Teachers: do you dance at Milongas?

[UKDancer]

I may have misunderstood what you are asking about. Is your question (more or less) when to do an ocho, vs some other step (like a pasada, or walking)?

I guess it is, fundamentally. I think that I would put it in different terms: perhaps, given a particular piece of music (nothing too difficult) what basic structure of stepping pattern might produce a simple but satisfying dance, hitting all the musicality targets (or a decent proportion of them) and not boring the follower to death.

I appreciate that there would be lots of different answers, even for the same dancers and the same piece and on the same day, but are there any underlying principles that can be brought into play, to produce a dance that isn't packed out with too much content, v. one devoid of any?

Given the sort of music I have in mind, and given no floorcraft reasons to depart from it, a 'simple' but probably not very satisfying dance could be had from dancing an 8CB again and again, always stepping on slow counts, and so matching the music's phrasing. Given a chance, there would even be possibilities to vary the movements (or their timing) slightly, to reflect the orchestra's interpretation of the song, and if this was not a potentially 'satisfying' dance (meeting the stated requirement of using simple movements), then why not?

Answers on a postcard, please, and objections on the grounds that any use of the 8CB would immediately preclude a satisfying dance will be disqualified, unless objectively justified...

BTW, I don't dance the 8CB, ever, myself. I use some of its elements, but I never dance those eight steps in sequence.

 

[dchester]

BTW, I don't dance the 8CB, ever, myself. I use some of its elements, but I never dance those eight steps in sequence.

Neither do I (at milongas). It's a just a teaching drill. I was taught it, and I teach it, though.

 

[tangomonkey]

Neither do I (at milongas). It's a just a teaching drill. I was taught it, and I teach it, though.

I use it sometimes if I'm dancing with a very inexperienced beginner and I know she has been taught it. I will vary the timing here and there so it may be 6cb or a 10cb. I will not do it over and over again, of course.

 

[AndaBien]

... and not boring the follower to death...

Many inexperienced leaders are quite concerned about this, but they needn't be. Most experienced followers would I'm sure, say that a dance does not have to be fancy to be very satisfying.

...to produce a dance that isn't packed out with too much content, v. one devoid of any?...

You don't get good content into your dance by putting quantity steps. You get it by putting quality steps.

... a 'simple' but probably not very satisfying dance could be had from dancing an 8CB again and again,...

If you did the 8cb the same way, or with minor variations, it could be quite boring. It's an interesting idea to do an entire dance using 8cb, but make it different every time. Change the timing, the strength, the emotion, the size, the rhythm. I've just named 5 things. Multiply that times 8 counts and you have 40 possibilites, more than enough. Include nuance in the equation and you have infinite possibilities. It's conceivable that your partner would have no idea what you had done, when the dance was over.

I once had a private lesson with a woman from Argentina. She worked me on the side step for the entire lesson. Her English was marginal, so it took me a while to figure out what she was talking about, but once I did, I loved the lesson. It was one of the most eye-opening lessons I ever had.

Did you watch the video of Cacho?

 

[dchester]

I guess it is, fundamentally. I think that I would put it in different terms: perhaps, given a particular piece of music (nothing too difficult) what basic structure of stepping pattern might produce a simple but satisfying dance, hitting all the musicality targets (or a decent proportion of them) and not boring the follower to death.

The term "basic structure" is puzzling to me. I probably could come up with something close to a basic structure for the step rhythms (although it would be closer to a guideline), but as for the specific steps, I'd have to give that more thought, as my approach is different as far as how to select the specific steps (as opposed to the rhythms).

I could say something like, if I'm walking, and next I want to step to quick steps, then I'd likely do rock steps. If I'm doing ochos and I wanted to do quicksteps, I'd likely lead a molinette. If a pause in the music was coming, I might just pause, I might lead a slow boleo (low, of course), or maybe a pasada. How the follower responds to my lead, has a big effect on this stuff.

A "simple" dance (which for me would mean I'm going for the connection), would entail lots of walking, pauses, rock steps, front ochos done to my right side (assuming the follower doesn't go on autopilot thinking it's going to be a pasada), maybe an occasional back ocho immediately walking out to the cross. Basically, it comes down to how well you can make things interesting, without doing a lot of steps. This entails a pleasant embrace (hopefully with head contact), which makes the pauses very enjoyable, an interesting walk, a gentle lead, etc. Of course for this to work, the follower must be able to respond to subtle things, and not try to assert her own intention (some Argentines call this, the surrender).

As they say, it takes two, to tango.

 

[dchester]

Many inexperienced leaders are quite concerned about this, but they needn't be. Most experienced followers would I'm sure, say that a dance does not have to be fancy to be very satisfying.

I agree with you, but I do understand the concern that new leaders have. It takes a while to get good enough at the skills needed to make a simple (i.e. walking) dance truly enjoyable to the follower.

I will also add that if a new leader can't walk well, he has almost no chance of doing more difficult moves well (making them enjoyable to many followers). This is something that took me a while to accept, on my tango journey.

 

[UKDancer]

Did you watch the video of Cacho?

Yes, I did, and I'm going to look again, in more detail, tomorrow when I have more time, but I liked his style, and can see how essentially simple, but subtle his dancing is. I didn't much care for his rather odd way of holding his follower's RH, but that is hardly an issue.

 

[UKDancer]

I agree with you, but I do understand the concern that new leaders have. It takes a while to get good enough at the skills needed to make a simple (i.e. walking) dance truly enjoyable to the follower.

I will also add that if a new leader can't walk well, he has almost no chance of doing more difficult moves well (making them enjoyable to many followers). This is something that took me a while to accept, on my tango journey.

I'm completely sold on the 'quality of walk' idea, and have been complimented on mine by quite experienced followers, at workshops where we have danced briefly in the partner rotation business. It's not something I would expect to struggle with: I'm a very experienced dancer (in other styles), and control, timing, weight transfer and carriage of the body's weight are all of vital importance in all the styles in which I dance, so it was only really a matter of working out what the AT requirements were, and I was away.

My difficulties usually start when I can't walk, and I'm left, in place, to come up with something that doesn't (can't) move. That's another story.

 

[Gssh]

I'd love to have a chance to go on a decently lead workshop that had at its focus sorting out just what, exactly, a leader might do, beat by beat, to produce one of these simple but satisfying dances. I do understand that this sounds like 'please choreograph a dance for me, so that I can learn the routine', but I don't mean that, at all. What I do mean, is to have an experienced leader guide me through the labyrinth of selecting when to move, and when to be still, in what directions, and with what actions: when to be clear and rhythmical, and when to be softer and lyrical.

I think one of the core problems with leading the "simple satifying dance" is that it first has to be satifying to the _leader_. Yes, we all talk endlessly how it is all about the follower, but if i as a leader am not actually satisfied with the dance i do i will not be able to convince the follower of it.

And i don't think there is really anything that will help a leader with that besides miles on the dancefloor. I actually think that is why most leaders get to that after we were able to say "sure, i can do a backwards saccada into a side saccada into a boleo here, but i don't want to" - before we can do that move there is always that tiny doubt if it wouldn't be cooler if we were able to do that trick.

In a way it is a paradox - almost everybody gets to that point at some time, and then wants to help others to reach it, but maybe it is impossible to reach without the intervening steps. I try to share what i think now about the dance, but sometimes i think it might not actually be useful to anybody. The real teacher of tango is the milonga, the social dance floor.

I just talked with a very good, very talented dancer who has been dancing for 1 year very intensly, and during the conversation i mentioned that i think that followers need about 5 years to find their own dance, and that it is really hard for them to get there. And he said something about how it depends on how much effort you put into it, and i realized that he felt i was exaggerating and i also realized how much my own view of the dance has changed, and to some extent i don't think that effort and classess and privates are as important anymore, but that an intimate, comfortable relationship with the music and dancefloor is the key, and that only comes from having gone to a thousand milongas ( this is a crazy number, isn't it? and at the same time most of us have reached it - 2 milongas a week on average (discounting festivals, and the 4-milonga weeks ), 50 weeks a year gets us there in 10 years.).

How to be happy with your dancing as a leader:

1) love the music - if you know the music doing rocksteps in place while stuck behind somebody can be endlessly entertaining - "look, i hit the break" "look i went from the violin to the piano" "look, i surprised my follower by dancing through the break" "look, there is a second rhythm line hidden here, and we can dance to that one, too" (this needs a certain degree of what i experience as layeredness of the music - and is why a lot of people after a while gravitate to the classics)
2) love the dancefloor - traffic is not an obstacle for dancing the way i want to, but an source of entertainment and inspiration, the dancefloor is like a second orchestra playing a second song one is dancing to - sometimes they are in harmony, sometimes there is dissonance, but it is always interesting to exist in the tension between those two things.
3) love the person you are dancing with and for - once you are on the dancefloor her technique and stylistic and musical preferences become the pallette one paints with - if she does wild crazy boleos lead them in the corners and towards the outside, but give her a chance to shine the way she wants to shine, if she does something on autopilot take note of it, and at least once surprise her by smoothly interrupting it and leading something else.

and 4) the hardest part is loving oneself. And i think this is why everybody has to go through a more stagey phase - it is really reassuring to know that one can do all these cool things, and do them when there is space and opportunity... ("there is a big difference between not wanting to do evil and not being able to" Montaigne .

Gssh

P.S. For a while now i have trimmed down my la cumparsita to just walking and pausing - i don't even allow myself rock steps or side steps. I find it a nice contemplative ending to a milonga - it helps to know which follower would enjoy something like this, though

 

[Gssh]

My difficulties usually start when I can't walk, and I'm left, in place, to come up with something that doesn't (can't) move. That's another story.

Just do rocksteps either in place or turning left or turning right - exactly the same technique and energy as the walk, and what makes a walking enjoyable makes rocksteps enjoyable, too.

Gssh

(take my opinion with a grain of salt, though - i am also deeply convinced that a beginning leader can survive a milonga and create acceptable dances with just walking and rocksteps - and nobody ever agrees with me there )

 

[AndaBien]

Thumbs up on those comments, Gssh!

 

[tangomonkey]

Thumbs up on those comments, Gssh!

Yup.

 

[AndaBien]

Just do rocksteps either in place or turning left or turning right - exactly the same technique and energy as the walk, and what makes a walking enjoyable makes rocksteps enjoyable, too...

I agree.

...i am also deeply convinced that a beginning leader can survive a milonga and create acceptable dances with just walking and rocksteps - and nobody ever agrees with me there :wink: )

I agree again.

 

[JohnEm]

I guess it is, fundamentally. I think that I would put it in different terms: perhaps, given a particular piece of music (nothing too difficult) what basic structure of stepping pattern might produce a simple but satisfying dance, hitting all the musicality targets (or a decent proportion of them) and not boring the follower to death.

This is what people mean when they talk about forgetting ballroom.
You are looking for a magic bullet yet there isn't one other then putting
in the time, the effort and the miles. A true non-choreographed dance
is improvised step by step in the moment and is influenced by your
partner, the music and the surroundings.

What basic structure of stepping? Look at this video and see how simply
the milongueros can move to the music but it's clearly not boring.

http://www.tangoandchaos.org/chapt_5video/17ismael.htm

It isn't shuffling and it's more complicated than first it looks
but not to the lady who is a picture of calmness.

I have little doubt about how I broke through the barrier of steps
and sequences and that was by finding partners who would practise
with me because they were getting something out of it too.
First it was only technique and gradually it became dancing to the music,
many whole afternoons or evenings have passed that way in moments.

This is a dance that can be practised in the small space of a kitchen,
you have the advantage of a whole studio to play in.

Gssh says a lot more about this in his long and worthwhile post,
effectively saying there is no shortcut and I would add that the time
it takes and the improvements you make depend entirely on you.

I appreciate that there would be lots of different answers, even for the same dancers and the same piece and on the same day, but are there any underlying principles that can be brought into play, to produce a dance that isn't packed out with too much content, v. one devoid of any?

Learn how to turn simply and navigate around the obstacles, no doubt
you are good at that in ballroom yet it is different in tango.

Given the sort of music I have in mind, and given no floorcraft reasons to depart from it, a 'simple' but probably not very satisfying dance could be had from dancing an 8CB again and again, always stepping on slow counts, and so matching the music's phrasing. Given a chance, there would even be possibilities to vary the movements (or their timing) slightly, to reflect the orchestra's interpretation of the song, and if this was not a potentially 'satisfying' dance (meeting the stated requirement of using simple movements), then why not?

You can dance the 8CB repeatedly if you must and, as has been stated
elsewhere, change the tempo with the music, turn it, change the
backstep to weight changes or sidesteps. Use a tiny right foot backstep
behind the left foot for One will enable a re-orientating turn for instance.
There is no substitute for playing and exploring the possibilities offered
by not having any set patterns at all.

BTW, I don't dance the 8CB, ever, myself. I use some of its elements, but I never dance those eight steps in sequence.

You have it all about face. The 8CB has no elements that "belong" to it.
It's a choreographed sequence for easy (lazy?) teaching made up of
some of the things tango dancers may do and it's thoroughly misleading.
I've seen it claimed it includes everything but that is totally ridiculous.
Arguably the salida and the resolution are ok but the automatic cross
for me definitely is not. Not that at one time I knew any better.

My view is that when I find a teacher who teaches the 8CB to followers,
stay away from their lessons/teaching. Followers should never learn it
because the men won't be encouraged to learn to lead and followers
will automatically cross as a result of the man stepping outside.
I've experienced the dreaded automatic cross and resulting confusion.

 

[dchester]

My difficulties usually start when I can't walk, and I'm left, in place, to come up with something that doesn't (can't) move. That's another story.

Rock steps, turns (giro), front ochos to the leader's right, ocho cortado, back ochos, slow low boleos, and don't forget that pauses can go in between any of this stuff if needed.