5415  Suggested Leads

Date: Wed, 2 Jan 2008 08:59:51 -0800 (PST)
From: Tango For Her <tangopeer@yahoo.com>
Subject: [Tango-L] Suggested Leads
To: tango-l@mit.edu

I would like to get away from my original post and
propose these questions:

1. Do you think a suggested lead exists in tango?

1a. If not, why not?

1b. If yes, what is your definition of a suggested
lead?

2. If you think there is a suggested lead, could you
provide an example of a suggested lead?

HERE ARE MY ANSWERS:

1. Yes

1b. I believe that, most of the time, we as leaders,
determine a direction and feel for a movement and use
cues to suggest that our follower begins her movement.
Then, we move in concert through that movement,
generally, desiring to not get ahead of her through
that movement, unless the move calls for "getting
ahead of the follower".

A beginner leader is often told to not step before the
follower. Thus, the three stages of a step as
presented in many classes: I suggest, she steps, I
step. This is a rudimentary concept presented for
beginners.

2. I provided an example in my previous post.

I expect to see much better representations than my
1b. I just wanted to get the ball rolling and don't
have a lot of time to spend thinking through wording
it correctly, at this time.

By the way, a different topic might be "Why it is bad
to tell beginner leaders not to step before the
follower".




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Date: Wed, 02 Jan 2008 23:54:46 +0100
From: Alexis Cousein <al@sgi.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Suggested Leads
To: Tango For Her <tangopeer@yahoo.com>, tango-l@mit.edu

Tango For Her wrote:

> 1b. I believe that, most of the time, we as leaders,
> determine a direction and feel for a movement and use
> cues to suggest that our follower begins her movement.
> Then, we move in concert through that movement,
> generally, desiring to not get ahead of her through
> that movement, unless the move calls for "getting
> ahead of the follower".

If taken like that, all leads should be suggested leads.

But it's more than just "suggestion". The way you suggest
is by moving where you want to move to. Then you encounter
resistance (or rather, the inertia of the follower) and
the rest is indeed movement in concert. There's nothing
artificial yuo have to "do" to suggest. It's all a matter
of timing and of finesse.

But I still think it's dangerous to overemphasize this
"suggestive" aspect. I see lots of suggested leads that are not
suggestions at all, but an invitation to guessing.

I also think that these finer points can only be learnt over
the years. It's certainly not beginner's stuff.

> Thus, the three stages of a step as
> presented in many classes: I suggest, she steps, I
> step.

It's again a dangerous way to present things; there's no
such thing as three discrete steps following each other.
Even within a step, there is a continuous play of suggestion
and listening whether the follower actually accepts the
invitations; the most obvious example is how much room
you're leaving for the follower to fill.