[Tango-L] Transition from Intermediate to Advanced

[Tom Stermitz]

On Jul 5, 2006, at 7:01 AM, astrid wrote:

>> Tom wrote:
>> I've recently noticed in several different venues, that the women
>> have not been living up to the skill level of the men. There may be
>> many explanations, but I think fundamentally, women learn quickly at
>> first, but have a much more difficult path going from Intermediate to
>> Advanced. Men learn slowly and steadily from the very beginning.
>
> I do not agree with Tom, and maybe his community has a very  
> different set up
> from ours, too. But Chris is right to the point.

By different venues, let me be more specific: US Festivals, US  
Travel, Buenos Aires milongas.

By "Advanced" I mean both technical ability, subtlety and musical  
expressiveness. An advanced leader can transform an intermediate  
follower. An advanced follower can transform an intermediate leader.


 From Astrid's descriptions, Tokyo sounds like the very different  
case. Denver is similar to other mid-sized US cities with 10 years of  
tango like Portland, Seattle, Atlanta, and others. (We have 100-120  
person milongas twice per week, and another 40-80 two or three  
times). Tokyo's huge excess of women and studio-functions (milongas?)  
seem quite bizarre.

I agree with Astrid that women can progress rapidly by taking  
privates, especially if they have ballet or other training, and that  
women are much more likely than men to seek improvement via privates.

I also agree with others that there is a large "complacent- 
intermediate" faction everywhere (men & women). And, obviously we  
experience lots of beginners and bad dancers.


MORE MEN TRANSITIONING?

My observation and my point here, is that I have the recent  
impression of more men transitioning from Intermediate to Advanced,  
and I've seen more women sticking at Adv-intermediate than a few  
years ago. (Yes, I'm generalizing, and "more" is just my subjective  
opinion. I'm talking about the average across a room of dancers, not  
the exceptions we can all point to. Take out the pros and the  
beginners...)

For example, in Buenos Aires this year I felt there were more good  
men than good women. But, in general the level in BA has dropped  
dramatically from 10 or 5 years ago, even in the good afternoon  
milongas where you do have many excellent dancers.

Second example, in festivals and among foreigners in Buenos Aires you  
see intermediate & advanced women traveling to find better men to  
dance with (just as Astrid describes), whereas few intermediate men  
have similar drive or confidence, so the traveling men tend to be  
more advanced.


ENOUGH ABOUT BEGINNER FLAWS.

The discussions on Tango-L frequently seem to bog down discussing  
beginner flaws (men pushing; women doing ochos on their own), as if  
the biggest problem in tango is that the local teachers aren't having  
a lot of success getting people from beginner to intermediate.

The big issues for the Advanced transformation:
  (1) Learning how to learn.
  (2) Pride, dedication, seeking of perfection.
  (3) Talent & technical or athletic ability,.
  (4) Musicality, Inspiration and physical expressiveness.


LEARNING PROCESS

Getting back to the difference in learning process for men and women.

It could be that the difficulties faced by men at the beginning  
filters out the less talented or less persistent. It filters in the  
kind of men who like the challenges and puzzles of tango, men who  
have the ability to learn in a focused way, and men who are more  
confident or bold, characteristics important for  advanced dancing.

And conversely, the (comparatively) easy experience women have at the  
beginning doesn't prepare them for working harder as tango moves to  
the higher level. The experience of having a great leader give a  
woman an amazing dance gives her the experience of early success, and  
fools her into thinking all she needs to do is work on following well  
and have a decent leaders.


Here's my concluding thought.

At first tango learning filters for women with good RECEPTIVE skills  
(following), while for men it filters for good ASSERTIVE skills  
(leading). In other words, going from beginner to intermediate trains  
up or favors learning styles for the women that are insufficient or  
even detrimental for going from Intermediate to Advanced.

Because the men are (typically) the leaders, they are always  
proposing ideas in the dance. So the learning process of beginning  
tango prepares men for the skills they need for the Intermediate to  
Advanced transition

I'm going to suggest that women would take a huge step upwards if  
they worked at leading.

I would also suggest that men are greatly improved if they work on  
the follower's role.

These are not new insights. Daniel Trenner has long advocated this  
training method. I have personally experienced it to be beneficial. I  
now feel that maybe it is highly useful, if not essential.



> The truth is, there are lots of things a woman can learn in classes or
> private lessons, but ultimately, her range of expression and  
> chances to put
> her ability to use depends on who she dances with. In our community  
> we have
> quite a number of women who are good dancers. Women flock to  
> lessons, and
> also often take series of (private) lessons with Rivarola, Oscar  
> Mandagaran,
> Jorge Torres, Balmaceda etcetc. whenever they come to town. The  
> men, on the
> other hand, are rarely found in expensive workshops, master  
> classes, and
> even less in privadas, and some not even in milongas. So, many men  
> either
> never really learn how to dance, some do and forever stagnate  
> around the
> intermediate level, a few take workshops in California, BA,  
> Scandinavia etc.
> during business trips, and a few master classes in Tokyo, besides  
> studying
> or not with some Japanese teacher they never talk about, and every  
> time I
> meet one of those, they have either improved a lot and are just  
> back from
> some trip or busy with some master classes, or their skill has  
> dropped to
> floppy and vague again, because they have not been dancing for a  
> while, and
> have once again forgotten most of what they knew for a while.
> ...
> So, Tom, in my experience, men do not at all learn slowly and  
> steadily from
> the beginning, women do learn more quickly, and may have some  
> difficulty
> reaching advanced stage, but that is mainly for lack of a partner  
> suitable
> to their own level, not because they would not have the skill or  
> willingness
> to get there. Some of our best women here simply go to dance  
> overseas, in BA
> or whereever, to get a better choice of partners and I have heard  
> of US
> women doing the same.
> Another obstacle for upper intermediate women is that certain men  
> eternally
> prefer to drag around some cute new face beginner who may not know  
> how to
> dance but is easily impressed. How do you compete with that?
> In Tokyo, tango is a men's world, even if there are not so many of  
> them
> around...
>
> Astrid's 2 cents
>
> P.S.
> Tom, what do you define as "advanced level"?