How many figures do you need?

tangomaniac said:
I enjoyed my vacation in BA. I observed that the Argentines use the following figures:

Back ocho
Low Boleo
Walking
Ocho Cortado
Giros (called molinetes north of the equator)

I've read messages on Tango A about workshops and festivals for colgaldas, valcadas, sacadas and other figures ending in "adas." It made me wonder how many figures do I need for a good dance.

What figures are missing from the above list you feel are necessary?

How frequently are you able to incorporate what you learned from festivals and workshops into your dance?

It's a slow Saturday night and I'm writing as I listen to Garrison Keillor's monologue. Unfortunately, there's no AT in Lake Wobegone, MN,.

Michael
Washington, DC
I danced Argentine Tango - - with the Argentines
Click to expand...

i think you've probably found lots of people have different opinions about what is essential...but I find it nice to know that the most of the elements you saw danced while In BaAs are pretty much the core of what I learned as small space dancing essentials.
 
tangomaniac said:
I enjoyed my vacation in BA. I observed that the Argentines use the following figures:

Back ocho
Low Boleo
Walking
Ocho Cortado
Giros (called molinetes north of the equator)
Click to expand...

Yup, I trry to keep mine simple, and I tend to gravitate around those on your list. It's how you vary them with timing, delivery and synchopation that (IMHO) makes it matter the most.
 
Doesn't anyone on this forum mention the words "feeling" or "expressing" the music? That's where the timing, syncopation, etc. should originate. The music tells you what to do and when to do it.

Don't think...feel!
 
jantango said:
Doesn't anyone on this forum mention the words "feeling" or "expressing" the music? That's where the timing, syncopation, etc. should originate. The music tells you what to do and when to do it.

Don't think...feel!
Click to expand...
Finally! :notworth:
 
Angel HI said:
The OP said that he just returned from Baires, and this is what they are dancing as the essentials. Then, we, a bunch of non-argentines chime in w/ what we feel it should be. Does someone else see the irony in this, or am I being aloof?

TM, Welcome to the DF.
Click to expand...

No. But what I do see a lot (both here and out of here) is many non-Argentines holding up anybody born in the BA that happen to dance AT to be right up there. And I mean right...up...there. As in the same locale as that guy up there wearing a crown of thorns and yelling at the sky in some weird dialect called Aramaic.

I have never been to BA and have no desire to. (Only because its not on my list of places to see before I die) But...I have danced with many, many Argentiines. Performers, teachers as well as ordinary chap/chappettes. And you kinow what? Sons of God they are not. Meaning: some have been good, most have been...erm...okay-Ish. And so what they are dancing in BA has no relevance to what/how we dance here in London. Good is good. Bad is bad. No matter the design on the front of their passports. Basta.
 
jantango said:
Doesn't anyone on this forum mention the words "feeling" or "expressing" the music? That's where the timing, syncopation, etc. should originate. The music tells you what to do and when to do it.

Don't think...feel!
Click to expand...
Yeah, but this thread is asking about figures, so most of the replies have been, unsurprisingly, about figures.
 
Heather2007 said:
No. But what I do see a lot (both here and out of here) is many non-Argentines holding up anybody born in the BA that happen to dance AT to be right up there. And I mean right...up...there. As in the same locale as that guy up there wearing a crown of thorns and yelling at the sky in some weird dialect called Aramaic.

I have never been to BA and have no desire to. (Only because its not on my list of places to see before I die) But...I have danced with many, many Argentiines. Performers, teachers as well as ordinary chap/chappettes. And you kinow what? Sons of God they are not. Meaning: some have been good, most have been...erm...okay-Ish. And so what they are dancing in BA has no relevance to what/how we dance here in London. Good is good. Bad is bad. No matter the design on the front of their passports. Basta.
Click to expand...

what a revelation!
 
the essence of tango is La Yumba

an explanation: "Pugliese's signature tune. played at his funeral. Pronounced 'Jumba' with a soft J. It is the sound of the Bandoneon going Yum-ba. Pugliese was a leading tango
pianist, composer, arranger and bandleader, working especially with bandoneon
player Ruggiero. He was key innovator in synchopation and counterpoint. He was
also blacklisted put in jail for being a communist. "

Edinburgh Tango

see also Tango and Chaos
 
tangomaniac said:
I went to the link. I didn't see any figures mentioned plus I read

"The Argentine tango is the easiest of all the ballroom dances to begin dancing, and to begin dancing well."

AT is a ballroom dance, really??? Not to me.
Click to expand...

Yeah, this is an old semantic argument. Some people use ballroom narrowly, to mean certain specific dances. Some use it more generally, as describing a couple in an embrace, on a flat floor as in a ballroom or bar or for that matter a street, etc. I fall in that second category.

You didn't see any figures because what I did was break down all walking figures into their most basic components. This allows leaders to make up their own figures. To be creative, to improvise figures.

What I was trying to do was free people from the "ballroom" approach of memorizing hundreds of figures, each with some obscure name, written down in some official rulebook as the only proper figures one can perform, and organied in bronze, silver, and gold levels. This strikes me as a way to teach people to become robots.


Laer Carroll
 
Originally Posted by tangomaniac
I went to the link. I didn't see any figures mentioned plus I read

"The Argentine tango is the easiest of all the ballroom dances to begin dancing, and to begin dancing well."

Argentine Tango is Not Ballroom.
What defines a ballroom dance is the syllabus. American and International Tango are included in ballroom they each have a syllabus. Argentine Tango, Salsa, West Coast Swing and many others are not considered ballroom, no syllabus. The reason for the Syllabus is for teaching and judging. Thank God AT isn't ballroom.
 
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