[Tango-L] Leading with the heart and the core

[David Thorn]

I said to "lead with the heart and the core" in my last post with considerable deliberation, because that is what I do, or try to do, always.  Yes, you are connected through the hands and arms, but they, as well as the chest, are merely extensions of your core, and of your heart, which is where you generate the care, the compassion, and the joy in the music that you must transmit to your partner.

A relevant example of this is the lead of an under arm turn.  I do not lead this with my arm.  The arm exerts absolutely no, zero, force.  An underarm turn is done with a very light finger-tip to finger-tip connection.  The real lead comes from the set-up of the turn (the 'pre-lead') and from my invitation.  It comes from the space I create for my partner to move into, the space that I block motion into, where I position my body throughout the turn, and where I position it to receive the turn.  The lead may even include my smile and the path of my gaze.  Does my right hand invite her back to move into it?  Does my frame invite a chest-to-chest "reconnection"?  All of that is part of the lead of an under arm turn.  And if she rejects, or simply doesn't get, any of this, I follow her and we do something else.  No big deal.  But not with the arms.

As to the use of the term "traditional tango", it is not I who have observed that there is nothing new about "nuevo tango", but rather many have commented on this.  I simply try to dance tango with all of it's richness of connection, invention and musical interpretation, which is, I believe, strongly in the tradition of tango.  I don't dance "nuevo", I don't dance "milonguero", but I try to dance inventivly and respectfully in the tradition of tango.  So yes, I think that I dance "traditional", even if it may not always look like it to your eye.

And I am indeed a romantic.  Otherwise, how could I dance tango?

David

_________________________________________________________________
Windows Live™: E-mail. Chat. Share. Get more ways to connect. 
http://windowslive.com/howitworks?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_t2_allup_howitworks_022009