Projecting steps

Steve Pastor said:
Another way to look at this is that, since I don't know with absolute certainty where my partner's feet, and/or her axis are (ie weight bearing vs free foot), I DON'T have the freedom to step with confidence. To me it seems like faux close embrace. See, here I am really close to you, but I'm not going to commit to you. I prefer going to an open embrace in these circumstances.
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I might be the wrong person to talk about this - i have pretty much confounded close embrace with apilado for me - but i think looking for commitment is probably the wrong framework when doing this - when it works well it is all about sensitivity and projecting and receiving information, being continuously both surprised and appreciative of what is happening just now, and matching and shaping it, trying to offer something similarly appreciable, and reacting to each other, it is really extraordinary, and really close to reading each others minds. A melding of perceptions, and brains, and souls.
What happens in apilado is very different, it is more creating a shared body, no longer reacting to each other, but being unified, a melding of bodies and souls, with less of this continious stimulation and surprise of how the dance is turning out.

And with both approaches the really good dances happen not nearly often enough :(.

Gssh
 
Gssh said:
...(though i would say that text book apliado is bad for ones spine then they are doing it objectivly wrong - i think this is usually the consequence of doing chest-to-chest without having actual apilado technique)...
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Maybe I'm not understanding you correctly, but yes, I think if apilado causes someone back pain, then I think the person is missing a crucial aspect of it. I find it very comfortable.

Gssh said:
...no-chest-contact-close embrace dancing...
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I don't think you are advocating this, but I can't figure out how it's not an oxymoron.

Gssh said:
...
apilado: both dancers use the chest-to-chest contact to balance themselves and counterbalance their partner. The follower does not "hang" on the leader - she pushes in a straight line from the ground through her hips trough her spine to the sky. The leader does not "hold" the follower- he also pushes in a straight line from the ground through his hips through his spine to the sky. The flow of energy is essentially an inverted Y - both push upwards at an angle, and where their bodies meet these two upward energies mingle, and go up in a vertical line...
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Exactly right.

Gssh said:
...The disadvantage of this is that they are inescapably coupled ...
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I would call that the main advantage.

Gssh said:
...but i would not call it "more advanced" - it just feels like that because i think most of us have gone through several iteration of how the baseline technique of tango works, and once we found the one that fit we stopped looking - so this seems like the last step in an evolution, but i personally think it isn't...
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I would consider the most advanced dance to be the one where the dancer can derive the greatest dance from the most minimal of effort. Complexity and difficulty are not, IMO, the most advanced dance.
 
Steve Pastor said:
in no-chest-contact-close embrace dancing

Another way to look at this is that, since I don't know with absolute certainty where my partner's feet, and/or her axis are (ie weight bearing vs free foot), I DON'T have the freedom to step with confidence. To me it seems like faux close embrace. See, here I am really close to you, but I'm not going to commit to you. I prefer going to an open embrace in these circumstances.
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I totally agree. I would say that Gssh's description makes sense for open embrace, but not so much for the "2 inches apart close but not touching" embrace with a fusion of the follower's left arm to the leader's right arm. The embrace isn't soft and flexible or "dynamic" it's fairly static but without physical connection of the bodies. I don't get the signals I would in CE or the ones I would get in OE.

Lest anyone still doesn't understand what I'm talking about when I brought this up... by "no chest contact" I don't mean contact along the SIDE of the body in a V-embrace... I mean the point of contact is in the area of the follower's tricep and inside of her elbow. Where that lands on the leader depends on his height, but they seem to want it on their bicep and elbow. (but not in an expanded ballroom frame) The chests may be V or parallel (usually parallel) close enough that loose clothing would brush, but you don't feel it. Literally a few inches. Too close to see, too far to feel.

Or perhaps these guys are just used to bustier women. Maybe I could solve the problem with a WonderBra.
 
Zoopsia59 said:
...they seem to want it on their bicep and elbow...
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Reminds me of a perfectly awful swing dance I had many years ago. My partner was a beginner and had clamped my elbow between her body and L upper arm, making it impossible for me to bend my elbow. My forearm and hand were sticking out behind her, with my hand waving around in the air. It didn't seem so funny at the time.
 
dchester said:
A beginner who thinks they are advanced.

:D
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Yeah, I was thinking this too... That Beginner and advanced are actual levels of dance ability whereas Intermediate is a psychological state that people pass through just before realizing they are still beginners.
 
[quote="Zoopsia59,]
Or perhaps these guys are just used to bustier women. Maybe I could solve the problem with a WonderBra.[/quote]
Heh. I've gained a fair but if weight, and prolly now qualify as "busty." It doesn't help. ;-)
 
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