[Tango-L] on open-embrace teaching (was something on inventingsteps)

[Lois Donnay]

Hmmm - this isn't my experience. I don't teach fancy patterns, or in open embrace, and I 
teach lots of technique. Yet I generally have more men in my classes and my classes are 
quite successful. I hear that another teacher in town, who teaches in open and with lots of 
complicated patterns, has more women in his classes.  Now I'm not saying that there aren't 
guys in town who are drawn to do too many fancy moves that they haven't learned how to lead 
yet, just that it's not good to generalize. Nor is it always the men - sometimes there are 
women who ask the men for fancy moves.

Then there's the teachers from out of town - We had a visiting teacher in town last week 
who taught the move where the woman secadas the man. I dislike that move, as it is almost 
impossible to lead well, and I don't think it is musical, beautiful or comfortable. A move 
purely meant to impress students. But because he taught it, and because he is from out of 
town, I'm sure the leaders in town will be cranking the followers around trying to emulate 
him, at least until his influence is forgotten. But being a traveling teacher is a 
competitive business, and I understand that you've got to have something new.

Loisa Donnay
Minneapolis, MN, where the Heartland Tango Festival opens May 9th!


> Again, across the great USA, the teachers with the
> most successful classes are going out and finding 6 or
> 8 step patterns that are tricky or elegant and
> bringing them back home.  Why?  Because that is how
> you keep men in your classes.  The men don't, as a
> norm, see that they are learning finnesse.  They see
> that they are learning a pattern that they can show
> off.
>
> However, if you go to the class looking for the
> finnesse, the feel, you can get just as much out of
> the class.