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

[Trini y Sean (PATangoS)]

--- Victor Bennetts <Victor_Bennetts at infosys.com> wrote:

> Teach always in couples? That is partly true in my view.
> If I ever go to a class and it starts with the teacher
> telling all the women to go to one side of the room and
> all the men on the other (sound familiar?), my heart
> sinks. At that point I am getting ready to walk out. If
> they start counting out from one to eight then I am
> changing my shoes and heading for the door :-). But there
> is a place for individual work. If a class starts with
> the teacher leading everyone in a walking exercise then I
> start grinning. 

The method of having men & ladies separate to learn a
choreography can work with really good instructors.  One
couple that uses that approach very successfully is Colette
Hebert & Richard Council.  It always surprises me how well
people are dancing a complex choreography by the end of
their class without much anticipation.  Part of their
success, I believe, is that they repeat the sequence over
and over and over again so that they separate out the
learning process.  First the choreography and then the
technique.  When they put people together, they work on the
communication skills.  But by keeping people apart for as
long as they do, they actually force people to do the
drills that they should be doing on their own anyway.  It
makes people be aware of their own bodies.  When people
have their bodies primed, then the communication in both
ways becomes a lot easier.

I believe the flaw committed by other teachers who may use
that method is that they only concentrate on the
choreography part.  They don't give people enough time to
work on the technique.  

Do they retain the sequence after the workshop?  Perhaps
not, but that's not the point.  The point is for students
to work on their technique.  And the milongas after the
workshops are fine.  No one going wild with a sequence
they've just learned, though I do see bits of the sequence
appear.  But they are done okay.

Trini de Pittsburgh

PATangoS - Pittsburgh Argentine Tango Society
  Our Mission: To make Argentine Tango Pittsburgh’s most popular social dance!
  http://patangos.home.comcast.net/
   



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