[Tango-L] What Does It Take to Dance Tango?

[Tine]

Manuel
I am not so astounded. There are different pleasures to dancing with a
beginning follower than with an advanced follower. Beginners are very easy
to impress and they don't object to armleading, manhandling, non-consensual
close embrace, and inappropriate teaching on the dance floor, indeed they
are grateful if you help fight their inertia and point out their mistakes.
They would never ever think a mistake is the leader's fault, or if they
suspect it they would never mention it. If you've never taken a class you
also can't offer your leader suggestions on how to improve their poor lead,
hehehe. This is of course bad manners at a milonga, but dancing with a
beginner is a sure way to avoid being questioned. A mediocre guy can dance
with a beginner and make a deep impression on her, and consequently feel
like Mr Big Stuff. Try that with an advanced follower!

The pleasures of dancing with an advanced follower are more a high-stakes
thrill,  like driving a Ferrari. You point at the gas and it GOES. You think
about stopping and it stops. Better not crash now! Plus everybody is
checking you out, and you think you are being mentally compared by your
follower to a lot of professional teachers and/or super cool pony tail and
cargopants types. You have to be really good and/or very confident to enjoy
this. This is assuming of course that there is a high pressure social scene
unfolding around you.

I know I vastly prefer advanced followers when I lead, even though as a
female I know I can't offer a hairy chest so I usually dance with the ladies
who have been passed over by the hairy chests for that particular tanda:
often beginners or the ones who don't bother to improve themselves. I have
some friends who are advanced followers and when I dance with them, man,
those boleos really go! Super gratifying. Of course, as a girl I am not in
the least bothered by fears of looking inadequate or unmanly in the eyes of
one or the other hot tango chica, so my motives are different from a guy's.

Tine


On 8/14/06, WHITE 95 R <white95r at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> >From: "Caroline Polack" <runcarolinerun at hotmail.com>
>
> >
> >I'm astounded, so far, there's been several responses to my first post
> >today
> >- both private and public and seems to me that the general consensus
> among
> >men who responded is that women do not need instructions or training to
> >dance the tango! That in fact, the less training, the better.
> >
>
> I'm also astounded that someone would make such patently absurd statement.
> I
> don't know what sort of "tango dance" these men do with all these totally
> untrained and uninstructed women do, but from what I know about Argentine
> Tango (and practically every other dance I know of), it definitely takes
> training and instruction to actually dance. Sure, I've seen the occasional
> phenomenal woman who can follow almost perfectly with little tango
> training.
> But they are definitely the very rare exception. And by the way, they are
> already astonishingly good salsa dancers in a professional level.... Most
> totally untrained and uninstructed women cannot dance tango at all.
> Actually, they can hardly take a step to a given lead without tripping, or
> losing their already precarious balance. IMHO, the women who learn tango
> the
> fastest are usually good dancers of some other style and they definitely
> have lots of natural talent, and even they can use training and
> instruction.
>
> sincerely,
>
> Manuel
>
>
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>



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