[Tango-L] open steps, Huck's post

[Jake Spatz (TangoDC.com)]

Hi Martin (and everyone else),

John Ward's post is so far the only one that addressed my original 
question, and his suggestion provided an elegant answer. I think I'm 
scrapping the ship metaphor though, because it implies a preferred 
direction of movement. (A helicopter or hovercraft would be more apt, 
but most people know of "port" and "starboard" from sailing, and 
sailboats don't travel astern unless you're in a lot of trouble.)

I've already decided to replace the ship with the clock again (although 
the compass might do just as well). Basically, it works like this, for 
an embrace _en face_:

The space behind the leader is 9:00 (or "west")
The space behind the follower is 3:00 ("east")

This allows both partners to dispense with left, right, forward, and 
back as descriptors of the couple, and to reserve those terms (more 
properly) for what their own bodies are doing. There the words make sense.

The advantage of the clock is that it gives us more familiar gradations, 
in thirds. Also, CW and CC rotations remain perfectly legible. The 
compass, however, has terms not already used (numbers are used in the 
8CB; #3 matches in both schema), which eliminates confusion.

Time for a test run... (Readers who are lost with the verbal should 
produce a quick overhead diagram: leader on left, follower on right, 
12:00/North is the extended arm, or "top" of the page.)

I still fail to see the utility in describing 8CB #1-- a tandem step, in 
parallel, due west-- as an "open step," because the dancers' legs are 
NOT open with respect to each other or even to themselves. Also, to use 
the clock positioning this time, let's consider that the leader steps 
straight back to 9:00. The follower stepping to 8:00 is, with visual 
clarity, doing an open step-- which also demonstrates his to be open. 
Likewise, if she steps to 10:00, she's doing a cross-step-- and so is 
he, because of her position. Why the difference? Not because she's 
"crossed" her own body, but because she has crossed _the embrace_. Only 
in a "back cross step" does one dancer cross their own body without 
crossing the embrace (even in over-turned pivots, soltada cases excepted).

So, where does the step swap from "open" to "crossed"? Precisely at the 
"neither-point" of 9:00, or due west, or whatever you want to call it. 
The follower is stepping directly into the embrace. In order to see that 
it's an open step, you have to distort the position-- i.e., relocate the 
central axis of one or both dancers. Otherwise, there is no opening, and 
there is no crossing. But relocating the axis requires a weight-shift-- 
the sine qua non of a step. So, in order to get the "opening" there at 
all, you have to take _another_ step. Or at the bare minimum, you have 
to perform another movement. THAT step, sure, is open. The initial one, 
however, if unaltered, seems to be something else.

And in any case, even if you persist in calling that step "open," you 
must realize that it's only "kinda" open. I'm asking not for a 
justification of the system that calls it so, but for descriptors of 
greater precision. That one, in my opinion, has simplified too much.

Jake Spatz
DC

=POSTSCRIPT: On the clockface=
The clock-thing provides a unique advantage over other metaphors, 
because it allows for diachronic description of motion. To wit:
   Let the follower be hours (little hand), and the leader be minutes 
(big hand).
   The parallel 8CB may be notated thus (alignment matters are ignored 
in this example, to give this new notation greater simplicity the first 
time out): weight starts at noon for both partners:

9:45
12:00
3:15
3:15
[stationary shift = #5, cruzada]
3:15
6:30
[close; or, if continuous, 9:45]

   Transitioning from open to close embrace would be 9:15. Vice versa, 3:45.
   The major problem, as you can see, is that there's no way to refer to 
the center of a clock. Same issue with the "fifth point" of a compass 
(the middle).
   That said, if a leader is ever confused, he need only turn his hand 
palm-down and check his directions. In close embrace, he can glance at 
the follower's watch on his left shoulder.
   Provided, of course, that you wear a watch on your left hand, like 
most right-handed people do. (I'm only partially one of you.)
   Or perhaps we could denote a stationary weight-shift with "+", a 
cruzada with "x," and nada with "__" or "(  )"
   Thus #5 would be "X:+", and #8 (as a close) would be "+:+"
   This doesn't account for which leg is which, but at least it tells us 
where we're both going with a single (diachronic) descriptor.

Jake

Nussbaum, Martin wrote:
> Huck wrote about the open step more eloquently than I did, I should have
> kept reading before posting. 
> Jake wrote:  "And if an analysis can't tell the difference between #1 and #2
> in the 
> 8CB, I'm sorry, but it's a fairly worthless analysis. No?"
>
> Not really, the first step is an open step with right foot of leader, the
> second is an open step with left leg of leader. 
> Jake, the mere fact that there is a range of motion in the movement to open
> step in relation to the trailing leg doesnt render the defintion useless.
> For example, if in parallel you step back with the left, ie 6:00 on the
> clock, or you step 
> Slightly to back diagonal, (7:00 oclock), or you step to side (9:00 oclock),
> doesn't change anything.  It is only when the range of that movement, using
> our left leg in that example, goes forward or back in the range from 12:00
> to 6:00 oclock,  that we start to cross the standing leg.  Hey, I wonder if
> using clock numbers in this fashion makes sense for your notations, Jake?
> More common to us landlubbers than "port" and starboard one of the sailors
> posted. 
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