sericson0

Tango Interior Design

Milonga ready furniture signals you are in a tango home. Dining tables that fold into the wall, easily movable couches, coffee tables on sliders. Minimalism taken to an extreme because space filled with stuff can’t be filled with steps. Wood floors, the tango feng shui. You can’t Calo on carpet, nor Lomuto on laminate. Whether dream home with two custom-built dance floors, or studio apartment with patio converted to miniature dance space, the aesthetics are the same. Racks of ladies heels on prominent display, mirrors everywhere, and wood bar bolted at hip height complete the curated set.

A strange man with abnormally dark round glasses on coffee mugs. A picture of a fat guy playing what looks to be an accordion. Walls adorned with photos and paintings of poses, embraces, lifts, and dips. Computer screen paused on a YouTube playlist with a little 030 inside a red circle in the top left corner. Old music playing from a new sound system. Tables littered with flyers for festivals, future and past.

Closets filled with baggy pants, slitted dresses, silk flowery shirts for both women and men. Skirts checked so heels don’t catch, outfits selected to easily fit in a suitcase. Clothes that normal people don’t wear, there to highlight that the inhabitants of this household aren’t normal.

A warm greeting from Pugliese the dog, Tanturi the cat, Goncho the bonsai tree, to name a few. Strange names of people talked about. Musicians, DJs, and dancers we have met, want to meet, wish we had met, are sad to have lost. Our famous aren’t famous, but they are famous to us.    

Tango seeps into our homes and into our lives. It changes how we dress and how we decorate. It changes how we hug when we say hi. It opens our thoughts and feelings, affects our dreams and our desires. A truth binding us together, wherever in the world and whatever journey we are on, that tango is more than just a dance.

By sericson0, ago

How You See the Music Part I: visualizing musical structure

Dancers are tasked with turning the sounds they hear into visual movements. For the social dancer, who must also navigate the space, remember their steps, and provide a comfortable embrace, interpreting the music can be a daunting task. At the same time, dancing musically is a wonderful, ever-changing puzzle and capturing the music through movement is a source of eternal joy. Few things in life are more enjoyable than the feeling of ‘really capturing’ the music together with your partner.

So how do we go about dancing musically? Experience (read; go to the milonga every week for years) provides a natural basis of feeling to understand what comes next in the music. This ‘natural approach’ allows us to reach a level sufficient for milongas and marathons, but in the end is limiting. Relying on our natural feelings constrains us to interpret what we naturally feel, which leads us to always dance the same song the same way. The natural approach often misses subtler aspects of the music and struggles with complex music and songs we haven’t heard before. We can always ignore our limited musical understanding and continue dancing only to the most explicit components of the same simpler “danceable” songs. Or we can take the time to analyze the structure of the music to develop a more comprehensive and sophisticated palette, allowing us to hear and feel more of the music and open new possibilities in the dance. This series of essays are for the dancer who is interested in taking this second path.  

A little bit of analysis unlocks some powerful tools for interpretation. Understanding the underlying structures and conventions of the music lets us know when changes in the music will occur. Knowing the standard conventions also highlights the choices made to change these conventions, exposing the unique aspects of each song. Music analysis does not replace the natural approach, but rather supplements it. We hear what we are primed to hear and feel what we have words to describe, so our study ahead of time heightens our awareness in the moment.

Standard structure of a tango song

The pulse of the music is called a beat and determines the basic unit of time. Beats are broken up into four 16th notes (counted 1 E & A). For reference, 16th notes are often what the bandoneon players play during the quick ‘variation’ at the end of the song. Stepping on the beat means we are stepping on the number, and stepping on the syncopation refers to stepping on the ‘&’. We don’t tend to step on the ‘E’ and ‘A’, though we may synchronize other movements to them.

In tango, sets of four beats comprise a measure (in vals, a measure consists of three beats). We sometimes call beats 1 and 3 of the measure the downbeats, and call beats 2 and 4 the offbeats. Dancers also sometimes refer to ‘single time’ as stepping on beats 1 and 3 and ‘double time’ as stepping on all four beats of the measure, though my musician friend Heyni Solera pointed out to me that this is incorrect terminology because the musical timing has remained constant, and it is simply the speed at which we step that changes.

If we default to stepping on the 1 and 3 beats, then the ‘&’ syncopation is four times faster than our normal steps. It is important to understand syncopations to dancing to more complex music, and it is essential to understand if we want to add embellishments (doing embellishments on the syncopations allows us to sneak them in between the beats and not disturb our partner. They also tend to look better). It is well worth the effort to develop the skill to be able to step on each of the syncopated beats.  

Four measures link together to form a phrase, which act as the sentences of the song. Phrases are integral to our musicality as a dancer. Starting our sequences at the start of the phrase, ending at the end of the phrase, and maintaining the same thread throughout the phrase, give structure to our dance. Otherwise, it is as if we are just speaking with a long run-on sentence. The last measure of the phrase sounds different than the other measures and is used to bridge one phrase to the next. While the structure of four measures per phrase is the most common, it is by no means a rule. Instead of trying to count the measures, listen for the bridge. It will tell us when the end of the phrase is coming and will guide us when the number of beats or measures in the phrase differs.

I need to mention that dancers often count something in between the beats and the measure, counting on beats 1 and 3. This then gives 8 counts per phrase. Dancers also used the same 8 numbers to name the movements of the basic 8 sequence, and of course we named the basic pivot movements eights (ocho). We are thus in the situation where we could lead an 8 (ocho) from the 5 (cross) on 4 (count), which is 3 (beat) of 2 (measure) of 1 (phrase). And we wonder why tango dancers get confused.

The figure on the right shows a visualization of the waveform of the first phrase of the song Ciego, by Francisco Canaro (it may be helpful to pull up the song as a reference). The peaks in amplitude show the beats. The song starts with a lead-in, meaning the very first beat is one before the measure starts. The cluster of waves in the final measure is the piano playing the bridge to signal the end of the phrase, with a lead-in to the next phrase.   

Visualization of first phrase of Canaro’s Ciego

Groups of four phrases form a musical section, which act as the chapters of the song. The underlying themes of the music change by section, and our dance should reflect this. The first section sets the theme A of the song. The second section is the variation and sets theme B of the song. The third section returns to theme A, the fourth section either returns to the same variation or takes a new theme C, and the final section usually returns to theme A. Songs will deviate from this basic structure, the standard strucuture is still good to know.

Here is one simple but powerful approach to musicality. Pause on each bridge and pick a ‘thread’ to dance to in the next phrase. Threads could be any choice you make: dance to a specific instrument. Dance small or big. Make your movements heavy or light. Dance linearly or circularly. Dance to the melody, countermelody, or rhythmic base. Do simple steps in close embrace or big steps in open embrace. It is not important what thread you pick. What is important is that you maintain the thread throughout the phrase and don’t get distracted by shiny objects in the music. Make a change each phrase and keep that change constant throughought the prhase. Even better if you make a change to signal when the new sections of the music occur. Of course this is just one of many approaches to musicality. Understand the musical structure and then play with it.

A final note is that musicality cannot be divorced from other parts of the dance. Dancing to syncopations is technically challenging for both leaders and followers. Capturing the beats, measures, phrases, and sections requires control of your own body, clear communication with your partner, an understanding of the vocabulary and movement possibilities, and the technical capability to express your ideas. Musicality also helps with our technique. As leaders, having a clear understanding of the music helps clarify our lead. As followers, understanding the music helps us prepare ourselves to better respond, and knowing musical structure provides the openings for a two-way conversation. Use the music as inspiration to develop these other aspects of your dance, and use these other aspects to further your musicality.   

By sericson0, ago

Milo the Tanguero: Principles of Progressive Training

Milo of Croton was an ancient Greek wrestler with a novel approach to training. As the legend goes, to train for the Olympic games, Milo took a small calf and carried it to the top of a hill near his house each morning. As the calf grew bigger, Milo grew stronger to meet the greater challenge. By the end of the process, Milo had unlocked beast mode and could carry the fully grown bull up the hill. With his newfound strength, Milo went on to win gold at the Olympics. Let us apply some of this ancient Greek wisdom to our own tango journey.

What are the components of Milo’s training protocol which lead to his success? Milo sets a goal—win the Olympic gold in wrestling. To achieve his goal, he gathers his resources—a hill near his home. He chooses a training frequency—once per day. And finally, he chooses a difficulty—weight of bull. Milo uses a process called progressive overload, where you incrementally increase the difficulty of a task to build a staircase from where you are to where you want to be (see here for additional discussion on this idea). The same process of progressive training can be applied to our tango.        

We first decide where we want to go before we can get there. I suggest you take a moment to write down a couple of goals you want to work towards. Goals can be specific or abstract, and it can be good to have a combination of both. Here are some examples of goals I have had: develop a comfortable embrace, do well at a competition, finish a choreography for an upcoming performance, expand my vocabulary of steps, develop better posture, make clearer from the outside the musicality I hear inside, make my lead clearer from inside the couple and harder to see from outside the couple.

Having the right resources is critical to your progress. A tree grows when it has the right mix of soil, water, and sunlight. Our dancing is no different. Progress is the result of having the resources we need, and stagnation is simply a symptom of missing resources. The most crucial resources to tango growth are: (1) teacher, (2) partner, (3) practice space, (4) colleagues to collaborate with. Take a moment to check if you have each of these resources available. The fastest growth tends to happen when we have all four. But there are many ways to adapt if we are missing one component, we just need to be strategic. Say you don’t have a partner, probably the most common missing component for tango dancers. Instead of putting your progress on hold until the perfect partner magically falls into your embrace, be proactive. You can get with a group of friends to work together and work through concepts and drills together. It may be easier to find two or three people to work with occasionally than one person to exclusively partner with. This way you can fill the space of a partner in aggregate. There are many ways to effectively work with limited resources if you take stock of what you have and what you need.

How much do we need to dance to get better? Obviously if we have too low of a frequency then we won’t improve, but do we have to train every day like Milo? Tango dancers tell stories about their marathon practice sessions, and tend to exaggerate the training schedules of professionals, (e.g., “I hear they practice seven hours every day.” ) What we need to remember, though, is that not all tango time is the same (see here for more discussion of this idea). I have seen dancers go to the milonga every night and a marathon every weekend, but only actually practice an hour or two each month. You don’t need much time to get a lot of growth, you just need to be consistent and set aside time for actual practice.

Shifting the analogy for a moment, practice sessions are like houses in Monopoly. Any number of houses are better than none, and more houses pay more dividends, but the benefit of each additional home is not the same. The third home always gives the most incremental benefits. Similarly, any number of practice sessions is better than none, and more practice tends to give more benefits, but three practice sessions per week tends to give you the most benefits per hour spent. Less than three per week and your body starts to forget what it learned between sessions. More than three is nice, but additional sessions tend to have lower incremental benefits. So, see if you can sustain three before trying to add more. Each session does not have to be that long. Your schedule could be as simple as meeting with a partner once for 90 minutes on day 1, doing solo exercises for 30 minutes on day 2, and committing to focused practice for the first hour of a practica on day 3. You would then have gotten your three days a week of practice in just three hours.     

The monopoly card analogy of practice. each house (practice) gives you benefits, but the third house (practice) gives the most benefits.

Difficulty is a variable we progressively increase (see here for ways to change difficulty). Bringing the analogy back to Milo, try and pick up a bull right away and you’ll get crushed, keep lifting the calf forever and you won’t grow. So, what is the right level of difficulty, and how do we find it? Effort and accuracy are both functions of difficulty and are our guides to dialing in the right level of difficulty. Effort is the mental and physical exertion we feel, and accuracy is our success rate and precision. Effort increases with difficulty and accuracy decreases with difficulty.

High accuracy with low effort means the difficulty is too low. We call this this hanging out in the green zone, where everything is safe, and learning doesn’t happen. Low accuracy and high effort means the difficulty is too high. We call this the red zone, where you are overwhelmed, and you develop bad habits. The area of high effort to maintain high accuracy is the gold zone, the sweet spot of optimal difficulty where progress occurs. When you practice, you always want to find your gold zone. You know you have found it when what you are practicing feels challenging yet doable.

The difficulty curves. Shoot for the sweet spot, the gold zone giving a good balance between accuracy and effort.
DifficultyEffortAccuracy
Too Easy – Green Zone-Feel bored
-Task feels automatic		-Miss because not paying attention
-Always get it right
Lower End of Gold Zone-Comfortably focused
-Like a fun, interesting game		-Usually correct
-Occasional error
Upper End of Gold Zone-Fully concentrated
-Hard challenge		-Both successes and failures
-Struggle to get it right
-Know cause of misses
Too Hard – Red Zone-Overwhelmed
-Drinking from a fire hose
-Feeling of confusion		-Miss and don’t know why
-Feels like luck when you get it right

As you progress, your green zone expands, and the gold and red zones shift. You then need to progressively increase the difficulty to stay in the gold zone. You need a bigger bull to keep the same challenge. You have to keep challenging yourself. Training is about being able to do tomorrow what you can’t do today. If you just keep repeating what you could do yesterday, then you are not really training and should not expect to improve.

The life cycle of the stereotypical tango dancer starts in the red zone, feeling overwhelmed with all the information. The ones who stick around then find a moment of the gold zone where progression happens quickly. (This usually occurs a little earlier for followers, but tends to last a little longer for leaders, which is why we often say followers learn faster early on, but learning is harder for more advanced followers). Eventually the dancer gets to a place where their dance feels comfortable to them, and they start to hang out in the green zone. At this point they no longer have a stimulus to promote progress, and their dance remains constant, if not slowly declining, for however long they continue in tango. If not addressed, then the gold zone also starts to shrink, locking in their current state. Usually this is due to a combination of frustration—”I’ve been dancing for 20 years, why can’t I do this?”—and arrogance—”I’ve been dancing for 20 years, and I’ve never needed that.”

Though common, this process is completely avoidable. We can find continuous and joyous growth for as long as we dance. Find some goals worth working towards. Marshall your resources and plan around your constraints. Set aside some time each week to practice. Find the joy in challenging yourself and pushing yourself to be able to do something tomorrow that you can’t do today. Little by little, and step by step, you will find your dance transform in a truly positive way.          

By sericson0, ago

But what kind of triangle? An Analysis of Sacadas

When I was two years into my tango journey, I attended a workshop with a couple whose dancing I admired. At the end of the classes I was lucky enough to dance with the instructor. Afterwards she said my was coming along well and asked if I was open to a piece of feedback? Of course, I wanted to hear! She said, “Remember to make a triangle for your sacadas.” The whole ride home I was repeating to myself remember to make a triangle for sacadas, remember to make a triangle for sacadas. When I got home, the question finally came to me: but what kind of triangle?

I majored in mathematics, so I have a knack for overcomplicating everything, and for thinking way too much about triangles. Are sacadas the symmetric beauty of equilateral triangles? Or maybe the right answer lies with Pythagoras? A sacada is a cute step, so should I think of acute triangles? Or wait, scalene and sacadas both start with ‘s’ and have seven letters. that must be the answer. I believe I finally have an answer, which I share with you here.

A bit of vocabulary. The term sacada is comes from the Spanish word sacar, which means to take out.[1] Our standing leg is the one we have weight on and our free leg does not have weight. We step onto the arriving leg, and step from the trailing leg. A sacada is when our arriving leg intersects our partner’s trailing leg. In this way, we generate the effect of “taking out” our partner’s leg. There are three points: the foot of standing leg which will be our trailing leg when we step (S), the foot of our partner’s trailing leg (T), and the foot of our partner’s arriving leg (A). These three points form a triangle.

Our arriving leg intersects our partner’s trailing leg somewhere between the ankle and knee. The figures below show a sacada towards the ankle (where there is no gap between the intersecting feet), and a sacada towards the knee (where there is a gap between the intersecting feet). All photos are taken from a performance of Gustavo Naveira and Giselle Ann in Austin Texas (https://youtu.be/Ez8y8iS8qPQ).

Sacada towards ankle
Sacada towards knee

The game of sacadas is all about where we position our standing leg. We position our standing leg (S) such that our free leg can step in a straight line to intersect our partner’s trailing leg without having to cross our own feet. What makes this game challenging is that our feet and our hips have width. This is not a problem when our free foot is inside the base of the triangle but presents a challenge when our free foot is outside. Doing a back pivot compounds the problem, because it generally moves the free foot farther outside the base of the triangle.

Here is my diagram to highlight the idea. Our partner takes a sidestep from their left trailing leg to their right arriving leg. If our standing leg is on the right, then our left foot (F) lies inside. This is the most forgiving sacada as most triangles work. A right triangle even works well here (first figure). Now suppose we are standing on our left foot, so our right free leg lies outside the base of the triangle. This is less forgiving, as a right triangle would make us cross our feet. Because of the width of our feet, we need to shift the vertex of our standing position to be more like an equilateral triangle. Finally, say we are standing on our right foot and want to do a back sacada. Then we need to shift over the standing leg vertex even more because the hip has width, and the back pivot moves our foot outside of the base of the triangle.

Front sacada with left foot
Front sacada with right foot
Back sacada with left foot

A great game is to have your partner pause with feet apart. Play with how the position of your standing food needs to shift to comfortably complete the three sacada positions shown in the diagrams. You need to shift your standing foot when your other foot is in the outside position and shift even more to when the back pivot moves it to the outside position. Another great game is to do the same sacadas but do it in the sidestep after the forward in the turn. The 90° degree turn between the forward and side step changes the geometry. Take a few minutes to play these games, they are well worth the time.

The figures below show an interesting example of this principle. In the first figure, Gielle’s standing foot is close to Gustavo’s arrival foot to accommodate space for her back pivot. In the second figure, Gustavo also does a back sacada, but his pivot brings his free foot inside the base of the triangle, so Gustavo’s standing leg position is closer to Giselle’s trailing leg.

Back sacada with pivot to the outside
Back sacada with pivot to the inside

Sacadas work or fail based on where the standing leg is positioned. Where the standing leg is located depends on where you last stepped. Thus, a sacada will work or fail, will feel comfortable or uncomfortable, based on the step before. You could spend forever troubleshooting a step without any progress, because it is the step before that matters. My final answer is that there is not one kind of triangle. You move the standing foot to make space for your foot width and for your hip pivot. Now go find the triangle for each kind of sacada you want to make.

Nota Bene from Jacqueline Pham

Similar to Sean, I think of sacadas in terms of triangles. We have the same map, but I invite you to consider an additional angle of the sacada triangle.

The partner receiving the sacada will typically move horizontally across the trajectory of the partner entering the sacada. Thus, the Trailing and Arriving legs of the receiving partner are the same as the above diagrams. However, I tend to think of the remaining leg of the triangle (which belongs to the partner entering the sacada) as the FREE leg (F) rather than the standing leg.

Notice that in each of the 3 sacada triangles above, the free leg forms a right triangle as it enters the sacada near the Trailing leg (the 90-degree vertex of the right triangle). Sometimes this trigonometry can shift, but aiming for this right triangle using the Free leg helps me find the sweet spot, regardless of whether I am leading or following, entering or receiving the sacada.

As a leader: if I am entering or receiving the sacada and my partner’s trajectory is too close or too far away from me, then I can adjust my standing leg however necessary to have my Free leg form a right triangle as it enters the sacada.

As a follower: if my partner’s trajectory is a bit askew or if they do not pivot me enough, I can use the goal of achieving a right triangle to either A) turbo-charge my pivot before the sacada to get my Free leg into the right trajectory, or B) understand that I will have to enter at a more challenging angle and turbo-charge my pivot after the sacada/upon arrival to compensate and correct the trajectory. I use the same right triangle principle for both entering and receiving a sacada to chart out the ideal setup and resolution. Consider this the Drive Assist that I, as the driver of our tango vehicle, can engage in case of unexpected road conditions to turbo-charge our dance.

[1] In high school Spanish class, we had to memorize the phrase “sacar la basura” which means “to take out the trash.” That and how to ask for directions to the library are pretty much the sum total of what I learned in my years of high school Spanish.

By sericson0, ago

In defense of Steps

Figures, vocabulary, sequences, and anything else labeled as steps get a bad reputation in the social tango world. Steps rank last on most dancers’ list of what makes a good tanguero, if they make the list at all. The phrase “they just did a bunch of steps” is a common way to express displeasure for a performance, and it is even a mark of pride amongst some leaders of how few steps they do. The advice often given is it is better to do a few steps than do a lot of steps poorly. “Better to remain silent and thought a fool than to lead a bad boleo and to remove all doubt.” Or, as stated in Proverbs 17:28, “even a fool, when he holdeth his ganchos, is counted wise: and he that sustaineth his pauses is esteemed a man of understanding.”

We have all seen that dancer who tries as many figures as possible, irrespective of quality, connection, or music. None of us want to be that person, or dance with that person. We see these dancers and think they care too much about the steps. We believe they should focus less on the steps to be able to pay attention to more important parts of the dance, such as the music and connection. I want to argue a different position. I care a lot about the steps I do, and by the end of this essay I hope that you do too. My thesis is that the problem is not dancers caring too much about their steps, but the problem actually is that dancers care too little about the steps they do. Steps are not simply sequences to half-learn in class, try at the milonga, and forget a week later. They are conduits for understanding ourselves, for sharing with the world, and for connecting with our history and the rich history of dance. Every step can reveal truths about ourselves.

Remembering a sequence is not the end, but the beginning of the journey. Dive deeper. Analyze more. Discover the reason behind each loss of balance, each moment of discomfort, and the cause of each mistake; then change yourself so that will always work. Visualize each movement in detail, and identify any part where your mental image is murky. This highlights the questions to ask and the areas to work on to complete your picture. Work with other dancers to get their insights and methods for doing the same steps. Understand the step inside and out so that it becomes a tool you can always use. This process can be slow, and you may come back to the same step many times year after year to discover new truths. The process of analysis and discovery is how we show our care for the steps we do. The person who mindlessly leads half-baked step after half-baked step is doing it because they haven’t put enough care into understanding the steps they do.

We each have a mental framework of how the dance works, but some frameworks are better than others. Limited mental frameworks hold us back far more than any limitations in ability or physicality. Steps are a way to expand our understanding of what is possible. Like how logicians use counterexamples to prove a theory false, steps that don’t fit within our understanding act as counterexamples to our limited frameworks. The best teachers give us steps that fail when our understanding of the dance is incorrect but will unlock easily once we have the correct framework.   

Steps are the vocabulary for expressing ourselves. Having a full vocabulary allows for full expression, and a fuller vocabulary allows us to see and think things we otherwise would not have. Different steps can capture different parts of the music, and knowing more steps helps us better hear the music. Different steps bring out different emotions, and knowing more steps help us connect to our own emotions and those of our partner. Throwing around steps without care is like throwing words around without knowing their meaning. We may judge someone for using words incorrectly, but it is not the fault of the words. The solution is not to use a smaller vocabulary, but to gain the understanding of what the words mean and use them appropriately.

Each step has a story. There are several steps that I have created myself—likely I was not the first to discover them, but I discovered them without being shown by someone else. I remember each time I first dreamt the idea up (sometimes literally as I often visualize movements before going to bed). I remember the details I changed and the pieces I polished to shape them how I want. I take pride in the steps I have discovered, and I take care in their continued growth and development. I find joy sharing these ideas when I dance, and in feeling the interpretation and additions of my partner.

Each step has a history. I remember the steps shared with me, and the people who showed me. I remember the place and the feelings and the energy. This history comes with me whenever I dance. I honor where I come from and those who have taught me by caring for their steps. For remembering, implementing, and adapting their ideas. Recently a teacher was showing me a movement and she said, “This is a very old step that I absolutely love.” It is a tiny movement, but a movement passed on from dancer to dancer, until she passed it along to me. This tiny movement allows me to connect into a whole lineage and bring their spirits with me wherever I dance. Each step allows me to be a part of tango, its past present and future. This is why I care about the steps I do.  

By sericson0, ago

The Inner World of Tango: Finding your flow

Indeed, one of the highest pleasures is to be more or less unconscious of one’s own existence, to be absorbed in interesting sights, sounds, places, and people. Conversely, one of the greatest pains is to be self-conscious, to feel unabsorbed and cut off from the community and the surrounding world.

Alan Watts, The Wisdom of Insecurity

Tango is a gateway to a state of consciousness where mind and body are fully engrossed in the present moment. It is a world filled with senses—the sounds of the music, the sight of our partner and the ronda, the smell of perfume, the inner senses of balance, acceleration, and stretch. It is a world filled with feelings—the pressure of our feet on the floor, our partner’s hand on our back, the warmth of connection, the texture of their movements. We feel curiosity, suspense, excitement, pride, nostalgia, safety, gratitude, joy, happiness, love. Our mind is fully active, but we are resensitized to the world so that our thoughts are saturated by the experiences of the moment leaving no room for regrets about the past or concerns about the future. This world of flow, once discovered, brings tango dancers back night after night in search of the opportunity to reenter. For many, access to this inner world of tango is THE point of the dance and the meaning behind the movements.

The journey to the inner world of tango can be a frustrating one. The trail is difficult to find and there are many ways to lose the path. And when we do arrive, we can be taken away at any moment. We can’t think our way there because those thoughts take up the space in our mind that is needed to fully experience the moment. I can’t tell you how to find your inner world of tango, but I can offer a guide to help you find the path, and help you reorient when you lose the trail. I can offer some reminders that can act as a catalyst to reconnect to sensations and allow them to engulf our thoughts.    

Comfort, excitement, and safety are the keys to the inner world of tango while pain, boredom, distraction, and fear bar entry. You begin preparing for your journey to the inner world of tango well before getting on the dance floor. Your state of being before the dance will affect how you show up in the dance. Did you get enough sleep? Are you fed and hydrated? Have you warmed your body up and taken care of any aches or pains that may distract you from the present moment? You make choices that allow the experience to occur. What milonga are we going to? What tanda are you dancing to? Who are we dancing in front of and behind? Who will be your companion on this journey?

When I was young in tango, I thought that everyone should dance with everyone, and that people were just being “snobs” and being too selective. This was because I still thought of the dance in terms of its steps and movements. Later I realized that the journey to the inner world of tango requires comfort and safety in your partner. We can practice with and experience joy dancing with a wide range of people, but the truth is that there is a much smaller group with whom we are able to travel deeper. Each dancer finds their own path to the inner world. I will share mine in case it is of help. I begin by putting my focus on my partner’s spine. The thread of connection to our partner’s center is fragile but

powerful. It contains information about their positioning and preparedness, their breath and heartbeat, their thoughts, and their feelings. Fully committing to the extrospection of my partner’s state of being can be enough to bring me into the inner world.

We need our eyes open for balance, to navigate, and to better read our partner.[*] But the milonga is filled with distractions for the eye. The sparkly clothes shoes of someone, the elegant movements of another, our friend who just walked in, the person taking photos of the dance floor.[†] I use what the great magician Juan Tamariz describes as the pianist’s inward gaze.

The pianist’s gaze is the gaze of someone who is concentrated on his own action, and on the instrument. This is the inward gaze…If it is intense, honest and strong, it may be very attractive too. It is as if we opened a door into ourselves and invited the spectator to come in.

Juan Tamariz, The Five Points in Magic

Use your eyes for the information you need without allowing the extraneous sights to distract you on your journey.

I bring my attention to the contact of my feet with the floor. To the contact of the embrace. To the feelings of my hand in theirs, their hand in mine, my hand on their back and their hand on my back, and the connection and intention of our bodies. I breathe life into these connection points, feeling the air flow into my feet, hands, arms, and chest. I allow the breath to bring with it the sensation of the present moment. I allow thoughts to calmly come and go without judgement, trusting that wherever I am in the moment is where I should be.

We seldom stay in our inner world for long. There are plenty of moments of distraction, boredom, fear, and pain to bring us back to earth. I am constantly entering and exiting my inner world. I often recheck where my focus is, remind myself of the inward gaze, reconnect with my feet and with the connection, and reconnect to my breath. I sometimes find myself focusing too much on these guides, which itself pulls me away from the inner world. I then feel the flash of self-judgement for thinking too much about ways to not think so much. This process is natural. It is a blessing that our internal thoughts are as complex as they are. I slowly find my way back. I ask you to come join me in this inner world of tango, if even for just a moment.

This article was greatly enhanced by the experiences and thoughts shared by Jacqueline Pham, Gabriel Gaumond, and David Zuckerman. Thank you all for your wisdom.

[*] I believe that it is best for both leaders and followers to keep their eyes open but maintain the inward gaze towards their partner.

[†] Still the biggest distraction I have experienced was the one case where a person decided to film me for the entire tanda. Needless to say, I was well removed from the inner world of tango for that tanda.

By sericson0, ago

Want a better tango walk? Then do this: Part II

In part I, we discussed some possible choices we can make to improve our walk. Next, we need to get our mind and body to do what we want it to do. Now that we picked our target, we need the accuracy to hit it. If we were throwing darts, then we would have the immediate feedback of where the dart lands to begin zeroing in on the bullseye. To improve our tango walk, we need a way to get similar feedback; to see where our metaphorical darts land.  If we use feedback in a manner which is healthy and effective, then our tango will quickly improve.

Here is a procedure for approaching feedback I find effective. I’ll call it the four Cs of feedback:

  1. Choose
  2. Capture
  3. Correct
  4. Compare

We first choose a specific element to work on. We then capture what we are doing. We next use this information to correct mistakes we notice. Finally, we compare ourselves after the correction with what we did before. For example, say I choose to work on my balance during my walk[1]. We film ourselves walking to capture how our walk looks. After slowing down the film, I see I wobble when I move my weight too far to the outside of the foot. I correct by practicing slowly transferring between feet while keeping my center of balance towards the second toe instead of the pinky toe. Finally, we film ourselves again and compare balance before and after the correction to see if I improved.  

Choose the focus before giving yourself or anyone else feedback. This narrows down the corrections to a manageable level. The most common challenge with feedback is that we are too critical about too many things. We think that we can criticize ourselves to improvement, but the truth is that when we are negative towards ourselves, all it accomplishes is this: we no longer seek out feedback. Not getting corrections is easy,meeting unrealistic standards for ourselves is hard. If getting feedback is a negative experience, then you won’t do it; if it is a positive experience then you will do it.

An analogy I think of is that feedback is like learning to box. Your partner throws punches at you so you can practice blocking and dodging, which is helpful and positive. But it would be hurtful and negative if they kicked you because kicking is not part of boxing, so you are not focused on it. The kick itself is not the problem and may be completely appropriate if you were learning kickboxing. The problem is that they struck you with something that was not part of your focus. Similarly, it would be hurtful and negative if someone randomly punched you while walking down the street, because this is not a time when you are focused on practice. When you give feedback, whether it is to yourself or anyone else, always keep in mind the focus of the practice and whether it is a practice space. Throwing punches in the gym is helpful, throwing kicks on the street is hurtful.   

To capture what we are doing, an external eye is critical. Internal sensations are essential as well, but we often don’t feel what we don’t have awareness of. External information and corrections train our mind to understand the internal sensations it is receiving, so we need a way to see from the outside what is going on. This can be done with a mirror, with feedback from our partner, by getting corrections from a teacher, or by filming ourselves. I highly recommend filming yourself and slowing down the film. This is one of the most effective means of improving your dance. But please choose what you focus on first and be very gentle with yourself. Remember that kicking yourself over all the things you notice won’t help you, it will just cause you to avoid filming in the future.

When deciding a correction to make or suggest, remember the chosen focus, and give one correction at a time, or even the same correction several times. It is better to give one piece of feedback a hundred times than give a hundred pieces of feedback once. As an example of what not to do, I once had a partner who, when I asked if she could give feedback on a fewer number of topics and provide positive feedback when I was improving, responded with “How can I give positive feedback when everything you are doing is wrong?” I hope none of you will be this blatant to your partner, but many of us say something similar with our internal narrative. It is not the corrections we get that are important, but the corrections we can improve upon that matter.

The final step is to compare yourself before and after to see progress. This step is often overlooked but is critical. For one, the correction may not have solved the problem, in which case you want to iterate with different options. Some corrections may work for some people but not others, or may only solve part of the puzzle. We want to find what works for us and in our body. Even more important though, you want to get the dopamine hit of seeing yourself improve. Take pride and joy in the fact that you are improving yourself and your dance. Instead of the masochistic onslaught of self-critique that we mistakenly think is helpful, mark the improvements that you make and celebrate each one. Make it a practice that every time you practice, you choose a few focused elements to capture and correct, and then celebrate each incremental progress. After all, it is not your current level that matters but your ability to grow that counts. Feedback in a focused and positive manner, as the four Cs hopefully provide, leads to sustainable growth and sustained joy throughout your tango journey.

[1] my partner chooses what they want to focus on as well.

By sericson0, ago

Learn 11,664 Tango Sequences in Under Two Pages

The simplest of movements in tango can be complex. And not just complex in the legs intertwining and heels flying every which way kind of way, but complex in the number of variations, big and subtle, which can occur. The beauty of tango is that every movement contains an inner world of depth and richness. We need not look further than the ways two basic tango steps can be put together to create a basic sequence to see the endless creative possibilities that tango has to offer.  

The follower can step forward, side, or back, and they can step with the right or left foot. They can also start the step with their hips neutral (squared) to their shoulders, or they can start with the free hip close or far. The basic walk is repeated back steps with the hip neutral; back ochos are repeated back steps with a far free hip, and front ochos are repeated forward steps with a close free hip. The basic follower step choices are:

  • Follower direction:forward side, back
  • Follower leg: left, right.
  • Follower hip position: close, neutral, far.

For 3 × 2 × 3 = 18 total possibilities.

The leader can step forward, side, or back, and they can also step with the right or left foot. We tend to relate the leader steps to the follower steps and talk about parallel and crossed system. Parallel system is when the couple steps with opposite feet (leader left to follower right), and crossed system is when the couple steps with the same foot (leader left to follower left). The basic leader step choices are:

  • Leader direction:forward side, back
  • System: parallel, crossed.

For 3 × 2 = 6 possibilities.

The follower choices can be paired with the leader choices for 18 × 6 = 108 possible steps. These are few enough steps that it can be a nice exercise to take a practice to iterate through each. We can link two steps together to create a sequence. Any two steps can be linked, so we have 108 × 108 = 11,664 possible sequences of just two steps!

There are all sorts of interesting possibilities within these two steps to explore. We tend to do ochos in crossed system, but leading ochos in parallel system is possible, and produces a nice dynamic effect. We usually do ochos with the leader taking side steps, but why not with forward and back steps? Why not do ochos at the same time? Or why not be cheeky and have the follower do side steps while the leader does their own ochos? What if you lead the first half of a back ocho (say follower back left with away hip and then pivot hips), but instead of completing the second back step you lead a side step? Or a back ocho to a forward step? Or what if you did the first half of a front ocho but after the pivot, instead of leading the second front step, you led a side sacada? Maybe as a follower embellishment for the ocho cortado, instead of doing two side steps before the cross you convert them to two forward steps? This adds more hip movement and gives a different feeling to the movement. Or maybe as the leader you play with leading the ocho cortado this way? There is a whole world of possibilities to explore. Even if you don’t like 10,000 of the possibilities, that still leaves 1,664 sequences to play with!   

Some options may seem to not work, such as stepping with the same leg twice. But you could always do a quick weight change or do one step to your partner’s two. What at first seems like an impossibility is just an excuse for creativity. It can be good to play with combinations of steps that may at first seem unusual. You may find that leading and following unusual sequences of simple movements are not easy, but are a lot of fun. And if you have trouble coming up with sequences to try, then randomly pick a few and see what happens. If you are computer minded (as many of us tango dancers are), then you can always get the computer to generate random sequences of steps to try for you. Or you play around with my very simple app here https://sericson0.shinyapps.io/TangoStepGenerator/ (Yay couple of hours learning R Shiny on a weekend 😉). Whatever works for you to explore new movements and new possibilities.

And we have just talked about the possibilities for what the steps themselves are—the what questions. We can also ask the where questions of direction and navigation. We also have the how questions—the size, timing, style, and dynamics. Do we go toe first or heel first?  Are we smooth or staccato? Do we accent the beginning, middle, or end, or not accent any part? Maybe the most important question to answer is the why of the step. Are we expressing confidence, doubt, gentleness, compassion, connectedness, dissonance, sensuality, sexuality, joy, anger, hurt, hope, happiness, love? Are we telling a story or sharing a joke? Or maybe we are feeling the metaphorical wind through our hair as we move in space? Or maybe our attention is on appreciating the sensations of moving and connecting to another human being; Sharing some precious moments of our precious time on this earth.

Once all these dimensions are considered, there surely must be more than a million ways we can take two steps. And by the time we get to the combinations of steps that can be done in a single phrase of the music, then the number of atoms in the universe are small in comparison. So the next time you find yourself repeating the same patterns in the same way you did in the last song, in the last milonga, maybe for the last ten years, take a moment to stop. Remember the world of possibilities in just two steps. Take a moment to dive into that world of possibilities and see what you come up with. I promise it will be worth it.  

By sericson0, ago

Want a better tango walk? Then do this: Part I

Every tango dancer wants a powerful and elegant walk. Ask a tanguero what they are practicing, and the most common answer is “I am working on my walk”. Whole books have even been devoted to analyzing the walk. For many, a good tango walk is synonymous with a good tango dancer. But how do we actually improve our walk?

Improvement takes two steps. You first make choices about what you want to do, and then you check to see if what you did was what you wanted. You first pick your target and then you check your accuracy. This article discusses choices we can make for the tango walk—the targets we can pick—and a follow-up article will discuss methods to check our accuracy.

The walk is too simple to be the only thing you practice. It does not have pivots, does not change systems, and does not have the pattern of alternating crosses and open steps that is fundamental to understanding many tango movements.[1] At the same time, the walk is too complicated to practice as a whole. An elegant walk is an integration of many specific components, each performed correctly and in the correct sequence. If we try to improve everything at once, then we overload our capacity to focus. Instead, we want to improve our understanding, control, and mastery of each component, and then reintegrate them into an improved whole. Practice the walk, and your walk won’t improve. Practice the components of the walk, and your walk will improve.

So how do we go about breaking down the walk into components and picking our targets? The approach I find helpful is to ask myself a series of questions about what I want to do. I have listed 10 questions below that are a good place to start (see here and here for a discussion of the joint terms used in some of the questions). I recommend you take the time to write down your answers for your own walk. These questions are just a starting point, and there are many more we could ask, especially related to the effect and intent of what we want to convey. The specific questions are less important than the specificity of your answers. Try to be detailed with your response. Clarity of intent leads to clarity of movement.   

  1. Feet: How do you line up your feet relative to each other and relative to your partner’s feet?
  2. Ankles: Do you bevel your feet, and when do you point or flex your feet?
  3. Knees: When do you straighten or bend your knees?
  4. Hips: When and how much do your turn out your legs, and when do you flex or extend your hips?
  5. Hip position: Do you keep your hips level to the floor?
  6. Collection: How do you collect? How does your collection synchronize with your partner?
  7. Embrace: Where do you connect with your partner? How do you hold them?
  8. Head: Where is your head positioned? Where are you looking?
  9. Balance: Where is your center of balance throughout the step?
  10. Effect: What do you want to convey with your walk? How do you want it to feel?

There is no “one true tango,” and there is not one correct way to walk, so there is not a right or wrong answer to these questions. What is important is to start making choices. That being said, some choices will better convey our desired effect, and some choices need to be bundled along with other choices we make. Studying the choices we can make, and the choices great dancers make can help with our own clarity. Consider some of the choices made by Jonathan and Clarisa in the images below (images taken from https://youtu.be/ujs4hFT2Kz0 filmed by 030 tango).

Images from Clarisa Aragon and Jonathan Saavedra dancing to “Patético” by Tango Bardo at Rathaus Berlin.

A few notes on some of the choices we can make. There are three main answers to the question of how do you line up your feet? One answer is to have the feet on two tracks, where the inside of the heels line up with each other. Another potential is to have the center of the feet line up with each other, so the back foot fits in the shadow of the front foot (if the light were directly in front of you). A third option is to have the balls of the feet on one line, in which case the center of one foot actually crosses the other. There are amazing dancers who use each of these three possibilities, and each results in a different style of walk.

Different potential foot positions.

Turnout determines where your knee is pointing relative to your hip, and beveling determines where your toes are pointing relative to your knee. The turnout and beveling combine to determine the size of “the pizza slice” your feet make on the floor. Your choice of beveling and turnout depend on your aesthetic preferences, foot strength, the music, and what you want to express. You can see Vanessa expressing turnout and some impressive beveling in the first image, and a more neutral ankle and turnout position in the second image (images from https://youtu.be/_7wySfMSuvA). Beveling the standing foot requires a lot of balance and ankle strength to perform safely, so I recommend most dancers to have a neutral ankle for the standing foot and play with different shapes with the free foot. One (more or less) universal rule is to position your feet such that when walking backwards the big toe is the first to arrive, and when walking forward the big toe is the last to leave. This rule is clearly shown by Roxana and Sebastián in the third and fourth images (from https://youtu.be/NFXs20kygAY).

Various levels of turnout and beveling by Vanessa Villalba (dancing with Facundo Pinero). Sebastián Achaval and Roxana Suarez displaying the big toe being the first to land when walking backwards and the last to leave when walking forward.

How you collect depends on some of the other choices you make. One important choice is whether your free foot is flexed or pointed when passing through collection. If your foot is flexed when passing through collection, then your knee, and ankle will pass through collection at the same time. If your foot is pointed, then your knee and ankle will pass through collection at different times, and you will have a continuum of collection (Credit to Jackie Pham for coming up with the term continuum of collection). In the panel above with Jonathan and Clarisa, you can see how they keep a pointed foot through collection. When Clarisa collects at the ankle, Jonathan collects his knees. And when Clarissa collects at the knees Jonathan collects at the ankles. This creates space for the step and makes the movement look connected. Your type of collection also depends on the amount of turnout of the standing leg. When you pass through collection, you want the knees to pass close to each other to not leave a gap between them. The more turnout you have, the more potential gap. This can be solved by turning in the free leg when passing through collection, which leads to a snakelike walk. If you want the snaky effect, then more turnout of the standing leg is helpful, and if you want a more linear direct effect then less turnout of the standing leg is helpful. The choice of turnout impacts your choice of collection, which in turn impacts the effect you display.  

So, you want a better tango walk? Then do this: ask questions and come up with specific answers. These answers give you specific components to work on. Work on the specific components and it will lead to improvement and clarity in these components. Better components sum up to a better walk.

[1] Practicing a range of movements exposes our body to new concepts, improves our balance and coordination, and highlights technical flaws which can then be corrected. Improving a variety of movements makes us a better dancer, when in turn gives us a better walk.

By sericson0, ago

Driver and Navigator: A Metaphor for the Roles in Tango

Each dancer in a tango partnership has their own distinct role and responsibilities. We give them the names leader and follower, but how should we think about these two roles? The metaphors we use to describe our roles play an important role in how we think about our dance and our interaction with our partner. What do we need to provide our partner, and what can we expect from them? Hopefully the next few paragraphs can provide some new insights to these questions.

I find the following metaphor a helpful guide for thinking about the roles in Tango. Imagine we are in a car together driving to a new destination. The follower takes the role of driver, and the leader takes the role of the navigator. Both roles are important for a safe and enjoyable trip. As a navigator, we remember the route, provide timely directions of where to turn, give information on the speed limit, and calmly recalculate the route when we miss an exit. As a driver, we take care of all the details to smoothly transport us to where we are going; putting on turn signals, checking mirrors, and providing steering, braking, and acceleration.

Something the driver-navigator metaphor particularly helps with is the timing of the dance. When we take an exit, the navigator gives the directions ahead of time. The driver then prepares to change lanes. Finally, the driver changes lanes and the navigator goes along for the ride. The same sequencing occurs in tango: (1) the leader gives the directions for a movement, (2) the follower prepares their body for the movement, (3) the follower executes the movement, and (4) the leader follows along behind the follow.

The metaphor of driver and navigator also solves some seeming tango paradoxes. Navigators need to give clear directions, but we don’t grab the wheel. This is the metaphorical difference between a clear lead and a forceful lead. We show the route in advance but then go along for the ride, the meaning behind the saying “you first lead, and then you follow your lead” As a driver, we let someone else navigate—giving up control—but it is so that we can better focus on the road—allowing for greater control. We follow the directions the navigator gives and generally avoid taking exits that aren’t on the route, but we don’t just shut our eyes and wait until we arrive at our destination. We actively take control of driving. This is the metaphorical difference between not following, passive following, and active following.

A final concept the metaphor exposes: if we are taking a trip together, then where are we going? Are we going to a fancy dinner? A cool café? A night with friends? The navigator gives the directions, and the driver controls the wheel, but we both choose the destination ahead of time. In tango, there is a conversation about the step that occurs before the step. As a leader, I choose the steps and the timing. But why did I choose those steps and why did I pick that timing? Surely I consider how my follower prepared their body, the energy and feelings they are expressing, and what they are hearing in the music. And as a follower, I choose how to execute the movements. But surely I consider the broader idea and effect we are going for. I fill in the details of the story that we are both telling.

We both have a say into the energy, texture, musical composition, and end effect of our movement. We have a conversation about where we are going to go. Maybe this conversation occurs at the beginning of the phrase or at the end of the previous phrase.  Maybe it occurs in the pauses between individual movements. But the conversation is always there to have, whether we speak up and listen or not. The conversation before the step opens a new world of interaction and collaboration. After all, where are we going is a more important question than how do we get there. Sure, it is nice if occasionally our driver shows us a more scenic route, or our navigator helps take the wheel—the metaphorical equivalents of how embellishments and two-way communication in tango tends to be taught—but this is different from having a conversation about where we want to go. I still have much to learn about how we have this conversation in the dance. Maybe I can share additional insights once I gain more clarity, or maybe you have insights that you can teach me. Regardless of how this conversation occurs, we can still have it together in our dance, and enjoy going on some exciting trips together.

By sericson0, ago