2409  Dancing tandas

Date: Fri, 23 Apr 2004 08:39:40 -0700
From: Tanguera Alegra <tanguers_alegra@YAHOO.COM>
Subject: Re: Dancing tandas

Marisa,
Your observations are consistent with mine.
A (male) friend who'd just returned to the US from a period in BA told me that the milongas didn't seem 'exciting' to him they way they had in BA. I pointed out that perhaps the lack of excitement was a side-effect of not dancing tandas.
Anybody who has danced in BA can remember the tension building during the cortinas: Everybody is absorbed with who is sitting where; what kind of music will come on next; who should I look to if it's a tango/milonga/vals. Then the music starts and you look to your first choice, maybe they're not looking at you...who next to look at?
It's very exciting.
And in places here where they dance tandas and respect the cortinas, I experience a frisson of the same excitement I got in BA.

Please reply to the list, not to me personally. Thanks.

I know that these are not traditional patterns - and
that hearing about them will offend and enrage some of
our listeros. But I find it disingenuous to repeat
over and over a "rule" which one would prefer is
followed - if it is not followed in fact. We are
describing our communities on this list, for better or
worse, and I prefer to separate facts from opinions.

Date: Mon, 26 Apr 2004 12:35:12 +0200
From: Alexis Cousein <al@BRUSSELS.SGI.COM>
Subject: Re: Dancing tandas

Tanguera Alegra wrote:

> And in places here where they dance tandas and respect the cortinas,

I'd have to add that it's perfectly possible to define tandas *without* a cortina,
although it takes some skills from the DJ (and even more skills if he doesn't
want to stick to the one-tanda-one-orchestra mantra).

Not that Argentineans will feel at home, but local audiences less accustomed to cortinas
may experience the same frissons...at least if you start the new tanda with something
with an introduction of a decent length ;).

--
Alexis Cousein Senior Systems Engineer
alexis@sgi.com SGI Brussels
If I have seen further, it is by standing on reference manuals.