[Tango-L] No Nuevo (as a style) - according to the Naveiras

[ECSEDY Áron]

>
> dancing, that we'd see each dancing to a different style of music. So
> forgive me Alexis at being perplexed with your response. I have been known
>   

After seeing the discussions, I have that feeling that either those who 
post on the subject had inadequate amount of exposure to different tango 
in different communities, different places, people and therefore are not 
really have the trained eye to differentiate ("for the average Westerner 
all Chinese look the same"), or they have the problem of not even trying 
to look.

We have made a small experiment with some tango teachers (who - even by 
their own admission - have fairly similar styles and priorities) in Hungary:

The task was to do the same: "lead simple backwards ochos" (there was no 
other desription of the task, to allow for personal differences to emerge).

The lady was the same girl for each leader. From the outside although it 
was a general backward ocho there were major differences:
- in the way it was shaped (more linerar, more curved)
- in the way it was sized and moved (someone made it small, someone 
bigger to allow for the girl to do larger twists; also someone made it 
non-moving, someone moving slightly forwards for the leader, someone 
played unconsciously or consciously with the directions)
- in the way it was felt by the follower (since she was a teacher she 
could tell the formal differences, but she could also tell which leader 
whe preferred and why - the quality and consistency of the connection 
was an important factor)
- in the way the followers posture and ability to be technically perfect 
was effected by the complex choices (or call it style) made by the leader

Based on the above we have tried and analyzed some more complex moves as 
well. We have conluded that it is a very powerful tool to have people 
show the differences, because then they understand that it is completely 
normal to have their own style of dancing - even more: it is inevitable. 
This liberates a lot of people and makes the process of improvization 
and learning technique a lot more relaxed.

My observation is, that as you go up the tango scale, the differences 
are getting huge. Many of the differences are ultimately linked to 
personality shining through people's dancing (when technical 
difficulties cease to be a problem, personality is taking over more and 
more priorities), some of these are personal preferences, some of them 
depend on the partner-combination, some the music, some the mood. Given 
all this, I cannot possibily imagine that any good dancer's natural 
style could match another's (if we rule out intentional copying - but 
even then there will be differences: it will, in most cases, just look 
like a caricature of the original).

Cheers,

Aron
Budapest, Hungary