line with one another."

The joints of the foot and leg need to line up so that the bones of the body support balance, rather than the muscles. Luckily for us humans, our leg bones are constructed in a way that allows these joints to stack up under/over each other easily. That way, muscles aid in movement, but balance is (mostly) finding the right way to stack bones on bones.

The ankle are relatively stable in structure. It is a hinge joint (forward backward movement, no rotation) and has a lot of strong ligaments holding it together. Rotation near the ankle happens within the foot. 

The knee is less stable, but still built to hold you up. It is a hinge joint, like the ankle, but has some rotation (too much, and you rip things, eek). If you hold the knee out of alignment in your normal walk and standing motion, you need to devote a lot of muscle and brain focus to staying balanced.

The femoral (hip) joint is a ball and socket joint, which means that all sorts of cool movement is possible here. Because the femur tilts out from the hip joint and then back towards the knee, the knee lines up directly with the femoral joint (and the ankle). In order to walk efficiently, the pelvis needs to be in an optimal position in order to balance over your feet correctly.

Images to help proper alignment occur

I think of my legs as part of a huge, thick spring coming up from the ground, up my leg bones and up to my center, with each piece of my legs having the same amount of even flex. Of course, this is not physically possible, but it prevents me from using my knees as my balance point, and spreads that strain from my ankles and feet up to my pelvis (if you have any joint injuries, imagine the other joints picking up the slack to protect your body!).

Here are some images that Dowd uses to help you position your body more efficiently:

  • Think of your sacrum (center back of your pelvis that is also the lower end of your spine) as very heavily sinking down towards your heels but do not contract your buttock or abdominal muscles to do this, let gravity do all the work while you simple observe in your mind's eye.
  • Imagine a line of energy thrusting up from the ground through the center of your foot . . . straight up to the center of your femoral joint (hip joint).
  • Think of the centers of your foot, ankle, knee and femoral joint as open gateways for the energy to shoot through from the ground source. This line of energy jets up like a fountain of water from the ground to your pelvis to support you upright and then it streams down from your buttock and all around you like a waterfall to flow out your feels and out each toe in a spreading pool. Remember that your bones provide the upward thrust against the pull of gravity, not your muscles.
  • Let your feet remember that they are always a living connection with the earth. Allow each leg its full capacity to be alternately stable as a column and fluid as water.

Learning takes time

For each one of you who has said to me, "But it's not working!" I want to reiterate that tango (and learning to walk efficiently) is a process that your body needs to learn. It takes time for the neural pathways of the new, efficient movement to take precedence over habitual movement pathways. Muscles have to learn to relax (or work harder) to balance in a new way. Motor memory needs time to function easily, memorizing the new pattern or shape your body will use. Dowd says this happens after" . . . much movement practice with a new alignment pattern. . . . In the meantime you must actively concentrate on performing every-day basic movement patterns with your joints in line."

OK, go out there, and WALK!

Note: for those of you who would like to read Irene Dowd in all her glory, the book is Taking Root to Fly, ISBN #0-937645-02-8. Eventually, I will touch on all the articles in this book (perhaps not the one of the anatomy of the eye; you can read that one for yourself!). Irene Dowd has performed modern dance, choreographed, as well as taught neuro-muscular training and dance at Juilliard and several other impressive places, and studied at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical School.

Spirals in the body for turn technique

Last week, we worked on leading right turns, left turns and front ochos after walking to the cross. For both the leader and the follower, these turns and ochos are relatively simple IF the spirals around the body's axis are used efficiently.

Leading turns

Leaders tend to muscle through turns and ochos in an effort to lead the follower "clearly". This often ends in the leader (and follower) being off-balance. Yes, your windup for the turn does INDICATE to the follower what you want, but it does not LEAD. To me, this is like turning on your turn signal at the "one-mile-to-the-exit" sign on the highway, but then not turning the steering wheel at the actual exit. The follower has to try to figure out when and how to execute the turn, rather than follow your lead.

So how do you lead efficiently? (I always prefer a clear but subtle lead to being driven like a Mac truck). Spirals! When I lead a turn, I ground my hips. That is, I try to keep them pointing the same direction as the V of my feet. I rotate my torso more freely, as I am more on balance this way. I focus on my solar plexus vs. my hips, making a SMALL spiral in my body, on axis. Only after I establish this spiral do I allow my feet and hips to also turn. I keep this spiral until I want to end the turn, at which point I catch up with my hips and V of my feet.

Trouble-shooting for your turns:

  • If your partner seems to pause at each step of the turn, or simply moves step together step instead of doing the grapevine step around you, you are probably NOT using a spiral. Make sure that you are continuing the spiral once you have established it. If that still doesn't work, focus on sending energy out your solar plexus and rotating that with a constant speed (at least for now) until you want the turn to end. BREATHE.
  • If you constantly get stuck about two steps into the turn, make sure you take your feet along with you sooner. A lot of folks use their extreme rotation to start a turn and then get stuck. I use most of my rotation, and start rotating in place before I feel torque on my knees or ankles. You will feel like you are making less of a spiral, but your follower will not: they are following the spiral of your torso.
  • If your partner seems to always be ahead of your position, perhaps you are pulling with your embrace. When I studied with Mingo Pugliese in Buenos Aires, he said, "Imagine your chest and your shoulders and your arms are all carved out of the same piece of wood." When you spiral, your elbows and hands don't "help" your partner in the turn. Your chest gives that information, which is relayed by the embrace.
  • If your partner seems to always be behind your position, perhaps you are clamping down too hard on your embrace. Focus on letting the energy and breath of the movement lead, aided by the body. I think that intention (although very woo-woo) is what really moves the follower; the physical lead only helps that.
  • If those suggestions don't fix the problem, see below for follower issues :-). To lead and follow a good turn takes a long time, so be patient with each other!

Following turns

First, I want to emphasize the importance of practicing your turns. The technique you learn here, spiraling your body from your solar plexus to the tips of your toes, applies to all those cool moves you beg me to teach you: boleos, ganchos, etc. Perfect your turns, and leaders will line up to dance with you!

Second, I want to remind you that turn practice is not something you will perfect and move beyond. At least, I haven't. I still work on my turn technique after thirteen years of tango, and it gets better every year. If you are a goal-oriented person, this may sound frustrating. You can set yourself mini-goals to achieve along the way (i.e., a fabulous back cross; a lovely adorno at the end of a turn; etc.).

Third, you can create a beautiful turn regardless of the level of your leader. Although it is not your job to make your leader's dance better, executing gorgeous turns, on balance, with energy, will make both partners' technique look better. Yes, a poor leader can make it harder to turn well, but that is no excuse! I don't "dumb down" my follower technique to follow a beginner or a poor lead: I try to make it the best I can to make the dance feel good for both of us.

OK, now that I've got that off my chest, on to the technique :-) The spiral for the follower differs from the lead spiral. The leader uses grounded feet and hips to stabilize so that the torso can be mobile and rotate. For the follower, the upper torso and solar plexus connect with the leader (whether physically or via breath and energy). That provides the stability to let the hips, legs and feet create the body spiral. I spiral around my own axis in a turn, not around my leader (if you are a tango leaner, there is an aspect of spiral around the leader's axis as well, but we'll leave that for the moment).

I use my body efficiently to get as much spiral as I can. A back cross in a turn is much more than a 180°pivot. When I turn, I use my maximum spiral to make a good, solid back cross in the turn. When my spiral is centered around my own axis, it is easier to create even more spiral. Because my feet are under me, I can then use the floor for stability and balance.

A turn has moments of winding into a spiral and unwinding to neutral for the follower. A front or back cross uses a degree of spiral, while open/side steps return the body to neutral for a moment. Use that constantly changing spiral to make your turns better. If you hold your breath, you cannot unwind as completely, thus taxing your muscles more than necessary. The spiral for turns (and ochos) is very dynamic, which allows you to constantly build your energy, recover balance (if necessary) and tune into the leader. Remember, the leader can choose different speeds for a turn (all slow steps, all quick steps, or the traditional slow slow quick quick), so working on your spiral allows you to respond more subtly to the leader.

When you feel the beginning of a spiral, you know this movement will require pivoting the hips, legs and feet. If you are led in a turn, it is your job to remember which step of the grapevine comes next. It is also your job to keep turning until the leader asks for something different. Hopefully, you will feel the leader's spiral return to neutral, which will return your spiral to neutral, ending a turn. Later on, other moves will come out of the turn, but for right now, you know it's going to be a walk (if you are in my Tango I in Salem :-) ).

Trouble-shooting for your turns:

  • If you seem to get further and further away from the leader, so that you cannot stay connected physically, examine your back cross step. This is the hardest step of the turn. If you tend to swing your leg around the back to create your spiral, you are probably tipping your axis over. Try to spiral all the way down to your feet, only sliding your foot behind for the cross step when your hips and legs/feet are completely in their spiral.
  • If you seem to be off-balance a lot in your turn, focus on your axis and support leg. A lot of dancers reach with their free leg BEFORE using their support leg to begin a step, worried about being behind on a step. If you push off from your support leg (which might feel as if you are waiting too long to project with the free leg), you will actually arrive at the new location faster! Pushing off FIRST allows your leg to project, but in sync with the leader's axis, so that you will arrive at the same time as the leader, with more energy, on balance. Think: push off support leg, project free leg, follow through with your support leg and toes to land (these three parts have to work in this order).
  • If you are having trouble keeping up with the leader's rate of spiral, the only answer is to push off and use ENERGY from the ground up. Think fewer steps and bigger, rather than running around with tiny steps. You are the motor of the turn: rev it up! (This is only possible once you are on balance, so focus on the step above first).
  • If you feel that you are always ahead of the leader, focus on the spiral of their torso, not on what their hands are leading. A lot of leaders give you two or three pieces of information, with the arms and torso moving at different rates. I always focus on what the solar plexus is doing and try to ignore extra information from the arms (like the scarecrow's "He went that-a way!" in The Wizard of Oz, you have to figure out which piece of information is the important one!).
  • Use ocho technique drills to help you with your front and back cross technique outside of turns, and then apply it to your turns. Like turns, ochos take a long time to perfect: your entire tango life. Again, if you apply yourself to your drills in practice, your dancing will improve on the dance floor.

Salem dancers: see you tomorrow!

Beginning tango: is there a "right" answer?

Tango has been around for over one hundred years at this point (working on 120-130 years). Over that span of time, there have been hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of people who have danced tango, all over the world. Each of those persons has been unique, and has experienced tango through their own viewpoint of dance, their partner, and the world. How can anyone say what the "right" way to dance tango should be?

I approach tango as a body- and energy-based dance, not as a series of steps to be memorized. For each person, tango is built on that specific body, how the dancer sees dance, musicality, approach to learning, and level of comfort with dance structure. For each person, then, there is a "right" answer within the practice of tango.

As a teacher, I have spent many hours both dancing tango and teaching it to other people. I have experimented with many styles of the dance, many embraces, many different partners, different venues on three continents and many different teachers. What I seek to bring to my students is a distillation of that huge body of information, so that I can provide a clear, concise set of movements and tango rules that will work with most other tango dancers.

The most important part of tango to me is body awareness. In order to dance with another person, I need to know where my axis is, find and maintain my balance, breathe, stay tuned into myself. and open my energy to my partner. Once that is achieved, I have much more energy and focus available to dance and play with my partner.

The next step in the dance is to connect with my partner. There is a circle of breath that connects my axis with my partner's axis in a big, tall oval. There is a circle of breath that creates the embrace, using the arms and torsos to physically join the dancers together. In the center, there is also an open, vibrant energy between the solar plexus of the leader and of the follower. All of these continually adjust, breathe, and move while the dance happens. To me, this IS the dance.

Once the partners have connected together and become a unit, I expand that awareness of self and partner to encompass the entire room and all the people dancing. There is a focus on the group that allows each dancer to donate and to borrow energy from the room, in order to maintain a strong flow of energy. This focus on the entire group creates a flow of movement in the room, to the music, that is beautiful to watch (on a practical note, it also helps avoid crashes :-) ).

Only after that do I think about steps. The steps of tango are what distinguish this dance experience from any other couple dance experience. Combined with the music of tango and the energy of the dancers, they make an exquisite dance form, the Argentine tango.

Tango steps--the basic ones--are based on normal, walking patterns. If you know how to walk, you can learn to tango. This means, of course, that if you have postural habits that create difficulties for your body in everyday movement, the same issues will arise in your tango. Do you tighten your knees as you walk? Do you slouch? Do you tilt your hips forward? If you are in my class, I often end up giving people exercises to strengthen their bodies and align the axis, as well as teaching steps.

I advocate walking heel-toe in tango when stepping forward. This is the natural pattern of the walk, and helps keep the dancer on balance and more elegant. I advocate maintaining a slight turnout (heels together, toes out a bit) because most people stand and walk that way. I advocate allowing the hips to move gently in the dance, as in normal walking. Generally, the more you can make your normal walk more efficient, the easier tango will become.

I advocate basically straight-up-and-down axis. Yes, some styles of tango ask for the partners to lean against one another. However, I feel that the connection between the couple is mostly energy. I should be able to balance on my own two feet, rather than hang on my partner. After you have found your own axis and how to use it, then THAT is the time to choose whether you want to be a leaner or not.

Follow your body's cues. If something hurts (apart from the feeling that your muscles are being well-used), talk to me about it. Tango should not hurt. This is not pain for art/beauty/dance's sake. People dance tango until they die, not until it puts them in a wheelchair. Take care, listen to your body, and it will reward you with many more years of dancing.

Walking to the cross in parallel system (Salem Tango I class)

This week, we worked on three related tango elements:

  1. switching lanes or tracks
  2. "maybe no" steps
  3. walking to the cross (maybe, yes, cross)

1. Switching lanes or tracks

In Argentine tango, you can walk in front of your partner, or walk on either side--creating three distinct tracks or lanes. As we mentioned in the first class, your hips and toes define the path of the couple, so this does not change, even when you are walking on the "outside" (follower is closer to middle of the room, leader has moved to his/her own right) or walking on the "inside" (leader is closer to middle of the room, having moved to his/her own left) compared to the follower. What, then, makes this changing lanes possible?

Torso rotation makes it possible to walk in the outside, center or inside track, without changing the direction of the couple in the room. This twist must happen while both people are on their axes, or the twist unbalance the step. Only after the rotation occurs, can the leader step through to the outside or inside: that movement creates the space through which to step!

If I want to step out to the outside track when leading, I twist my torso TOWARDS my follower while on my axis (to my left, or counterclockwise), and then step through to the outside. The follower's torso adjusts to my twist by rotating to face me, so the connection/energy of the couple is still between the partners. The focus of this twist/rotation is--you guessed it--the solar plexus.

To return to the center track, I step back into center, returning my torso to a neutral orientation (no twist). Remember, this is not done with arms or feet: the center of the body returns to center.

If I want to step towards the inside, or center of the room, I twist my torso TOWARDS my follower (to my right, or clockwise) in order to maintain connection and energy, as well as to make room for myself to the "inside" track. The "maybe no" and "maybe yes cross" elements come into play when the leader moves to the inside track.

Note: An experienced leader makes sure that the follower's dance is enhanced, not disturbed, by switching lanes. As a beginner, you can achieve this by:

  • making sure that you take your entire body along: don't leave your head in the center lane and take only your legs to the side :-)
  • focusing on leading even-length, clear steps for the follower. That means that your own steps to the outside/inside and returning to center, must focus on the forward motion, not a wide diagonal.
  • keeping the energy of the connection between the partners, rather than turning your chest to follow your own direction and having the embrace collapse. Imagine that both partners are responsible for holding a little pillow between them while doing this step: at no point should the pillow fall or shoot out the sides of the embrace! That pillow is your energy focus, and keeping it in the middle makes the dance feel smooth to the follower.

2. "Maybe NO"

As far as I know, this terminology is from Daniel Trenner (my first tango teacher). I think it works very well, which is why I've used it for thirteen years! Short ad: Daniel will be coming to Portland to teach for a week in February! Check him out on the Portland tango page: http://portlandtango.com/

When the leader steps through to the inside track, and the follower steps backwards onto the left leg, that is a MAYBE. If the leader returns to the center track immediately (with the next step), that is a NO. In other words, no, we are NOT going to the cross right now! Remember that the torso twist needs to happen before the leader steps to the inside track, while both partners are on axis. If you twist too soon, the follower will try to begin a turn or a grapevine (more on that in later classes) instead of walking. If you twist too late, there's no room for the leader to move through to the inside.

This step can be done to the outside track and returning to center, but it is not really a "maybe no" because we don't walk to the cross on that side. (Well, OK, sometimes you can do that, but it is unusual, and we'll save it for Tango III or IV!).

3. Maybe yes cross (walking to the cross)

When the leader stays in the inside track after the "maybe" step, the next step is "yes" and on the third step, the follower crosses the left leg in front of the right leg and shifts weight onto the left leg. The right leg will then be free for the next step in the dance.

In the current "high school math" version of walking to the cross, the leader will walk to the inside track with the right foot, lead the "yes" step with the left, and then step in place, putting the weight on the right foot while the follower crosses. That way, the leader's left foot will be free for the next step. Warning: this will change! There are many things you can do at the cross, once this is working. For right now, we are walking in parallel system and both partners are taking the same number of weight changes at the cross. More on that later :-)

Torso torsion: The cross is led by a combination of the leader's forward movement and the untwisting of the torso. When done correctly, this step brings the follower across the leader's "inside track" to make this the current center track. For the follower, this is a diagonal step, with an emphasis on the backwards direction. This means that the untwisting has to complement the leader's forward motion; it is a subtle movement of the solar plexus, not a shoving with the arms!

The follower's walking to the cross will be the same for all versions of the step. The back step with the left leg will always be "maybe" and the next step back on the right will either be "no" or "yes". If it is "yes" the follower will scissor the left leg closed in front of the right leg and transfer weight to the left leg, ready to move on the right for the next step.

This is a very stable position in the dance that is based on thigh and knee alignment, not toe alignment! Remember that we talked about leg shape and the shape of the cross. No two people will have the same look because their bodies are different. Keep your thighs together and stack your knees one in front of the other (like Pringles potato chips, both are slightly curved: no locked knees!). Your toes will probably not align with each other perfectly. For me, with my (well let's be nice) strong calves, I cannot get my left toes as far back as my right ones. However, because my knees and thighs are working hard, the shift from right to left is still in place and still on balance. Work up the center of your axis, from the floor to the ceiling, and let your axis support this move.

My two cents: lead the cross or the automatic cross: which is it?

Here's my opinion on this topic: the cross is a codigo, or a convention/rule. We all KNOW that the follower is walking to the cross after the "yes" step, BUT the leader should be allowed to interpret the move. In other words, the follower should not just do the cross automatically, but rather wait to see HOW the leader is interpreting the move vis-a-vis the music. Is it slow? Fast? Abrupt? Smooth? At no point does the follower go on autopilot!

Next week, we'll review this work, and also start doing steps at the cross: ochos and turns!!!!!