4239 What to learn first.
Date: Fri, 05 May 2006 17:28:18 +0000
From: "Sergio Vandekier" <sergiovandekier990@hotmail.com>
Subject: [Tango-L] What to learn first.
To: tango-l@mit.edu
Aurora asks what style do you think should be taught first.
Do you have to learn more than one style? No, this is not necessary. You
can learn close embrace and dance that way for the rest of your life
enjoying most of the things that tango has to offer.
You will be able to dance socially in most places and circulate with ease in
very crowded milongas.
You will be able to do exhibitions and take part in competitions using close
embrace salon tango.
This is the situation in most milongas in B.A. where due to lack of space
people only dance close embrace tango.
If you only know Salon Open embrace or Nuevo Tango you will obtain all the
benefits of dancing tango as well but you will not be able to dance in very
crowded places.
You will have to arrive to the popular milongas early or late in order to
have enough room to dance or else you have to go to certain dances which are
organized for these particular styles. Close embrace dancers on the other
hand will be able to mingle in these last events without disturbing anyone.
My impression is that close embrace and open embrace have different dancing
techniques.
Open embrace teaches you a very complete dancing technique that is not only
useful for tango, milonga and vals but it is also applicable to any type of
dancing including stage tango.
Under these circumstances you acquire the basis to learn any type of tango
style and also ballroom dances.
IMO Close embrace and social dancing should be introduced as soon as the
students can handle the basics of open embrace, so that they will be able to
dance under any circumstances of space availability.
In this fashion you will have a group able to dance Salon open and close and
eventually with the introduction of the ocho cortado and a few other
adjustments the milonguero style, and if so desired even Nuevo tango.
IMO and I have discussed this subject many time with dancers of all styles
is that if you start dancing close embrace for a long time you end up being
fixed in that style and become unable to learn the other tango styles either
due to lack of basic technique knowledge or due to lack of interest, or due
to lack of necessary physical skill. It is more difficult to make the
transition from close embrace to Open than the opposite. (many dancers of
close embrace will think otherwise, mostly the ones that only know close
embrace and despite of that give opinions on the subject).
Those are my thoghts, other people may have different opinions. I dance
Open and close both and feel very comfortable dancing tango in any place. I
learned Open first and close embrace later.
Under any circumstances what should be avoided is to teach just figures of
open tango instead of teaching how to dance socially, walking with
musicality around the dancing floor.
I hope I have not offended anybody with this note, accept it as just one
opinion more among many different ones.
Best regards, Sergio
Date: Fri, 5 May 2006 18:58 +0100 (BST)
From: "Chris, UK" <tl2@chrisjj.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] What to learn first.
Cc: tl2@chrisjj.com
Sergio wrote:
> due to lack of space people only dance close embrace tango.
I'd be interested to hear what makes you think people dancing only close
embrace is due to lack of space.
Have you considered that actually dancing close embrace might be what
/causes/ "lack" of space? That people like to be close, and close embrace
is what lets them do that, both within and between the couples?
Your theory sounds like saying it is due to lack of space that people
sit close together in bars. Even though in a bar that has lots of space
to start with, if the bar is popular, the space is soon displaced by
closely packed happy people.
Chris
Date: Fri, 5 May 2006 13:54:46 -0500 (CDT)
From: Zoltan Hidvegi <tango-l@hzoli.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] What to learn first.
To: tl2@chrisjj.com
Cc: tango-l@mit.edu
Chris, UK wrote:
> Sergio wrote:
>
> > due to lack of space people only dance close embrace tango.
>
> I'd be interested to hear what makes you think people dancing only close
> embrace is due to lack of space.
Please read Sergio's email again, and do not quote out of context.
The full sentence for the above quote was this:
This is the situation in most milongas in B.A. where due to lack
of space people only dance close embrace tango.
I.e. in the crowded BsAs milongas people only dance close embrace due
to the lack of space. That's just a simple fact, if you have a big
crowd in an small room, people have to be close. He did not say that
that's the only or even the main reason people dance close. He even
said that you can dance close everywhere, even if there is enough room
for open.
-Zoltan
Date: Fri, 5 May 2006 14:54:22 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Trini y Sean \(PATangoS\)" <patangos@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] What to learn first.
--- Zoltan Hidvegi <tango-l@hzoli.com> wrote:
> Please read Sergio's email again, and do not quote
> out of context.
Hola Zoltan,
Sean here. What you say is perfectly true. Chris's
luminous observation does not logically follow from
Sergio's post. Nonetheless, that little nonsequiter
does not diminish the startling brilliance of Chris's
main point:
"Have you considered that actually dancing close
embrace might be what /causes/ "lack" of space? That
people like to be close, and close embrace is what
lets them do that, both within and between the
couples?"
For these few words, all his cheap shots at teachers
might be forgiven.
Sean
Date: Mon, 8 May 2006 22:44 +0100 (BST)
From: "Chris, UK" <tl2@chrisjj.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] What to learn first.
Cc: tl2@chrisjj.com
Zoltan wrote:
> ... people only dance close embrace due to the lack of space.
> That's just a simple fact
It sure is.
Here's another: "People only dance close embrace due to the lack of beds."
'Cos notice the lack of beds where people dance close embrace? ;)
> if you have a big crowd in an small room, people have to be close
Correlation does not mean causation.
Chris
