Ladies' sacadas

[Peaches]

I hate 'em.

Actually, I'm kind of mixed on sacadas in general, although I'm guessing that most of my ambivalence comes from how difficult they are for me right now. Back sacadas are pretty cool, I've got to admit.

But I don't like ladies' sacadas one bit. Maybe I'm not doing them right. I just feel like I can't get my let out far enough for the displacement without really bending my supporting leg (which hurts my knee), and if I can't extend my leg far enough then it feels like I'm going to smack into my partner. Not a happy feeling. And, it goes against all my instincts to deliberately try and walk into someone, which is what this feels like. Not to mention, I feel like I'm all twisted up. Argh...

Any suggestions for how to practice sacada stuff on my own (other than the most obvious extension, weight transfer, pivot, extension)?

[bordertangoman]

I hate 'em.

Actually, I'm kind of mixed on sacadas in general, although I'm guessing that most of my ambivalence comes from how difficult they are for me right now. Back sacadas are pretty cool, I've got to admit.

But I don't like ladies' sacadas one bit. Maybe I'm not doing them right. I just feel like I can't get my let out far enough for the displacement without really bending my supporting leg (which hurts my knee), and if I can't extend my leg far enough then it feels like I'm going to smack into my partner. Not a happy feeling. And, it goes against all my instincts to deliberately try and walk into someone, which is what this feels like. Not to mention, I feel like I'm all twisted up. Argh...)?

Sounds like you're not close enough to the man and you don't necessarily have to make contact for the displacement to happen the strength of the embrace helps


Any suggestions for how to practice sacada stuff on my own (other than the most obvious extension, weight transfer, pivot, extension)?

practice on innocent passers-by as you walk down the street....

no forget I said that;)

[Peaches]

practice on innocent passers-by as you walk down the street....

no forget I said that;)


OOOOH...fun with fellow commuters...I love it!!!

This could make the evening hike down the train platform very interesting indeed...

[Steve Pastor]

I will cite several people who teach tango extensively, both nationally and internationally. You - meaning all of the readers of this posting - may agree or disagree with my repeating of what I believe they have taught me.
I know the sacada mostly from the perspective of the leader, but I assume it is my responsibility to lead the woman to step "under" my trailing foot to produce a sacada.
Paulo Araujo
http://www.tangonoticias.com/articles/articles2002/apr_2002_paulo_bio.htm told use that "the woman will step where she is pointed", according to my notes. So, if you are pointed slightly to my left, and I move myself back and to my right you should simply step forward. If I have pointed you in the right direction, your foot should land where I have asked you to step.
So, my concept of how it works is that, unless you look down and think, "Am I going to step on him?", you just step. Since I am withdrawing my trailing foot at about the same time your foot lands, it looks like I'm kicking, or "displacing" my foot.
Alex Krebs http://www.tangoberretin.com/alex/alex.html
teaches widely, and he is quite explicit that in the sacada you step under your partner's trailing foot. This stepping under your partner, or stepping into your partner's space, is also referred to as an entrada.
Komala and Steffan http://www.tangoberretin.com/workshops.html
teach that the sacada, as with the barrida, is an illusion.
In a class with Cacho Dante, Cacho told us through and interpreter to "sweep the woman's foot", to which Robert Hauk http://home.teleport.com/~robhauk/ added that she will actually be stepping anyhow because of the lead from your torso.

So, based on all of the above, I concluded that the ability and willingness to step assertively and without trepedation is the essential skill for the woman in order for her to do sacadas. That, and someone who is really up to leading it correctly.
As usual, good question.

[Peaches]

On the face of it...yup, I agree. Granted, I can't tell if the techniques you've described are actually several different techniques/takes on the same thing, or just different ways of describing the same technique. If that makes any sense.


[...]I assume it is my responsibility to lead the woman to step "under" my trailing foot to produce a sacada [...] "the woman will step where she is pointed"

Yeah, pretty much. It always ends up that I've got nowhere else to go, realistically, except forward toward the trailing leg. And, if I'm on the ball with my technique (extend the leg and wait to transfer weight until I'm led to do so) it works fine. But I usually get hung up on something along the lines of, "But you're in my way!" and forget that when I actually take the step he will have moved. If I've managed to shut off my brain for a bit and just follow, then thing things work. But shutting off my brain is something which doesn't come easily.

Which means that, pretty much, you've hit the nail on the head in your last paragraph...


So, based on all of the above, I concluded that the ability and willingness to step assertively and without trepedation is the essential skill for the woman in order for her to do sacadas.


That, and someone who is really up to leading it correctly.

I'm going to trust that my instructor knows how to lead it well.

[bordertangoman]

Steve Pastor has nailed it on the head. I've been to workshops with Alex Krebbs and respect anything he has to say. Leading ladies' sacadas is very new to me but its the same principle as chains.

[Peaches]

Leading ladies' sacadas is very new to me but its the same principle as chains.


Eh? How is it the same?

I'm not trying to be argumentative. We've worked a bit with cadenas, and I LOVE them, but I'm trying to think about it and figure out how the principles are the same. To me they feel entirely different...

[bordertangoman]

Eh? How is it the same?

I'm not trying to be argumentative. We've worked a bit with cadenas, and I LOVE them, but I'm trying to think about it and figure out how the principles are the same. To me they feel entirely different...


They are similar (at least one version of a cadena) in that the man is leading the woman toward his axis even as he's moving in a different direction.

Cadena starts with a sacada on the woman's back cross to the man's left;
man side steps to his right (going North) with woman's forward step (also North) Man leads the woman to another Northward step as he pivots and steps back across her path. etc etc.This is where she effectively acts a small sacada on the man and he pivots on his left leg so he is now doing the steps she did earlier.

[Peaches]

They are similar (at least one version of a cadena) in that the man is leading the woman toward his axis even as he's moving in a different direction.

Cadena starts with a sacada on the woman's back cross to the man's left;
man side steps to his right (going North) with woman's forward step (also North) Man leads the woman to another Northward step as he pivots and steps back across her path. etc etc.This is where she effectively acts a small sacada on the man and he pivots on his left leg so he is now doing the steps she did earlier.

Hmmm...from your description, I can see how you'd say they're similar.

But...wow...THAT's what's going on? Interesting. I think I'm going to have to ask my teacher to break it down some more in my next lesson. We were working on it more in the context of my just following it, and not resisting going where I'm being led--I never got the step breakdown.

Somehow (probably from the sacada from what you're saying), it starts off with me doing a sentada (right leg supporting, for this example). Which means that I must be taking my next forward step with my left. I know I must take another step forward with my right.

I wonder if the end sacada that you mention is what I'm thinking of. Alls I know is, and this is where I usually start thinking and get hung up, is that I end up...somehow...seeming to straddle his left (?) leg in taking the final step with my left. I guess that could resolve into his sentada...

Hmmm...if the lead then proceeds to do the same series of steps as i had just been doing, I wonder what it is that I've been doing during that time...

*sigh* MORE questions to add to the ever-growing list.

Does anyone else ever feel like you could spend the whole lesson getting questions answered about stuff and never work forward...so frustrating.

[bordertangoman]

Hmmm...from your description, I can see how you'd say they're similar.

But...wow...THAT's what's going on? Interesting. I think I'm going to have to ask my teacher to break it down some more in my next lesson. We were working on it more in the context of my just following it, and not resisting going where I'm being led--I never got the step breakdown..


Somehow (probably from the sacada from what you're saying), it starts off with me doing a sentada (right leg supporting, for this example). Which means that I must be taking my next forward step with my left. I know I must take another step forward with my right. .

Sorry. You're on the wrong leg from the start, but supposedly we'd just end up doing the cadena clockwise rather than ccw.:)

I wonder if the end sacada that you mention is what I'm thinking of. Alls I know is, and this is where I usually start thinking and get hung up, is that I end up...somehow...seeming to straddle his left (?) leg in taking the final step with my left. I guess that could resolve into his sentada... .

The cadenas work better with a close embrace since you can't see the man's legs anyaway. In the workshop I just did we led the woman to do a planeo and practiced this stomach-sucking-in exercise to draw her toward us.

An atomic analogy: the man atom A; sends energy into the woman atom B; which creates a spin in her electron - her free foot- and this is captured using a particle accelerator and directed toward Atom A (the man) who is now travelling at a tangent, t, to Atom B and so her foot heads toward his axis. The success of this is capturing the orbital energy of the free foot and not letting it get changed into a linear step. This (I am told is called suspension). Of course its suject to the Heineken Uncertainty Principle that even if you lead something perfectly correctly the resulting movement of the woman is still highly unpredictable

[bordertangoman]

Since it seems that your problem is one of trying to avoid a perceived collision, maybe a better strategy is to do a Maltese Cross exercise:

Imagine a cross drawn on the floor; the woman is going to step on one axis; pivot 180 deg to the right , cw (irrespective of which foot she's on) the man does the same; You alternate steps to start with: woman steps, man steps,woman steps, man steps,woman steps, man steps; then you do it holding hands and man chases the woman's step until he is starrting early enough to do a sacada. If you reverse the roles so you are chasing the man's step then you will be doing the sacada! et voila confidence restored!

[Peaches]

Sorry. You're on the wrong leg from the start, but supposedly we'd just end up doing the cadena clockwise rather than ccw.:)

Oh bloody hell. I know we practiced it going in both directions, but by that time I was very dizzy and wasn't paying the best attention. Well, I know what question #1 will be at my lesson on Thursday--I wonder if we could find someone else for him to dance it with so I can see it altogether.




The cadenas work better with a close embrace since you can't see the man's legs anyaway. In the workshop I just did we led the woman to do a planeo and practiced this stomach-sucking-in exercise to draw her toward us.

Planeo? That's a new one on me... I can't imagine doing it in close embrace...we've been doing it with a very fluid embrace...which is another thing he's trying to get me to work on (switching smoothly, easily, and readily between close and open).




An atomic analogy: the man atom A; sends energy into the woman atom B; which creates a spin in her electron - her free foot- and this is captured using a particle accelerator and directed toward Atom A (the man) who is now travelling at a tangent, t, to Atom B and so her foot heads toward his axis. The success of this is capturing the orbital energy of the free foot and not letting it get changed into a linear step. This (I am told is called suspension). Of course its suject to the Heineken Uncertainty Principle that even if you lead something perfectly correctly the resulting movement of the woman is still highly unpredictable

...um...yeah... You completely lost me on that one.

Hmmm...maybe I should try to make up an excuse to visit the UK so I can dance with you and get this cadena thing figured out!! (I wonder how I can get DH to go along with that one...) :-)

[bordertangoman]

Oh

...um...yeah... You completely lost me on that one.

:-)

sorry 'bout that.I was going for humour rather than clarity. Most of these things are easier to demonstrate than explain.;)