[Tango-L] NA-E:Tango Therapy Conference in Rosario by Christina Johnson

[Kathryn Johns]

                           TANGO: A LIFE SAVER

            What soothes your heart, lowers your blood pressure,
cancels out diabetes, and counteracts depression?
What allows more balance and confidence to those with Parkinson's
disease? And gives people with Downs Syndrome a way to solidly inhabit
their bodies with more grace and precision? What unites your psyche
with knowledge of the body, inspires your endocrine system with
endorphins, and fattens your chances of a longer and much happier
life? Without Alzheimer's.
            Argentine Tango.

Yes, indeed; dance your way to maximum health and superior cognitive
mastery within the ecstatic embrace of tango!

I returned July 22 from the first International Tango Therapy
Conference in Rosario, Argentina.  I was invited to present a
miniature version of my workshop: Argentine tango: the Relationship
Dance.
The workshop is about the polarities of masculine/feminine energy, the
different brain functions of men and women, and how tango is a perfect
metaphor for why we need, and love, each other.
The conference brought together many professionals who have all
learned that the dance of Argentine tango has brought about
extraordinary, positive changes in many lives.
It is a HUGE undertaking to put on a conference.
I wish to heartily congratulate Ms. Marisa Adriana Maragliano, one of
the organizers, for doing an exceptional job. She cloned herself to be
everywhere at once, and had her finger on every rhythmic pulse of the
Conference.
There were many supporters and organizers who merit acclaim and
recognition:  ( see:
http://www.congresotangoterapia.com/organizadores.htm),

The conference was at the Hotel Ariston in Rosario, Argentina.
 More than four hours by bus from Buenos Aires; Rosario is a river
port city that has a top quality art museum and other interesting
sights. However, free time was brief if one wanted to get to all of
the presentations.
Tango milongas on two out of three evenings took the leftover hours of
sleep, and so heavy lidded participants arrived late every morning.
Almost all of the participants and presenters were also tango dancers,
so the milongas were well attended.

Largely psychotherapists, psychologists, and medical doctors did the
discourses and presentations. Most of the events were in lecture form,
although the last day allowed for experiential events involving
movement and/or dance.

The first morning Drs. Ricardo Comasco and  Luis Aposta opened the
conference. They both represent work from the Favoloro Foundation; a
well-known and respected specialty heart clinic in Buenos Aires.
 Their research, using equipment to measure oxygen consumption and
heart rate, clearly shows that dancing tango gives one optimum
exercise without strain. In addition, flexibility is increased,
self-awareness increases, depression relieved, and social anxieties
reduced.
            Some very humorous tango posters from the turn of the
century were shown, at a lecture on "los Bailes del Internado". In the
early 1900's, medical interns and doctors took to tango in a morbid
frenzy. Posters showed doctors with bloody aprons and scalpels dancing
tango together. Social milongas were hosted by interns, and once in
awhile severed anatomy was hidden at the milongas for a joke.
            Fortunately, it seems the love of tango is still alive in
the Argentine and Uruguayan medical profession, but is now pairing the
gift of science with the dance instead of with the macabre.
            Presentations included subjects of : individuation through
tango; encountering the psyche's shadow and using the alchemical
process of transformation turning darkness into luminous light.
            Feldenkrais method and body awareness. Presentations
included movement and exercises to awaken and limber the body. These
were very well led, and a welcome relief from sitting still in chairs
during presentations.
Using "Psicotango," participants succeeded in using all the senses to
rediscover movement and connection to each other. This kind of
awareness is, in my opinion, at the heart of tango, and is what
contributes to the pleasure of a dance.
It is the art of play itself, and continual re-discovery, that makes
the inner smile widen during a tango dance.
            Another presentation stressed that tango keeps us alive in
our basic core, as it enlivens the libido. Through the ritual and
ceremony of tango and its customs, it becomes a group participation
dance of life celebration, not just a ritual for two.

            Musicology was also introduced as a healing therapy; with
interesting data about illness dropping away after hearing different
tones, notes, and rhythms. Memory retention, help for Alzheimers and
dementia were also addressed in a talk about favorable results of
movement and sound when they are coherent and integrated.
            One complete dissertation was on the embrace of tango, and
the healing effects of partnering in a dance where hearts beat in
unison, and where contact and touch become a healing art. The speaker
was Dr. Federico Trossero, a psychiatrist, tango performer, tango
teacher, and researcher of tango as a therapy. His book is called
Tango Terapia.
           Another book, Con el Corazon en el Tango, Includes research
data The author is Dr, Roberto Peidro, chief of Cardiovascular
Rehabilitation at the Favoloro Hospital in Buenos Aires.
            Short films were shown of mentally and physically
handicapped people, including those with Down's syndrome, dancing in
hospital halls. Enlightened and free with their new dance ability,
their movement was graceful and their co-ordination was extraordinary.
At the conference itself, a young, beautiful, and blind participant
was in not only my workshop, but also several others. Her dance
ability was extraordinary. At one point, I tried to discourage her
from an exercise in my workshop where she could have been physically
harmed, but she exclaimed, "This is something I want to do! Why won't
you let me try?"
Not only did she complete the exercise, but also she excelled! The
room exploded with applause.

            Other presenters come from half way around the world to
the conference. Dr. Gammon Earhart from the USA spoke about the
improvement of functional mobility for Parkinson's patients using
tango as a therapy. Dr. Patricia McKinley, from McGill University in
Montreal, spoke about improvement of elderly patients through tango
study. I hope I have not excluded any presenters who traveled far for
this extraordinary conference.

            Dr, Leon Gerner, from Uruguay, did a wonderful talk on
tango and alternative health lifestyle. Dr Gerner will have a link
page to all of the presenters at the conference, both in English and
Spanish. He will also have data available on the research done and
statistics with tango and health.
(http://www.crecelindo.org/eng/content/category/5/14/27/)

            On the day of departure, as I was getting luggage on to
the bus, one of the young presenters introduced herself. Her
presentation had been on Zero Conflict tango. Her thesis is that tango
is a way to self realize, and to deepen a commitment to non-violence
by promoting harmony, group interests, and awareness. She travels
internationally, using tango as a way to promote peace.
(http://www.ceroconflictotango.com)

Finally, on the bus ride back to Buenos Aires, I was mentally
reviewing the conference. I was sitting next to the woman who had been
my seatmate on the way to Rosario. She is a beautiful and celebrated
journalist and radio show host in Buenos Aires. We made friends on the
trip, and even saw each other for a dance and supper on the same night
we arrived in BA.

The others on the bus were singing tangos, mariachi tunes, giggling,
laughing, and caught in an ephemeral web woven by Argentine tango. It
was like a bus to summer camp! The buzz of youth hummed through the
bus, and sewed our ages in years into a gay, inspired, human crazy
quilt of hundreds of pieces.

"What is it," I thought, "that makes us so devoted to tango? "

I thought of the local tanguero who had helped me with my
presentation. He was knowledgeable, kind, tender, an amazing dancer by
night; a paramedic by day. My ideas, he said, were tangential to his
own. He was inspired to consider what nurtured him as a man, and how
tango made him a better person.
As I struggled to leave his magnificent  ( and exemplary) tango
embrace during our presentation, more material surfaced in me that I
had learned from the conference:

"The embrace of tango releases oxytocin for the woman. If she does not
trust her partner before the embrace, she will feel bonded to him
after the embrace. Like it or not, the loving embrace releases
oxytocin. Oxytocin bonds the mother to her baby and the lover to her
mate."


"The tango embrace is going back to the Mother, where we came from,
and where our world is nothing but Love, and where the 'two" become
"one".  This third "one", who emerges from the "two, " is the one who
is present when we are really dancing a tango that transforms, and a
tango  that heals."

And finally, a quote from one of the organizers, Oscar Derudi:
" Tango is a marvelous soundtrack to a movie called 'Life'. "