Practicas vs. Milongas

As Zoopsia, says, venues here are not always set up, or big enough; rarely see any aisle outside any seating, and at the place i was at yesterday non dancers trying to creep around the outside the line of dance were more of a nuisance than if they had walked across the middle of the floor, because they were on the leaders blind side.

It was a squeeze getting from your seat to the dance floor but people were tolerant and co-operative about it
 
It's been my experience that the practica is the antithesis of the milonga. Some examples. Music is sometimes played in tandas, more often it is played continousy with no breaks. There is no obligation to dance more than one dance with your partner.(Well there never is, but it is customary to do so). People will stop and work on things. For example, as a leader I may stop and ask my partner if I communicated my intention properly. If not I'll ask her what I need to do and if we can try it again. Sometimes I might work on moves that I would rarely do in the milonga. There are necessarily more rondas and more flexibility moving in and out of them.

In a milonga The only "codes" that matter (to me) are the ones which foster good dancing. And those stem from one point: respect other dancers on the floor. Move with the crowd, if there is space ahead of you, move forward, if not dance small. Respect the rondas, don't zig zag in and out of them. Don't pass the couple ahead of you unless they are doing stationary moves and there is a large gap between them and the couple ahead of them. Don't stop or work on steps/moves/patterns. Don't talk on your mobile on the dance floor. When not dancing don't get in the dancers' way, walk behind tables if possible and don't walk accross the floor. etc, etc, etc...

Courtesy and manners - these things should only need explaining once or twice. (There will always be exceptions...)

Other "codes" (the cabeceo, where to change shoes...) are social conventions and may or may not apply in a specific country, city, milonga, or individual.
 
jantango said:
If dancers have a large space for a practica where there are no codes, how will they ever be prepared for the milonga?
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IMHO, I'm with jantango on this one. A practica is a tango "Practice" party. A simulation to prepare for a real milonga. The exception being learning, teaching, correcting, pausing and interrupting to (hopefully) get things right is permitted. So that, when the learner does go to a real milonga, there is enough knowledge to begin assimilating.
 
Ampster said:
IMHO, I'm with jantango on this one. A practica is a tango "Practice" party. A simulation to prepare for a real milonga.
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Yes - hope I didn't come across as believing otherwise. But there is at least one, partial, exception. There are nuevo dancers (to some extent that includes me, at times) who respect the milonga and won't do large moves or patterns there, unless there is a nuevo/alternative tanda. Which is fairly rare around here. So a practica is where such dancing can be done for those so inclined.

Ampster said:
The exception being learning, teaching, correcting, pausing and interrupting to (hopefully) get things right is permitted.
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IMHO that is a very big exception. Dancing around practicing couples certainly helps develop navigation skills.

Ampster said:
So that, when the learner does go to a real milonga, there is enough knowledge to begin assimilating.
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Yes indeed. The first few times I went to a milonga with my wife we regularly got in other dancer's way and sometimes even bumped (gently) into other dancers. We were still pattern and sequence dancers. We have a large room with a hardwood floor at home and we practiced regularly. But navigation is not something that can easliy be practised without something to navigate around. I felt lost not being able to complete my sequence or judge space properly. Practicas helped us get rid of sequence-thinking and forced me to develop navigation skills. I am no longer a meance in the milonga - haven't been for quite some time. :D
 
Around here, the music is played in tandas in that there will be three songs that go together, then another set of three, and so on, but no cortinas. People follow the three-dance rule, but will pick up a partner in the middle of the so-called tanda and dance for three, including when the music switches. They are not as crowded as the milongas, but the space isn't any bigger.

Frankly, I don't believe people in America should follow what is done in BsAs just because we do the same dance they do. We're a different country with our own culture. Certain social niceties should be observed everywhere, of course, but if it's the norm to change your shoes at the table because there's nowhere more appropriate, and that is what everyone does and expects, I see no problem. In ballroom and swing, that's what everyone does, as well.

Just like every other area of life, if you go somewhere different, you should try to figure out the norms and fit in. I got to a milonga early a couple weeks ago, and a man was waiting outside who had arrived even earlier. We introduced ourselves, and he was from the bay area, so he asked some questions about our norms, like use of cabaceo, etc. I answered, and he had a great night.
 
There are 2 aspects of 'preparation' for milongas -

1. Social codes
2. Skill

It seems to me that when practicas are structured like milongas, it will help with social codes, but will deter (esp beginners) from focussing on skills. When somoene sees a floor full of dancers focussed on dancing, affected social codes that are tending towards structure/formality (dress codes, cabaceo, high emphasis on floorcraft), they are likely to think that this is just another milonga, and will be less inclined to be the only person on the floor who makes mistakes, stops to figure stuff out, works on technique and potentially stands out.

To me the key question next is this - how do you structure a practica to look like a milonga, yet keep them from 'feeling' like they are in a milonga, and instead get them to feel and act like they are in a practica? If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, it's surely not a chicken.
 
I had always thought of a practica in two ways.

The first type that I typically experienced in London is time after a lesson to practise what had been taught in a lesson. There was usually no DJ and the music went from one CD to the next and the social etiquette of AT was very loosely followed, although Line of Dance was observed.

The second was more in line with what Newbie described above

Originally posted by newbie
Well, keep powerful lights, put chairs and not tables. No food except mint candies, no drinks except water and tea, no cortinas, no demos.

with tandas but not cortinas.
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I have experienced these in smaller tango communities. They have a DJ playing the tandas and people did discuss things but not in the Line of Dance.

I never felt however even in this environment that it was preparation for a milonga but rather practising your dancing.

Finally, the question that keeps nagging my mind is how long does it take to pick up the etiquette of a milonga?
 
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