1684  Video instruction etc

Date: Mon, 11 Aug 2003 00:35:40 +0100
From: Alex <alejandro.delmonte@NTLWORLD.COM>
Subject: Video instruction etc

Thanks to all the tangueros for your feedback. I would like to add a few
comments.

Tapes are okay mostly to refresh you about how the figures go, and probably
give you a tango vocabulary. Nothing wrong with that. But it's very clear to
me that the gist of the matter can only be **experienced at close
quarters**, ideally under the guidance of a **good** teacher (as opposed to
a charlatan). Those things such as posture, presence, axis, weight, balance,
embrace, leading with the torso, expressivity, disassociation of upper and
lower body and -very importantly- how to walk. I can tell if a tango dancer
is good or not just by the way he/she walks. Everything is in the basic step
when walking, and it doesn't cease to amaze me how many people think that
walking is plain boring -I wonder, do they understand tango?

I guess that one reason for this is that men want to flash the women with
twists and turns, and panic at the idea of the woman thinking that he's an
incompetent moron, in part also because many a woman seem to think that
walking is dull, or at least that's my experience...

I think it's very sad when a self-proclaimed 'teacher' starts teaching
figures this and figures that, but his style of walking is scruffy. Learning
to walk seems to take a lot of discipline, and in the showing-off stakes of
the dance floor doesn't seem to score as high as the most obvious stuff.

Also, dancing dancing dancing is very important, of course, but beware of
jumping to dive into a pool with no water. If you dance a lot but without
good coaching you can develop a lot of bad habits that later will cost you
the world to get rid of.

Alex