[Tango-L] The Basics

[Alexis Cousein]

On 20/09/2010 12:26, Ming Mar wrote:
>
> What specifically about navigation would you teach?
>

That learning to dance is like learning to drive a car:
it's no use practicing 1000 hours outside of traffic,
and that when you learn how to drive and park you
should pretend there are others around you.

That there's a ronda.

That you don't have to be facing the same
way as in class to begin a figure, that it's all a matter
of moving in the ronda at the pace set by it.

I would *wish* that most teachers didn't encourage
people to start dancing with their nose in the direction
that is supposedly the ronda, at least not if whatever
sequence they are using to teach something is better
another way. Very frequently, nose 45° to the outside or
nose 45° to the inside (for moves that have the leader
go to the follower's "outside lane") is a lot better.

That if they don't know who's behind them, a step back
can be a 2.54mm (1/10") or 5cm (2") step back, that they
don't have to take that back step as large as their
forward steps.

That you can adapt the amount you turn in turning
steps to end up in the orientation you want.

That, as a result, if they want to do that large back step,
there are ways to make the leader point with his back
(BIREFLY!) to the line of dance.

Also, I'd like teachers to make people *aware* of
the direction they end up, and why it's a bad idea to
let X follow by Y unless you either adjust the amount
of turning in X so that the combination makes sense
or adjust your movement with respect to the line
of dance before you do X.

They should also teach that you shouldn't be causing
traffic jams. That if you can't resist doing XYZ, you can
wait until you're in a corner of the room so that
others may be able to pass you, rather than in the middle
of a dance floor edge where you'll act as a windscreen wiper
and form a Berlin wall for anyone behind.

In summary, make people *aware* that whatever you're dancing,
you're not dancing it in a void.

Awareness is often enough, you know. But I know teachers
who will not spend *one* moment to point out where your
nose is pointing when you started in orientation X and
did A, B then C, and what this entails if you started
in orientation Y with respect to the line of dance.

How would their pupils be supposed to navigate on a dance
floor? Many of them just revert constantly to a "nose in
the line of dance" reset position, from which they engage
in movement that drives them all to the middle of the
dance floor, because that's how they did it in class.

Have too many people like that on one single floor and
they all end up in a bunch in the middle (where they
quickly discover that the couples from the opposite
side have another idea about the LOD).

Sometimes they're taught a short turn pattern but turn
90° less than what the teacher did in class, but
insist on closure "just like in class", even though
it turns them and their partner into a ballistic
missile on a crowded dance floor.

The sad part is that often they're not doing it
on purpose, they're simply (not that blissfully)
unaware of the havoc they're creating.