[Tango-L] Assessing tango (was Serpentine youth in Zagreb..look out!)

[Trini y Sean (PATangoS)]

--- On Wed, 11/19/08, Myk Dowling <politas at gmail.com> wrote:
> I was replying to Anton's comments, not Mario's.
> Anton was expressing a desire for some potent authority to define Tango and make it easier to assess. 

I didn't read that in Anton's statement, but I did read a reflection of what I do see happening.  That people are too willing to have an "anything goes" philosophy about tango without really thinking through the implications.  Inexperience?  Laziness?  Excuses?

Tango is a dance that anyone can hang up a shingle and call himself/herself a teacher.  There's no qualifying exam or regulations.  So it depends on the voices that are heard to help define what it is.  I think that too often the voices that are supportive of new things in tango, such as nuevo, are misused.  Others take the support of nuevo to mean "anything goes".  But the best of the nuevo practitioners would not advocate that.  In fact, they look for the same qualities that traditionalists look for, too.  Elegance, connection, musicality.


Trini de Pittsburgh