Appropriate vs Inappropriate Lead Gaging

[opendoor]

..concert with some Beethoven and ..Dvorak.. These classical pieces were obviously not intended for dancing at all. Yet, by focusing on predicting structural and rhythmic patterns I **could** have danced to it. My fingers, at least, could..

Intention and purpose do not determine danceability, I totally agree with you. But I don't expect predictability, structures or rhythmic patterns as prerequisites. I can also improvise sudden and singular sounds, through I would not call it tango.

1) On the one hand, there are people who want to dance and music only is the means to an end. This group expects the music to be useful and supportive. This group only notices music when it doesn't fulfill this purpose because it is poorly selected, poorly produced or perhaps even because it is too good and too demanding.

2) In the other group, the impulse to move only comes from the music itself. They then can't help themselves but dance. For this group of people, the music has to overcome certain qualitative hurdles in order to be noticed..

I clearly belong to the latter group!

Please let me pre-book a Pugliese tanda with you..

And I thought we had a date?

 

[JournalInTime]

I clearly belong to the latter group!

Same.

I cannot even fathom putting music in a supporting role, and dancing my "moves" regardless of the music. Music – even dance music – can exist independently of dance, but dance cannot exist independently of music. I've seen several attempts at "silent dance" and, to my eyes, it looks like clumsy fumbling, almost like a person having seizure . . .

You learn technique, steps, how to connect with another dancer, floorcraft, etc. in service to expressing the music with the best possible posture, movement, complicity, and freedom. I've seen so-called "advanced" and even "champion" dancers just doing their routines with the music as a backdrop. To my eyes, they look like circus monkeys, not dancers.

All this is especially true in social tango, which is supposed to be 100% improvised. You're literally making up your "choreography" – and often your steps – on the spot. If it isn't music that's your muse, what is?!?!

 

[Miradamiranda]

And I thought we had a date?

We do! It’s in my calendar. Hopefully there’ll be a Pugliese.

 

[opendoor]

..seen... "champion" dancers just doing their routines with the music as a backdrop. To my eyes, they look like circus monkeys..

Please don't be so strict. I too am a teacher. But how much harder is it to teach dancing or any other form of creativity? I too, earn my money mostly with routine. But if once a week I can get a student to frown and ask excitedly about physics, chemistry or biology, then I have defended my place in this world. Quality over quantity, brother! (And the student must bring about this moment, not the teacher.)

 

[tangomaniac]

This topic came up on another thread and I decided to start a new thread because I would like for leaders to comment.

There has been discussion on how leaders discreetly and appropriately vs inappropriately “test” a followers abilities to determine what level figures they can follow.

Please feel free to add your insights. And followers also!

The word is gauging, as in measuring.

When I visited Buenos Aires, my tango tour guide said, "the embrace says everything." If I feel a lot of tension, the follower has difficulty rotating which limits pivots. If her right hand is thrust out like flagging a taxicab, my frame is limited in leading.

We don't have to move for me to know it's going to be a bad tanda.

 

[Bailango]

The word is gauging, as in measuring.

When I visited Buenos Aires, my tango tour guide said, "the embrace says everything." If I feel a lot of tension, the follower has difficulty rotating which limits pivots. If her right hand is thrust out like flagging a taxicab, my frame is limited in leading.

We don't have to move for me to know it's going to be a bad tanda.

Indeed embrace tells a lot before taking the first step. I believe it works both ways. I don’t know from the follower’s side what their reaction is to an embrace that says this leader might be experienced.

My experience of the embrace and before taking first step falls into three categories:

- the embrace is warm, close, and the follower is confident. Embrace doesn’t change for rest of the tanda except as required by dancing. Usually these kind of followers turn out to be really good dancers. By confident I am implying they can adjust according to the leader.

- the embrace starts close but after I embrace, she settles down into more relaxed embrace. To me it feels like the follower starts with a default defensive and then decides to drop her guard by trusting the leader before the first step. Most often this category of followers tends to be just a rung below the previous in terms of skillset. Dancing with them can range from good to average to poor. A lot of beginners do something similar.

- starts in slightly open embrace. It is neither fully open nor fully close. I think some in here call it salon style embrace because there is seven to eight inches of daylight between us. After first few steps to half a song they will move into close embrace by themselves. I experience the this far less. May be once every ten followers. Most times they turn out to be average or below.

I have excluded the followers who only will dance in open hold. Because that is much rarer experience for me.

All above applies equally in the home scene as well as when visiting other places.

 

[Bailango]

I am in the camp of being willing to take on whatever comes, musically. I even accept Cabeceos already during the cortina if I know the person.

I don’t ask before the music starts (in any dance form) with very rare exceptions (DJ has been playing really good music). I can’t remember asking anyone ever during a cortina. I just don’t like it. A rare few times I have been asked during the cortinas, I say let’s wait to which tanda plays. I haven’t turned down the dance once the tanda starts. But I think it tells the person asking that knowing what music will play is important to me. There are followers who will ask should we dance to this music. That’s very difficult in Tango and only happens if you are seating at the same table. Much easier in other dances where the asking is verbal.

Having discussed this with many followers and leaders, I do conclude empirically that the leaders pay more premium on choice of music than the follower. I don’t know why this is so. May be because being asked means less chance to picky about the music. Second conclusion I draw is that the leaders for whom what music will play next doesn’t matter are usually steppers (not dancers) and most times are not skillful.

I can dance to any music. But because I can doesn’t mean I should.

discretely tapping my fingers to the music as if I was dancing to it, judging the balance of predictability vs. unpredictability.

I do this almost all the time when I am sitting out and not discreetly. I always want to judge how danceable a music is. When I say danceable, I meant inspiring to dance with high level of creativity.

Last night I was dancing to a live music that was playing strongly rhythmic tango music with someone I dance regularly with. It was a bit crowded ronda. After two or three dances she was smiling and said “you are dancing new figures you haven’t done before”. I shrugged saying not really, it is just whatever the music is calling for. She nodded and murmurred, yeah following the music. I tend to make up lot of steps in the moment and when you do that you don’t remember what sequence you did. I don’t mind unpredictability or musicians playing something that is tricky to dance to. I don’t think musicians are thinking their is tricky to dance to. I bet don’t realize what is danceable and what is not. They are probably playing what is interesting to them musically. If it is a tricky music you have to dance to, you need a partner that is versatile enough to be able to adjust to the music and dancing its trickiness. Unfortunately only a few can managed that.

dancers who only dance to pieces they know really well -

For a long time I never realized this was a thing. It baffled me when I first got to know it and still does. For me bit part of improvisionational is able to dance to music you are not familiar with.

 

[Bailango]

Someone put a Mozart cortina last night, I danced it as milonga

I will certainly dance the first movement of his 40th symphony as a milonga. There are some places in other movements where I will switch to Tango. Actually the whole symphony is switching between milonga and tango.

Some DJ could create a 5-8 minute milonga tanda by mixing right parts of the symphony

Also the spring and autumn from Vivaldi’s 4 seasons for tango. Autumn I will feel like dancing a Vals.

 

[Bailango]

Hehe – yes, it's almost impossible for me now to listen to any music without thinking about how I'd dance to it. Though with a lot of jazz the answer is "only at gunpoint."

You can dance blues to a lot of jazz.

 

[Bailango]

But I don't expect predictability, structures or rhythmic patterns as prerequisites. I can also improvise sudden and singular sounds, through I would not call it tango.

Same. Dancing doesn’t have to be tango or any defined form as long as you can improvise to fit it to the music.

 

[JournalInTime]

For me bit part of improvisionational is able to dance to music you are not familiar with.

I agree 100%.

That said, I think it can be harder to dance to music you are familiar with being played live by musicians who are riffing on the piece in real time. You've never heard it that way before and you'll never hear it that way again. It's a divisive issue . . . concertgoers in general either love the "irreproducible experience" of that one performance, or detest its departure from the recorded version. For tango, this tends to be an even bigger division, as far too many tango dancers are purists about the music and cannot stand it when there's a little fantasie or tempo change getting in the way of the same damned choreography they always dance to a piece.

 

[pianistamediano]

For tango, this tends to be an even bigger division, as far too many tango dancers are purists about the music and cannot stand it when there's a little fantasie or tempo change getting in the way of the same damned choreography they always dance to a piece.

In the case of live music, I would only gripe about it if the average level of dancing was low enough that a significant number of dancers couldn't improvise adequately well. Because there is no use introducing even a 2/3 polyrhythm if the dancers can't dance to it. I don't like dancing to live music with followers who can't adapt and respond to the changes on a dime anyway.

 

[JournalInTime]

I don't like dancing to live music with followers who can't adapt and respond to the changes on a dime anyway.

I don't like dancing to any music with followers who can't adapt and respond to changes on a dime. When I have the job of floorcraft, changes will happen because I'll change dynamics mid-step, cut movements short, execute changes of direction up to and including 180°, create hard blocks with my right arm, etc. to avoid collisions. Since I rarely to never dance on empty floors, this in practice means that changes on a dime are standard operating procedure; so, I prefer partners who can handle them. The added wrinkle of musical surprises is a minor additional load at best, and won't further narrow my partner choice.

 

[JournalInTime]

When I have the job of floorcraft, changes will happen because I'll change dynamics mid-step, cut movements short, execute changes of direction up to and including 180°, create hard blocks with my right arm, etc. to avoid collisions. Since I rarely to never dance on empty floors, this in practice means that changes on a dime are standard operating procedure; so, I prefer partners who can handle them.

I'm not stating this in a controlling way. I prefer to dance with partners who dance eyes-open, signal when trouble is about to happen where I can't see it, and counter my lead with a proposal that avoids the trouble. I will listen and adapt to the change on a dime! I was talking about this at a práctica just this past Saturday . . . my girlfriend and primary dance partner can put the brakes on a high-speed cadena at any step in the movement, and that's the level of complicity I've come to expect in general. Followers who blindly let bad things happen and never make me change ideas do get a controlling lead, because that's the only way we can dance safely.

 

[Bailango]

I agree 100%.

That said, I think it can be harder to dance to music you are familiar with being played live by musicians who are riffing on the piece in real time. You've never heard it that way before and you'll never hear it that way again.

Agree. That’s why I love dancing to live music. I know others in Tango and Salsa don’t prefer live music for the reason you mentioned. The instrumentation can change and that also has an impact on how we hear the music from dancing perspective. I don’t listen to music when not at milonga. This prevents memorization from taking shape. Some music becomes familiar because I have danced to it a lot. Esp plenty of milongas. I like my music when dancing to be non-predictable.

It's a divisive issue . . . concertgoers in general either love the "irreproducible experience" of that one performance, or detest its departure from the recorded version.

I can’t speak for concert goers who do not dance. As a listener at a concert where there is no dancing, I can still distinguish between nice to listen to and nice to dance to.

For tango, this tends to be an even bigger division, as far too many tango dancers are purists about the music and cannot stand it when there's a little fantasie or tempo change getting in the way of the same damned choreography they always dance to a piece.

It surprises me if people do really have choreographed their dancing to particular music. Even 25% choreography will surprise me. It is a lot to remember.