Tango Diaries

[Bailango]

That sounds like someone who has encountered the concept of projection but not understood it. Or been taught it badly.

It is also bad mechanics that have not been corrected.

Rather than an odd apple or two doing it, if significant numbers in community are doing it, the compass should point to the instructors in the community. Either they are teaching them incorrectly which leads to what had been described or are incapable of identifying the issue or are do not possess ability to correct it.

 

[Bailango]

I've been in classes where they taught this technique of going backwards a little bit before going forwards (or slightly shifting right before taking a left step etc), to produce a slight rolling sensation ( I think even a chicho workshop mentioned this), but it wouldn't be used as a normal/default step.

I know the mechanics of what is intended by those who instruct on doing it. It is basically an instructor (in inarticulate way) getting student to generate the forward momentum by pushing off the standard legs.

I must have done at least a dozen instructors’ workshop where between 30 minutes to full hour was devoted to just this aspect of projection and walk.

My conclusion is most are very ill equipped to verbalize and get the students to do what they mean but are not able to explain or breakdown.

I had to work it out on my own how and when I can employ slightly varying mechanics. The result is the same - projection, push off the ground and step in the direction (forward, back, or side). From the feedback I get both from the followers and advance dancers/instructors, I must be doing something right.

If there is one single thing that has improved for me in the last 7-8 years it is this project, push, step, arrive/finish. I used to get positive comments earlier too. But I think I have managed to improve it to a whole another level.

 

[Bailango]

Something like that. I was taught that one advances the torso to "project" and then the legs come along due to being attached. Yes, of course your legs stay under you (or you fall over), but they shouldn't carry most or all of the intention of the step, which should come from the core. In effect, the legs ground the core so that it can communicate.

In a more complex explanation….

The mechanics to project starts from the foot pushing against the ground. This then causes the (like a vertically traveling) invisible and unfelt wave (by the follower) which causes a projection that’s 0.5 projection. The remaining 0.5 is the torso’s intention of the directionality. Added to together that makes for me the total 1 of projection. In this neither my feet nor my torso has moved. They may be on verge of the movement but the movement is absent. The proof the projection is working is followers leg start the movement in the direction of the projection. I am not saying this is the only mechanic. It is the one I prefer. But I might also change and use different mechanics. What I avoid is being imbalance and introduction of noise in the projection irrespective of the choice of mechanics utilized.

If I project but decide to not move, I do it in two ways. One, I hold the projection and the follower’s leg hangs freely in the direction. No weight change by neither. This is a pause. It may be for musical reason or I am waiting for something ahead to clear up. The other is I cancel the projection and the follower realizes it. Her feet will often be back together. I could then either do a weight change or re-project in the same or different direction. These are the parts of toolbox I have. I can do them with most dancers. They clearly work best with good dancers. The subtlety and the energy will depend on how sensitive the follower is in perceiving the projection. Clarity is my responsibility. I can calibrate my own clarity.

Now there are other instances where my projection is more through lower body than the torso. I might push less off the ground and still project. Rather than projection, the momentum of the previous step is signaling the next step and its direction.

All these things happen in split second. The decisions are sometimes very conscious and sometimes I let the muscle memory take priority. Other times I am in the flow and not consciously taking decisions. Suffice to say there are complexities of which permutations and combination come together as we turn mechanics of movement into dancing. Even if it is one step.

 

[ArbeeNYC]

I find cabaceo usage more common the smaller the venue is (Solas and Nacional). The bigger ones a lot less so from my experience.

It may be because of the crowd size and the overall chaos (and often the lighting). But I've used it at the larger milongas as well.

 

[tangoing]

It may be because of the crowd size and the overall chaos (and often the lighting). But I've used it at the larger milongas as well.

I mean I use it at the large ones too, I just find it generally less successful with the younger followers unless it’s very close/obvious

 

[Bailango]

On the cabaceos, reading the experiences of posters from other scenes, it does appear this trend is much broader.

I don’t mind walking up and verbally asking. I do that in other dances and am used to it. But I don’t like this pretend cabaceo walking up to 5 feet and then asking. Everyone knows who you are going to ask. Yet I will say it is putting most of the followers on the spot.

As I have observed, I seen some leaders who are trying to cabaceo. They give up and walk to ask. Others try to find someone else. Whereas a lot of new leaders (started dancing in the last 2-3 years) will do walkaceo and talkaceo as if that’s how it is done.

 

[opendoor]

..Here, the original dancers (~1993) danced so-called "tango nuevo," "neotango," or whatever you call the Frumboli-Naveira-Salas thing...

Did you eventually make a mistake? Neotango arrived in my city ten years later, in 2003. In 1993, Chicho still was drumming in a post-punk band.

 

[Bailango]

Did you eventually make a mistake? Neotango arrived in my city ten years later, in 2003. In 1993, Chicho still was drumming in a post-punk band.

Agree. The neuvo craze started more around earlier part of mid-2000s.

 

[JournalInTime]

Did you eventually make a mistake? Neotango arrived in my city ten years later, in 2003. In 1993, Chicho still was drumming in a post-punk band.

There's undoubtedly a time gap between when the dance movements emerged and when those three guys got their name associated with them, but not in my memory: There's video evidence of such dancing here in the early to mid 1990s. Gustavo was the idol, although more once he started dancing with Giselle Anne in 1995.

 

[JournalInTime]

Agree. The neuvo craze started more around earlier part of mid-2000s.

Globally, perhaps.

Locally, it started sooner wherever the work of the Tango Investigation Group was more available than traditional dance masters. Montréal was (and still is) Canada's capital of contemporary, modern, new, and experimental dance; a lot of controversial and "edgy" approaches to traditional dance were welcomed here from the 1970s on, and in fact all the early tango instructors here started in those domains, not in tango at all.

Edited to add: My coach started as a contemporary dancer and later moved into circus arts, another of my influential teachers started in modern ballet, and yet another came from musical gymnastics. A somewhat infamous local figure loved to attack them verbally and in writing because he felt their credentials weren't proper tango credentials. However, they're the people who set the pace for tango here from the 1990s.

 

[JournalInTime]

One thing that keeps cropping up here is the assumption that Argentine tango somehow transcends local culture wherever it catches on, and has a global existence that penetrates virtually all culture and language barriers. This is a simple assumption that works reasonably well in many places. It probably even holds true for tango festival (including encuentro and marathon) culture worldwide. However, there are exceptions.

I live in a francophone part (Québec) of an otherwise anglophone country (Canada), a region that has a 65+ year history of rejecting the surrounding culture in favor of its own – in dance, literature, music, visual arts, and most other things (right down to beer, cigarettes, and travel destinations). A side effect of this is that when third-culture (i.e., neither native anglophone nor native francophone) phenomena land on the national doorstep, people here make a point of choosing different influences from those chosen by English Canada, and are often contrarians about how those things "should" look when adapted locally.

This is definitely the case for tango! In English Canada, tango largely followed the U.S. trajectory in terms of who was admired, how it was taught, which steps were danced, etc. In Québec, tango was reimagined quite a bit, in part due to an admiration for all things French, particularly ballet, and in part owing to Montréal from 1960 onward taking pride in cocking a snook at Toronto . . . it's a city that thrives on irreverence, which is extremely visible in dance. (More practically, maestros and maestras who speak French always get first billing over those who do not, regardless of pedigree or lineage.)

So, while you can certainly find expat Argentines teaching tango here, you can also find people teaching a more balletic, modernized dance and calling it "tango." The two groups intermingle – you can't pry them apart. Lots of wealthier dancers who travel come back and dance or even teach the more internationalized version, but their dancing definitely isn't seen as "standard" here.

Something to think about.

 

[tangoing]

On the cabaceos, reading the experiences of posters from other scenes, it does appear this trend is much broader.

I don’t mind walking up and verbally asking. I do that in other dances and am used to it. But I don’t like this pretend cabaceo walking up to 5 feet and then asking. Everyone knows who you are going to ask. Yet I will say it is putting most of the followers on the spot.

As I have observed, I seen some leaders who are trying to cabaceo. They give up and walk to ask. Others try to find someone else. Whereas a lot of new leaders (started dancing in the last 2-3 years) will do walkaceo and talkaceo as if that’s how it is done.

I just don’t like the narrative that women see all cabaceos directed at them and “it’s working as intended” if they don’t see yours when it’s obviously not the case.

 

[opendoor]

Did you eventually make a mistake? Neotango arrived in my city ten years later, in 2003. In 1993, Chicho still was..

There's undoubtedly a time gap between when the dance movements emerged and when those three guys got their name associated with them, but not in my memory: There's video evidence of such dancing here in the early to mid 1990s...

Of course, there was some precedent. Naveira studied with Dinzel and developed his style. Chicho had privates with Naveira. My Damascus initiation was Sally Potter's Tango Lesson in 1997. It was clear that Naveira had perfected his style. But Naveira was Nuevo, not yet Neo. Naveira danced upright, not earthily into the ground. Nuevo still had many artifacts of the Escenario style. But the first really authentic Neotango video was Chicho and Victoria dancing in 2003 to Tanguedia. The video hit like a bomb, it was a catharsis for me. Honestly, there was hardly any news of Neotango before that.

 

[ArbeeNYC]

But Naveira was Nuevo, not yet Neo.

Hmm. What's the difference? To my mind they're both very similar.

 

[Bailango]

Globally, perhaps.

Locally, it started sooner wherever the work of the Tango Investigation Group was more available than traditional dance masters. Montréal was (and still is) Canada's capital of contemporary, modern, new, and experimental dance; a lot of controversial and "edgy" approaches to traditional dance were welcomed here from the 1970s on, and in fact all the early tango instructors here started in those domains, not in tango at all.

Edited to add: My coach started as a contemporary dancer and later moved into circus arts, another of my influential teachers started in modern ballet, and yet another came from musical gymnastics. A somewhat infamous local figure loved to attack them verbally and in writing because he felt their credentials weren't proper tango credentials. However, they're the people who set the pace for tango here from the 1990s.

Here there were two sets of instructors.

One set was expatriate Argentines in the late 80s and early 90s that started teaching. I took a few classes from at least two such in mid to late 2000s. They were both good. One of them produced a lot of good dancers and also a second generation of instructors who started teaching in late to early 2000s and are still teaching. She also started one of the firsts if not the first major tango festival that would attract people from all over the country and beyond. It used to last a whole week.

The second set were the cast members of Tango Argentina and Forever Tango cast members who would based here when traveling in the USA for the show. They bought a lot of stage tango influence into teaching. They influenced the neotango dancers who then went on to become Neuvo style instructors.

I wasn’t around in 1990s. So everything I write is based on hearsay, told by those who started in 1990s. I haven’t met any local dancer that started in 1980s.

While the non-Argentine first generation instructors did had previous dance background (as far as I can tell from talking to them), they primarily danced more traditional close embrace than neuvo which started becoming popular around mid-2000s. The close embrace was danced apilado. Then in late 2000s the salon came in which people no longer danced apilado. Salon has been predominant for the last 13-14 years.

I do think this mirrors what I heard and talk with other dancers in the rest of the USA.

Locally, a certain sub-set of instructors have more influence than the rest. Their teaching style and student base then influences the predominant trend. If the worldwide popular trend is different, it takes longer to infiltrate the local scene.