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Argentine tango blog
/ with Interaction Design interludes / by Oleh Kovalchuke |
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Tango dance connection
Sep. 2, 2004 - On quality of close embrace connection
"If I held you any closer I would be on the other side of you."
Groucho MarxListed below are some of connections I have experienced. I describe the followers styles only since I have not had a chance to experience different quality of leads. Everything applies to close embrace only of course.
Steady presence – the most common. Experienced with the close embrace followers who are aware that they need to be present but not comfortable enough with the lead cues to start fooling around with connection. Very easy to lead. The experience can range from flat to trance.
Dynamic horizontal axis – strong presence in the beginning of the stride somewhat lesser by the end of the stride (Alicia Ponce).
Dynamic diagonal axis – dangerous vulnerability, like a sword twisting and unfolding – experienced with one follower only. How does she do it? You fall into trance and do not wish to get out.
Fluid connection – the most challenging to lead and to follow. Quite a bit of twisting in the upper body. The most fun for milonga. Should be used by advanced dancers only and even then only when they are comfortable with each other’s lead and follow habits after the first dance in the tanda. The person has to be naturally wicked to follow this way. Do not force it otherwise it will be percieved as a lot of body noise.
“Love me now, you fool” connection – not always possible to reciprocate, especially on the dance floor.
The big momma connection – does not necessarily correlates with body size, however usually does. The follower puts you in her motherly embrace and owns you for duration of the dance. Later on she might mention: “oh, your lead is so cute”.
Fleeing connection – it's like stepping into thin air or chasing a ghost, very frustrating. Experienced with advanced dancers trained in open embrace who have no problem doing the footwork however essentially dance with themselves. Not all advanced followers who started with open embrace dance this way however I am yet to find a follower who started with close embrace dancing with fleeing connection.
Absent minded connection - experienced with some beginner-intermediate level followers trained in open embrace style. They often simply ignore the torso lead and either proceed with what they think might be implied or wait for the arms to push-pull. Unfortunately quite common around here.
Soft connection – response was like leading a pillow and I am not talking about breast size here – no edge whatsoever. Not for Pugliese, could work with later Fresedo I guess.
Flat connection (as soda without bubbles) – usually comes from the followers who are aware of necessity of presence but prefer to chat while they dance.
Refrigerator connection – it’s like pushing refrigerator around the floor. Experienced once only. Embrace was entirely superfluous.
Trepid connection – beginners, who literally tremble in your arms. This stage passes as experience gained, usually.
I wonder what are leaders like?
Sep. 3, 2004 - On quality of close embrace connection, follower perspective
Linda~ has posted some of her experiences with connection on Tango-L:
There's the awkward, timid connection. It's commonly found in beginners, but I've found that beginner leaders who learn close-embrace first don't seem to have as much trepidation. I think this is because the main thing for them is to maintain a good connection, so they don't have as much pressure to lead particular steps ("Oops, I didn t lead you to the cross").
Another common type is the business-as-usual connection, where the embrace is mundane, there s not much feeling between partners and you feel like you re just going through the motions. The dance is pleasant, but I could be drinking coffee.
There s the trust-me connection. There's a leader I know whose embrace is quiet but resolute, calm but totally in control. It is easy to surrender to his lead because the trust is established immediately in the beginning.
There s the passionate connection that ranges anywhere from quietly intense to "Ay, mi vida!" By that, I mean that the leader is full of energy (but not body noise), and his enthusiasm is infectious. Milongas are as uproarious as an open fire, and in the quiet moments, you can feel the emotion humming beneath his skin. The lead is clear, but not rough.
On another note, I have a tendency to assume that open-embrace (particularly nuevo tango) to have lots of motion, while close-embrace is a lot more calm. One memorable dance had all the circular dynamism of nuevo, but it was done in close-embrace. It was completely new and unusual to me, and it blew me away. [this is how good dancers dance in Buenos Aires - OK]
Lastly, the all-encompassing connection: there was a series of dances where I no longer thought of myself as a separate entity. I was completely lost in my partner, like when two colors of paint swirl together. I guess this is what people call trance, but I ve never experienced anything quite so powerful.
Aug. 4, 2004 - Learning the connection
I wrote in the usual confusing manner:
2. it takes more than technique to become good dancer musicality (as Robert Hauk correctly pointed out in his message) and in my opinion more important perception/responsiveness/ability to communicate and to add to the dance based on that ability to communicate are harder to learn but possible (not for everyone) with correct mindset, instruction and sensitive partner.
What I tried to say is that "connection" part of tango is much harder to learn. Understanding how your partner perceives the dance and complementing / enhancing his/her tango. When both partners are able to relate on this level then the connection is amplified and becomes the proverbial "tango trance".
Not everyone is able to reach this level of connection (and performance dancers do not need it at all and therefore would have trouble teaching it, I think) because not everyone is capable to empathize. It is well known that most women empathize much easier than men. Maybe that is why it takes men longer to become a good social dancer according to numerous quoted estimates. Of course there is a matter of learning to lead the steps too (as opposed to connect), but I am not talking about mechanics here.
Aug. 6, 2004 - On conversation of movement, good women leaders and empathy
Frank G. Williams wrote:
It's so disappointing to mark steps that give the follower latitude to interpret a lovely song and then... she totally ignores the opportunity. In the 'conversation of movement' she not only misses your straight line, she doesn't know you're listening for a come-back.
Lois Donnay wrote:
I see many more women who are good leaders than men who are good followers.
[There could be many reasons for this including the one below - OK]I wrote:
"Connection" part of tango is much harder to learn. Understanding how your partner perceives the dance and complementing / enhancing his/her tango... Not everyone is able to reach this level of connection ... because not everyone is capable to empathize. It is well known that most women empathize much easier than men. Maybe that is why it takes men longer to become a good social dancer.
--------------------------------------------------------
I think we are writing about the same thing.
Jul. 25, 2005 - Connection, an input from active follower.
Hyla Dickinson from Seatle has posted some very eloquent thoughts on role of follower in achieving that elusive perfect connection with a partner. Here are excerpts:
...listen to the music. I would change my breathing, the tension or density throughout my body, the weight of my footfall. I would alter the feel of the embrace, snuggle in or be more aloof... This is something that the more sensitive and musical leaders will always notice, even when I don't notice it myself. It is a "hidden" part of the conversation.
...When my body responded to the mood of the music with a different density or alertness or tension, they would mirror that, or pick up on it in some way. They would alter their own interpretation to include my limited one, or breath deeply so I could feel it bring us closer together into the embrace, the music, the dance.
These musically sofisticated followers are rare and very exciting to dance with. They do need to know and feel music very well though to pull off this kind of meaningful contribution (Hyla is also a tango DJ).
And from leader's perspective (Ramiro Garcia):
I have come to appreciate and understand several pieces of music that were opaque to me before, or I was simply indifferent to, because I was able to perceive how my partner was experiencing the music. Their bodies, their energy, their movement, transmitted their feeling to me. They were marvelous experiences. Subtleties in the music which I was not aware of at all became apparent. Patterns and harmonies that I didn't know existed, suddenly became part of our dance.
Dec. 18, 2004 - Musicality, what to do during pauses in the music
Jay Rabe from Portland on pauses:
The problem of pauses is that, if you let the movement of energy die when you cease the physical step movement, then you've lost something critical to the connection to your partner and the music. The trick is to keep the energy moving, swaying, rising/falling, but moving, while you're pausing. You can do this with intention, very subtle body movement, or with breath, always slow and controlled and intentional, inhale to raise the energy, or exhale to release it as you prepare for the next movement/step.
Great observation. I didn't analyze it (and no one taught me this) but this is exactly what I happened to do. Basically keep connection dynamic at all times. It's a subtle (invisible to a third party), vacillating movement in the torso full of anticipation of upcoming surge in the rhythm. Build up and release.
Even though controlled breathing sounds a bit too convoluted to me, more and more I shift my dancing from feet to my solar plex. Feet follow (with a good partner).
Jan. 17, 2005 - A problem dancing with the followers trained in the open embrace
One of the most common problems with the followers trained in the open frame attempting to dance in the close embrace is that their posture is pulled too far back from solar plex, which cripples connection, communication with the partner (the grossly exaggerated form of this posture is done by ballroom dancers). I have experienced this problem so many times especially with nuevo tango dancers.
Alexis Cousein wrote a lot about necessity of dancing in open embrace to be a good dancer and a bit about the magic of getting in close embrace:
Actually, the *very best* dancers will alternate between the three styles according to their movement, the music and the inspiration of the moment (and in a social dancing setting, the room on the floor ;) ) even within one dance - there's something magical about feeling your follower's hand sliding around your shoulder when you're going from an open to a closed embrace :] ...
Magical indeed. It's only when you separate from the close embrace to execute another exceptionally difficult step that you begin to feel like a bummer.
May 27, 2004 - On dancing close and close embrace dancing
Basically the title says it all. Dancing close is not close embrace dancing.
I was reminded of this recently when I had danced with two "beginners" (6 and 9 months of dancing) with whom I had perfect connection and as a result I was able to lead virtually all steps I know without any problems. Those two dancers where highlights of two milongas to me. At the same milongas I have danced with much more experienced dancers (three and more years) who also followed all the steps but connection was rather poor.
The key difference was embrace. Caveat: many experienced followers dance in close embrace, it just happened so that at those two particular milongas prevalent style of my partners was dancing close. The perfect close embrace to me is this: man's right is opposite to his solar plex, hand reaches almost in the follower's armpit, woman's left hand is on man's left shoulder. Here are two illustrations of what I am talking about: http://www.close-embrace.com/southstreetseaport2052304/index.htm. Middle column first row "close embrace" tango, underneath in the second row "dancing close" tango.
Why is embrace important? In perfect embrace I never have to wrestle, try to lead with my arms or shoulders. Our body axes are necessarily perfectly aligned. All I have to worry about is shift in the common axis.
I assume the "dancing close" followers are students of open embrace instructors they could be exceptional dancers, they simply have never being taught the fundamentals of close embrace tango.
Tango is the dance of shifting axis and dynamic balance. Connection between the two dancers is needed to communicate the shifts in the body axis and the mastery of dynamic balance by each of the dancers in required to maintain steady connection. The subtlety of the shifts in the axis of the couple is what gives tango its smoothness, unpredictability and grace.
Those dancers, who are not aware of these fundamental principles of lead and follow communication resort to all kinds of replacement techniques. One is to hop up and down to indicate that the step is about to be executed – this technique is often employed by complete beginners. I can think of one dancing in Denver right now.
Another replacement technique is what I call “polka style” tango. Here the leader shakes up and down his left arm to beat the lead. You can find "polka tango" dancers everywhere including Buenos Aires. The result can be comic as in this clip (at 2 min 50 sec) or more subtle as, when Ricardo Viqueira does it. Ricardo is a good dancer, his steps are fun to watch, yet when Ricardo dances, his tango is not nearly as smooth as it can be. For examples of smooth, balance-and-axis based lead see this playlist of milongueros (a great example of smooth milonga dancing from the list - compare to Ricardo’s milonga).
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