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Basics

There are 5 basics for both lead and follower: 

1.) Walking.
2.) Ochos. 
3.) Turns. 
4.) Crosses. 
5.) Embrace. 

The 1st is the golden fantasy of Tango, not the reality on a modern social dance floor.
The 2nd is usually Traveling Ochos, and infrequently Milonguero (“Lazy”), there are 8 kinds of ochos!
The 3rd is modern Tango to a ‘T’, the Turning Dance. 
The 4th is usually done in Parallel Walking System at first, and later on, Cross!
and the 5th causes more problems than it’s worth, mostly due to instability, compression, tension, force, and resistance.
The 3rd and 5th are where you’re going to spend all your time.

MORE REMINDERS

The Neurology of Leading – Part 2

September 17, 2017 No Comments

A question that comes up for some leads, not all leads, but some Leads (big ‘L’) is why is it important that you spend a lot of time listening to Tango music, and more importantly to mark the music ? Typically you’ll hear this question as “I have a life you know ? I have things to do. I can’t sit around all day long just listening to song after song after song for days, weeks, months, marking up every song in some crazy 8 count beat sort of way, and then try to memorize all that all so….

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Spectrum of Ideas.

December 31, 2016 No Comments

Because there are no ‘Standards & Practices’ in Tango, therefore ‘Right’/’Wrong’ are subjective, which are for the most part, based on your teacher’s point of view of how things should be done. And as a result you, the unwitting student, take one those ideas as your own because you believe that because X is teaching that they must be the soul of all wisdom. Very infrequently do tango teachers teach a fair and balanced, or well rounded point of view. They usually teach what their subscribe to in their Tango world view, what they agree with, and what their teacher showed them. Very infrequently will they teach something that is outside that world view.

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Tango Improvement

March 7, 2017 No Comments

You say the words, “I want to get better”. You mouth them as you watch the latest performance tango video on youtube. While at the same time, the thought flashes in your mind that you should schedule a private or two with X. ‘X’ being the local variant that teaches what you ‘believe in’. This teacher is also the one that you have gone to before and from your perspective has ‘helped’ you.

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Men (Age)

February 26, 2017 No Comments

Welcome to the Department of the Obvious Department. Today’s menu of the Obvious includes: Men not asking for directions when lost, Men over talking Women, Men squeezing the living daylights out of their partners, and last but not least the Age of a Man has nothing to do with his ability to get dances!

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Discomfort

April 30, 2017 No Comments

Far too often we experience ‘discomfort’ when dancing. Most of the time we discard it and just accept it as the price we have to pay in order to dance with X, or so that we don’t have to sit through yet another milonga tanda, etc. Sometimes we feel that discomfort, and sometimes we don’t but in general it’s there, most of the time.

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On My Balance

April 17, 2017 No Comments

Frequently with Argentine Tango we use language that we think is descriptive of what we’re doing but in actual fact is either not that or so far from the mark it is more confusing than anything else. Before we go any further, it is possible that in reading this that you may not see the issue at all. That you know what the speaker meant, and that’s the important part, right. Wrong. That’s the problem right there. The inference. If you have to infer that X or Y is occurring then there’s far too much ‘wiggle’ room for errors in understanding to crop up.

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Lead Bashing

February 11, 2017 No Comments

Bashing ? Meaning that you’re throwin’ some shade, picking on, pointing out the errors of, giving some shit, pointing fingers at, trash talking, talk down, blaming and shaming, and the euphemistic UK’ism “taking the piss”. While that last one is more about making fun of someone, that’s not actually what this idea is all about. It’s about disparaging someone, or in this case, from a Tango perspective, the L/lead’s abilities (the person, and the action).

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Milan for Followers

February 3, 2017 No Comments

A good spot for Followers to plan their next Tango vacation is: Milano. Why ? Several reasons. 1.) The men dress nicely for Milongas. No. It’s true. They actually dress up for Milongas. And as has said before in Vol 3. (Truism 1096), nothing screams ‘come hither’ more to a woman than a man in a tailored suit! And in this case, usually the shoes are handmade as well. 2.) Then there’s the fact that they smell nice.

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Keep something in the back of your mind: What you’re seeing in a youtube video is a couple that is performing for the 15th row for a room full of people. They’re not social dancing! Whereas this website is all about ‘Social Tango’  or how to make things function on a social dance floor. Social Dance floor ? Your local milonga! They are showing you flashy moves as a presentation, to show off! But not stopping and talking about how this works which is what you need to see. This website and all of it’s content show you the how and  why you’d want to put that piece of vocabulary there, or how to make things work. This website is all about those things and more!

You could watch Tango YouTube videos and thereby spend your time, trying to infer, and figure out how things may work in that particular situation. Bend your body this way or that, twist and force this position or that. Place your foot here or there and figure it out. This is known as Tango Twister.  Which can be a lot of fun, but more than likely it won’t help you, because you’re missing something: The explanation from an experienced teacher showing you how to properly excute this stuff from a Leading Perspective as well as from a Following Perspective!

The goal of YouTube videos is to get you to study with those teachers in person. The goal of Tango Topics videos allows you to work at your own pace, in the comfort of your own space, so that you can play them over and over again to improve your understanding of the vocabulary or technique being described to therefore better your dancing experience. The goal of classes and workshops is to get you to come back over and over and over again, thereby spending more money with that teacher. This website and the videos under it are here to act as a resource for you to help you to improve your dance. Pay once and you’re done.

Eventually, one way or another you’re going to pay for this lesson, either here and now, or with them. TANSTAAFL! The difference between that lesson and this ? Is that you get to play this lesson over and over and over again. Further still, there are supporting materials (other videos) that help to explain the language and the underlying technique of how and why things work, so you can easily reference those things in the corresponding articles that go with the material, and or any language in the Tango Topics Dictionary. 

DROP ME A MSG HERE

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