Tango late in life?

Not to mention just the barriers that men face when learning to dance. Of about ten men that started with my beginner’s class I only see about three left after nine months. And only two of us are brave enough to go to milongas.
I don't see any "barriers," meaning anything that could be moved aside. The entire concept of "tango" is significantly less attractive to men (in Northern Europe) than to women. Tango was, after all, originally "designed" to be attractive to women. And I don't think there's any consensus to change that.

Oddly enough, a few couples that won’t dance with anyone else, won’t rotate partners in class and only dance with each other are also the ones that go to milongas enthusiastically.
The needs of (functional) couples are simply different from those of singles, and in my opinion this becomes even more pronounced with age.

There is hope though, there is one guy in my class whose wife has tried to get him to dance for 15 years and he finally started taking classes and is actually enjoying it. So as long as the tangueras get married early and start influencing their spouses to dance once in while, it can take less than 20 years for it to be part of the relationship.
What a view of men, and also of women!
 
Or rather, I'm trying not to let it intimidate me. My own market value has gone to zero. Nobody dances with me anymore because it feels good, because my social standing is advantageous, because I'm considered attractive, or because they can draw attention to themselves through technique or charisma on the floor.
Assuming they do want to dance with you for above reasons, I recall you stating being on restricted diet on how much you dance these days :)

I really doubt your market value is gone to zero. You are not considered attractive? :P I need to poll the women at your milongas!!
 
For sure! And a lot of the women I see learning to lead do it because...
I know several women who have chosen tango as a lifestyle (pilates, tango, pottery, travel, yoga...) for their later years, just as you described in your opening post. And without a doubt, being able to lead becomes beneficial in several respects, especially at that stage.

My girlfriend tells me that dancing with women is a separate style of its own. And quite a few women tell her that women lead more sensitive anyway, and that it actually works better without men. My view is that, at least with regard to events and travel, the scene will continue to fragment while I get older, according to the needs of different target groups.
 
Thank you so much for sharing this. Your words carry a quiet, profound truth—the kind that only comes from someone who has danced long enough, lived long enough, and loved tango deeply enough to see its seasons change.


What you wrote resonates with me in a very personal way. I also used to dance every day—ten, sometimes fifteen years ago—milongas from beginning to end, losing myself in tandas like they were chapters of a story I never wanted to end. Now, with heart issues, I hardly dance once a week. Sometimes the sadness comes in waves, especially when I feel the body say “not today” even though the soul is begging for music. But I’ve come to accept it. Not in resignation, but in a way that feels like gratitude. Looking back, I carry no regret. This—these few steps, these walks forward and back, these ochos, these cortados—this is what remains, and I love it immensely. Basics, yes, but full of meaning.


Your dinner gathering with those six tangueras touched me. It felt like a small window into the future—what aging in tango might look like—its losses, yes, but its fierce, stubborn beauty too.


Your stories about them were a mirror to something I’ve quietly observed:


Tango doesn’t leave people. People find new ways to remain inside it or connected to it.
Thank you for sharing.
As someone who is absolutely hopeless at learning other languages, I do empathise with the difficulties of posting in another one. However, I'd strongly recommend either using your own words or doing a direct translation over asking an AI to do it for you. As soon as I see obvious AI output, I stop reading, and I'm sure I'm not alone in this.
 
As someone who is absolutely hopeless at learning other languages, I do empathise with the difficulties of posting in another one. However, I'd strongly recommend either using your own words or doing a direct translation over asking an AI to do it for you. As soon as I see obvious AI output, I stop reading, and I'm sure I'm not alone in this.
British understatement?

It's the way AI renders the style for the anglophone audience. It just doesn't sell it!

I wonder if it's as poor for hispanic, francophone, or german? Or maybe it's about what's fed in?

A golden rule in good translation is to have a native speaker, who understands the culture (cf reading the 'mood' of the dancefloor), for the final cut. Poor translation is acceptable given that you know the provenance - at least someone tried.
 
I recall this post in the Queer Tango London Facebook group about wheelchair dancing:


If you can't view it, it's a video of a Buenos Aires-based wheelchair dancer, Brenda Holtz, dancing in a milonga there, along with an initiative QTL are currently involved in.

There's also another about two wheelchair dancers dancing together, but no videos.

 
And quite a few women tell her that women lead more sensitive anyway, and that it actually works better without men.
I’d say for me the main difference when I dance with female leaders is that they know which moves they like as a follower and then prioritise to learn to lead these. Sometimes. And sometimes these coincide with my personal preferences. There’s also the opposite, since many lead in open embrace, there might be a bit too many ganchos and flashy tricks. “Better than with men”? Nah… I can think of only one woman, my favorite milonga leader, who I’d pick any day over a guy of equal skill level.
 
There used to be large Tango Inclusion events (Tango en Punta) but they have not resumed since Covid. Videos show people in wheelchairs, with Down's Syndrome, and fully enabled.
Southern California Tango Competition had a wheelchair performer, awesome to watch, but I didn't see him dance socially.
 
Hahaha, I might burst his bubble of online persona… I expected a grumpy old bitter man based on this forum… I sure was in for a surprise when we met!
I am pretty sure he is not how he writes. I have been on Internet long enough to know writing style doesn’t project irl personality. Neither do I think it is deliberately cultivated. @opendoor likes to be a provocateur at times. But there are plenty hints in how he loves socializing, success at finding dates at milongas, etc - not at all signs of someone grumpy. And in a few pics he has posted he comes across as a good and pleasant looking gentleman :) I am pretty sure he is an enjoyable company irl. As to his lived tango experience different from the most of us, that makes it interesting, not bitter.

Helping burst a bit more of the bubble :D
 
I’m going to 90th birthday party next week for a favorite old dance partner I haven’t seen for a decade, I believe. He stopped due to a severe medial issue. In fact, he collapsed on the dance floor! From something life threatening - a ruptured aneurism in the neck - and was saved because there were two highly qualified doctors present. The likelihood of there being doctors present in a tango scene is pretty high. Another place where an old salsa friend of mine was saved from a heart attack that required quadruple bypass surgery, was when he was a referee for a little league soccer game at an expensive private school where a lot of the kids had doctors as parents. He collapsed in the middle of the game. Oh, another story about him. Maybe a decade later he had another serious medical event that landed him in a coma. He was gone for I don’t know how long, and the two people he had designated to make decisions for him were dance friends. One of them told me later the story of when they had to make the grueling decision about pulling the plug. They put on some loud energizing salsa music on, stuff they knew he liked and there was the first reaction they had felt in weeks! Now he has recovered and I have danced both salsa and tango with him since then.
(Gee, I’m tearing up thinking about these wonderful old chaps and how close a call it was for both. They are still with us!)

Dancing is life prolonging. And proven to be dementia preventative.
 
..And in a few pics he has posted he comes across as a good and pleasant looking..
I think I posted two photos: one from a beach milonga at the tango festival in Sitges (Spain), all in swimwear (I'm too fat for that sort of thing now) and one from a ball. But that was twenty years ago. I'm quietly working on a comeback.
..burst a bit more of the bubble :D
I never hid, especially not in tango, I always found those dancers you'd never meet on the street at day light highly suspicious. I always thought it was important that my tango existence had some overlap with my everyday life.
My FB account
My theatre company
See You!
 

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