[Tango-L] Milonga 101 -- conversation between dances

[Chris, UK]

> Gustavo ... "What comes from only the head alone is worth nothing...
> only things that come from the heart have any value."

He gave an excellent exhibition of that at our milonga the other week. His 
lesson consisted of prescribed sequences - the same giro, sacada, change 
of direction type stuff we've seen countless times before - which the 
students were to repeat these over and over, whether the music called for 
it or not. This Gustavo interspersed with demos and lecturettes explaining 
exactly why the guy's torso turned through this angle while the girl took 
that number of steps etc.

I watched with dismay as the standard of dancing steadily deteriorated. 
The struggle to get bodies at the required angles and feet in "the right 
place" left no hope at all for anything that really mattered. In the hands 
of even normally good leaders, the girls were suffering torture. Feeling 
for partner? Feeling for the music? Feeling for the ronda? Not a chance in 
hell. By the end of the lesson there wasn't a single couple left doing 
anything one could remotely call dancing.

Where in all of that were the "things that come from the heart"?

I started the music with Malerba's Remembranzas. An hour later the ordeal 
was largely forgotten and almost everyone was back to dancing.

--
Chris

PS Alfredo De Angelis "La Cumparsita":
  http://youtube.com/watch?v=jjPp6CZ2vVo (video 3m07s)