[Tango-L] Styles of Tango

[Huck Kennedy]

On Fri, Jul 25, 2008 at 10:29 AM, Brick Robbins <brick at fastpack.com> wrote:
>
> I came away with this  major point:
>
> It is all "good tango" as long as you:
> 1) respect yourself
> 2) respect your partner
> 3) respect the music
> 4) respect the people around you
>
> I think a lot of the resentment against "Nuevo" dancers is because,
> when they violate the 4th rule they usually do it in "big way."  But
> I've seen plenty of bad "traditional" dancers violate all 4.

     Good point.  But with that in mind, observe how close-embrace
leaders have a huge advantage complying with rule #4 right off the
bat:  It is physically impossible for them to look at their feet (as
so many amateur nuevo dancers do), and it is also physically
impossible for them to ogle their partner's hot little outfit and
bedroom eyes (as so many amateur nuevo dancers do--and which the close
embrace leaders do as well, of course, except they do it between songs
rather than during  :-).  With those major distractions gone from the
equation, the close-embrace leader is left with the freedom to
actually look at the other dancers and navigate with little to no
effort.

     So almost by definition, close-embrace is a much more
socially-oriented dance than nuevo.  There is a much greater focus on
the other dancers on the floor.  Dancing becomes a cooperative project
shared by many, rather a self-centered, private little world
comprising just two people.

     The many private little two-person worlds behavior that nuevo
tends to induce resembles the scientific model of molecules easily
prone to random collisions.  The cooperative behavior that close
embrace fosters, on the other hand, more resembles the graceful
collective movement of a school of fish in the ocean.

Huck