I was taught that milonga should be danced "on the ground" as milonga is not intended to be dance in the ballroom, more in the street, man stepping more flat footed (accentuate the beat), and women should have knee bent and dance on toes.
Rise and fall when walking?
- Thread starter Dave Bailey
- Start date
I was taught that milonga should be danced "on the ground" as milonga is not intended to be dance in the ballroom, more in the street, man stepping more flat footed (accentuate the beat), and women should have knee bent and dance on toes.
Dave Bailey
Active Member
Yeah. I get it. We all get it. In fact, we all got it about 177 posts ago. I still get it.
Now how about actually answering a question on a technical topic, rather than spamming the forum with BsAs adverts?
How's that sound as a concept?
Good grief. You're worse than Barrefly and his daughter.
Peaches
Well-Known Member
Interesting. Very very interesting.
The on the toes bit for women runs contrary to most of what I've ever been taught. Don't know about the guys' flat-footed thing, or necessarily how that contributes to accentuating the beat, but whatever.
Kinda seems like a lot of rules, but it could just be the difficulty of communicating about dancing via the written word. I tend to think of milonga as being the most changeable of the three.
Lilly_of_the_valley
Well-Known Member
In the context of learning tango, when there is a question "How to do (better) this or that?" the answer like "Look at the old milongueros, those who have been doing it for ages, quite successfully. Observe how they do it" is a totally legitimate answer. That is how many people who are extremely good at tango learned in the first place.
Why would you consider it spamming?
Oftentimes, I believe, it is the best possible answer to such questions...
Why would you consider it spamming?
Oftentimes, I believe, it is the best possible answer to such questions...
hbboogie1
New Member
Quote:
Originally Posted by jantango
The question of rise and fall could be answered by attending a milonga in Lo de Celia or Centro Region Leonesa and observing the milongueros. If you can't make the trip in person, watch a video on YouTube.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jantango
No, it's impossible. When two are connected, they move together.
Let’s not fight children.
Yes Dave B Jan always seems to make reference to BsAs when it comes to tango, that’s where she lives and dances.
After making 4 trips to BsAs and observing the rise and fall the connections looked pretty good to me and everyone seemed to move together.
After traveling to London and attending Negracha it reminded me more of the rise and fall of the Roman Empire.
Have you ever been to BsAs and danced at the milongas? If you haven’t I would highly recommend going it’s quite an eye opener.
If you have been I don’t understand some of your comments to Jan.
Originally Posted by jantango
The question of rise and fall could be answered by attending a milonga in Lo de Celia or Centro Region Leonesa and observing the milongueros. If you can't make the trip in person, watch a video on YouTube.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jantango
No, it's impossible. When two are connected, they move together.
To quote Godfather II: "Difficult, not impossible."
Flippin' heck Jan, do you ever answer a question with anything other than a plug for a BsAs milonga?
Let’s not fight children.
Yes Dave B Jan always seems to make reference to BsAs when it comes to tango, that’s where she lives and dances.
After making 4 trips to BsAs and observing the rise and fall the connections looked pretty good to me and everyone seemed to move together.
After traveling to London and attending Negracha it reminded me more of the rise and fall of the Roman Empire.
Have you ever been to BsAs and danced at the milongas? If you haven’t I would highly recommend going it’s quite an eye opener.
If you have been I don’t understand some of your comments to Jan.
Lui
Active Member
Dancing in B.A. is the mind opening experience. Although the first week was horrible for me. Everything I ever had learned seemed to be useless and wrong. No woman wanted to dance with me and on the floor I felt like a pinball. Only slowly did I begin to really learn. Therefore, jan’s answer is correct, but cruel to us, who can’t travel for which reason whatsoever.
Dining, talking and dancing with the milongueros I discovered that everyone of them seemed to have honed his individual style and was very proud of it, in a silent content way. When I took a class with one of them, I could hear his name murmured at the tables when passing by, even when he wasn’t at that milonga. The styles were so different and well known among this group, that they could easily identify who studied with whom. Consider this mentality! When everybody else dances with a straight leg, sooner or later someone would try to dance with bend knees and make this his trade mark.
“El Chachafaz”, considered the pinnacle of dance in his days, danced on the same level of height with a bend in the knee:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Yv9V-3APpc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTfwzCBNKAY
and the old timers in 70’s showed a bend and some up and down movement
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z219e03AmWg&feature=related
Therefore, it’s not the question, “Going up and down – yes or no ?”, but rather “When going up and down, what will it do to my dance and do I want these results?”.
Dining, talking and dancing with the milongueros I discovered that everyone of them seemed to have honed his individual style and was very proud of it, in a silent content way. When I took a class with one of them, I could hear his name murmured at the tables when passing by, even when he wasn’t at that milonga. The styles were so different and well known among this group, that they could easily identify who studied with whom. Consider this mentality! When everybody else dances with a straight leg, sooner or later someone would try to dance with bend knees and make this his trade mark.
“El Chachafaz”, considered the pinnacle of dance in his days, danced on the same level of height with a bend in the knee:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Yv9V-3APpc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTfwzCBNKAY
and the old timers in 70’s showed a bend and some up and down movement
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z219e03AmWg&feature=related
Therefore, it’s not the question, “Going up and down – yes or no ?”, but rather “When going up and down, what will it do to my dance and do I want these results?”.
jantango
Well-Known Member
I don't care to get into analyzing tango to death which happens to be your main interest. I don't understand why you consider my comments to be spam.
I am not advertising the milongas in BsAs. That's where I dance.
You seem content to avoid exposure to tango's roots. That's your choice. You certainly have lots of learn about the culture of tango.
Rise and fall is a British invention by the creators of the International (or Standard) ballroom style used in competitions (Blackpool). What they call tango with all that head shaking bears no resemblance to the original. If you believe, Mr. Bailey, that tango needs a rise and fall, then by all means just do it. You are the authority.
Having started posting on this thread and I just can't resist commenting. If you don't care to analyse why are you here and why comment at all. People are learning, querying, seeking answers to all the contradictions that are Tango in all its various flavours. People sometimes open their mouths first (or commit to the keyboard) without first researching, people don't always listen and stick to their own beliefs, but that's life.
You keep recommending going to BsAs but most people cannot do that sensibly. A two week tango tourist trail holiday is not going to be all that enlightening or aid in absorbing Tango. That probably needs 3 months or more preferably and it takes time before Tango gets important enough to someone to even consider that, if it's possible at all.
I may criticise (silently in the main) show influenced tango, so-called tango for export or what one milonguero apparently recently called "European" Tango but the Argentinians themselves, their world touring shows and the teaching participants are to blame for the public's view that that is what is Tango. And it makes many people want to try dancing it.
In the end, if your rather dismissive view prevailed, you would not be witnessing the growth or at the least the continuation, of Tango. Dances always need new blood, it needs to be encouraged. Hopefully a few will proceed to discover the heart and soul of Tango but it takes time.
As for rise and fall being a British invention, I doubt that. The British Ballroom people do seem to be the first to codify it, set standards for it, teacher assessments and lesson syllabuses etc. But they did contrive Ballroom Tango from Argentine and unfortunately they didn't like what they considered the creepy hold. They (we) aren't latins. So they changed the visal leaning in to a modified ballroom leaning out hold.
They did not incorporate rise and fall, the ballroom version is as flat as possible, heel-lead and with bent legs in a mistaken effort to make it visually rather than physically grounded. To me it's all ugly in look and feel. Don't get me going on about all that leg-flicking head butting stuff which actually is another influence from another country altogether.
However DB is not talking about ballroom tango which you definitely are (Blackpool etc) and that's just confusing the issue.
As milonga being fast you don't have time to down and up (in side step) or so. And generally steps are small and fast. If you have time to go up and down that's ok.
If you do giros in milonga you step on the heel, but not generally.
I was at Gustavo Rosas classes, and he also stated that milonga is danced linear.
It does not mean that during the dance you go up and down, but within a beat not.
Lilly_of_the_valley
Well-Known Member
Hmm... Two weeks in Buenos Aires can be very, very enlightening for tango students, if they prepare their trip well, and do their homework.
Heather2007
New Member
Crikey O'Reilly DB - that was harsh. You don't have to stick someone with a knife to have your name edited out of the Book of Good Deeds - words are just as lethal and produce equal measure. We may not agree with each other and boy have I come under some schtick in the past for my views (but, hey you know me - face-bovvered-face). Jantango has a right to her opinion (no matter how different, bizarre etc.) without the risk of coming under overt abuse. You disagree. Fine. Say why..and move on. And the Barrefly comment was well out of order. Sticking a finger at another's child is downright...well....my south-east London adjectives would not sit well here. Suffice to say, the winds have ears and a very sharp memory to boot. Lest we forget.
Dave Bailey
Active Member
So you're saying that answering any technical question can be reduced to "Come and watch the experts in BsAs"?
Why bother having a forum at all, huh?
Dave Bailey
Active Member
I believe you.
Unfortunately, some of us have commitments and lives which make such journeys practically impossible.
Dave Bailey
Active Member
Firstly, you've managed to misunderstand my comment about rise and fall. Secondly, you've managed to misunderstand my opinion about rise and fall.
My main complaint is that this thread is an "analysis by death" thread - if you don't want to partake in that exercise, fine, simply ignore it. But in a thread discussing technique, I think it's appropriate to keep the focus on discussing technique.
bordertangoman
Well-Known Member
My take on rise and fall was that i was taught to be as level as possible at the outset by keeping a flexed knee joint in normal standing position but after a three or four years and watching a lot of the better dancers I could see a rise in the collect position and thought that felt better; so that's how I dance now; with a modest amount of rise and fall.
DB you could go and watch CARLITOS & ROSA PEREZ at NEGRACHA, lucky sod.
DB you could go and watch CARLITOS & ROSA PEREZ at NEGRACHA, lucky sod.