Please Protect yourselves from Swine Flu!

Don't do this!

Fancy Schmancy

I had to look for this video today. When I import it from Picassa, it won't show as a video, ARRRG. La Garua at the end of a night in winter. I don't suppose there is anything that interesting about it, but it reminds me that my favorite milonga is peaceful, civil, romantic, and comfortable most of the time.

It has to be good for the community when all the "kids" from across town come over to watch visiting stars. And maybe they can get a look at the calm side. It might look boring to them, but someday it won't. But it was a little nuts with a crowd, the flying back boleos, and the bumping, and the unknown factors to deal with. It made me nervous. I love the quiet Sunday afternoons rolling into evening, with the sun going down and the lights going low, and drifting away after beautiful tandas, driving over the lake and back home, or sometimes stumbling in to our favorite bistro for Croque Madame, otherwise known as a ham and cheese and egg sandwich. And if you eat it too often, you will indeed, croak. Sometimes a fancy name, or a fancy dance is just not needed.

Studio garden begins to grow...

Geranium "Anne Folkard" from Carol, some day lilies that Megan gave me, some iris, some lavender, some sedum of some type, and in the middle a big poppy which blooms reddish pinkish silverish purple, like an old lady color. Finally, some warmth, some sun, some growth!

Serious Fun

When I was in my early time of learning I complained to a woman teacher that it was difficult for someone at my beginner level to get dances with guys who were "good" or "better". She asked me why I wanted that, and I replied that of course it was important for me to have a more advanced leader so that I could learn faster. (Why did I care about doing things fast?)

She told me to forget about that idea. She said I ought to dance with newbies, anyone who was learning at any level, and that to dance with leads slightly less experienced was a fantastic way to learn.

I have never forgotten this great advice. By taking it to heart I made many good tango friends who are always there for me now, and now they most definitely dance well. I learned to just listen as they worked it out, and they are remember that. Well, they remember it until the newest chica comes around... but they come back. I have had many beautiful and heartfelt tandas with sweet guys who do not think of themselves as too good for me. Thus, we all got better together. And no one sits around thinking there is no one to dance with.

The only caveat: I protect my body, my axis, my pedicure, and my mood. I don't dance with just anyone. I just dance with people I like, people who are fun., and serious about learning.

Practica and Roles

We have been practicing the weight change: The leader changes the weight of the follower, without changing his own weight....going from parallel to crossed system without the rigmarole of going to the cross via the dreaded eight count basico. It is so simple, so elegant, can be reversed back to parallel ( e.g. he moves by stepping on his left as I move on my right) by easy and sweet turns etc. Well it just further proves that much of the teaching going on is way too arcane and complicated. Last night I was awake trying to remember if sometimes the leader shifts his weight and causes her not to, or vice versa....basically I think all these things happen while I am just enjoying myself.

When leaders and followers all learn together, going to class partnered up, figures are typically taught, and the follower then has a poisoned mind...knowing what the step is and sort of doing the step even when it is not being led, by poor Mr. beginner who is just trying to figure it out, and would be better off if she weren't there at all! Of course the instructors might be reluctant to lose half of the students this way, so it isn't happening, except in a few cases of Men's Technique classes....) Have you watched these beginner classes? It is really enlightening, and I was the student/victim for a long time. You can see her foot going first! To my teachers credit, they understood that the women were thinking, and talking too much, and would make gentle or nor so gentle reminders for us to cut it out.

A better world would be this: We go somewhere else, say, shopping, or having lunch, or getting our pedicures, or hanging out in a women's techniques class which would make us feel like we were doing something about our wonky feet and our slow response or whatever, and then later when we are all worn out, we could partner up, and just be quiet, and let the leaders lead, and then offer them our best selves. There is plenty for us to express...we just can't do it until we are invited. We cannot be invited until he works it out in his own way, and in his own time. God, I wish I had all the money I've spent on classes to buy shoes with, or nice dresses, while my husband does all the work....Oh gosh that sounds a lot like what I do anyway.

Girls, if you just have to learn a lot of figures and variations and this and that, which I totally understand, then learn to lead. If you absolutely need to chase down the guys for dances and you are willing to use all sorts of means to do the inviting, and the dancing, yourself, then learn to lead. Just do it so the ladies can have the space they need, you can have yours. I don't care what gender the leader is, or the follower, or if they are the same gender, or whatever, I just like to know, since I hear that tango is an invitation...

Alicia Pons Weekend

We were fortunate to be able to take two classes and one private lesson this weekend from Alicia Pons. To the host who brings her here: Seattle dancers are grateful! The only bad part is that she goes away, and we are left to our own sad devices again.

I have a very different idea now of "active following".....not so active, more attentive, softer, and relaxed. For this milonguero style, which is the preferred style for me, the concept of "home" in the balanced pose of standing just relaxed on the home leg is emphasized. For the man, Alicia is very definite about the concept of home, knowing where the woman is, and of not driving through the woman and mowing her down...

Alicia uses poetic visual references...the tree, the roots, the tubes of water up and down, not splashing out. Sometimes the fountain of the woman's energy.

Honestly it is hard for me to reconcile now, that I do two different types of dance when I go out. I dance more open at times, but only with one or two people who can be trusted not to injure or upset me. It is fun. I like it...it can be connected. But I go for the milonguero style and this is invisible to many. As Alicia says....no one can see what happens, but it happens.

Thinking about how to grow, and to develop this style in a limited environment. Thinking of how to study with Robert Hauk...Alicia's friend and partner who danced with her here. He is in Portland...so it is possible.I think someone made a video of them dancing at La Garua on Sunday. I will post it if it shows up. What a moment. Alicia's feet fly, as in her teaching analogy, like birds. The invitation and response is not entirely invisible when you have been working on it all weekend...then you see how it's done...or you see a little bit of it.

Sometimes I reflect on how strange it is that we have appropriated, sometimes inappropriately, the dance of this very foreign culture. What are we doing? Do we not live in our own world? What we are presented with is too often a theatrical version of tango, as silly as the hokey version of the Western United States, of cartoon cowboys and dude ranches. I grew up in Eastern Oregon, spending plenty of time on the fence watching real roping and riding. So the attitude that I see, of people who like to be pretend cowboys, or to make fun of them, is funny and sad. I think the Argentines must look at us this way, as misguided fans. They can sell us a tarted up version of tango, and god knows they do....

Or maybe sometimes they just extend the embrace, some of them, to bring us the real tango...no circus, no rodeo. Just tango, a tango that can belong to anybody.

P.S> For one of the classes we took the Beginner class. Now we are able understand it better. Almost everyone in the class has been dancing for some years now, and they were smart to go back to basics. It is a good idea to always be a beginner.

Solo hip hop tango (vals)

Ernest Williams explores the African roots in Tango...here to clearly European music....bringing it all together!

FaceBook In Reality - idiotsofants.com and BBC'sThe Wall

Comforts of Home

Driving back from Oregon gave me a nice time to listen to music and to think.
Oregon is still home, and is just down the road, it isn't really like travelling. I had family to see, and business to take care of.
On the way I thought about all that would need to be done just as soon as I got into the house...would there be dirty dishes? Did the trash get taken out? Alan has had a grueling work schedule and probably not had time to even notice the house...or the garden.

I walked in, tired. The first thing I saw was an enormous bouquet, five feet tall, of forsythia, arranged in a tall crystal vase on the coffee table. The trimmings from a massive and pesky bush which threatens to take over our pathways and weigh down the old fence, these brilliant flowers are still growing and blooming a week later. Alan carefully replenishes the water and sets the vase back where it towers over us as we visit in the evenings, a tree that we sit under, in the lights of those flickering yellow stars reflected in a nice glass of Malbec. All we need is a talking snake and an apple to complete the archetypal vision.

We worked in the garden yesterday, one of the first days of real spring weather here. Frost damage has taken a toll this year, but it forces some rearrangement that needs to be done anyway.

We haven't gone out to dance for two weeks, probably the longest break in over four years of obsessive tango. We did get in some really fun and productive practice at home though. Next weekend we have Alicia Pons here, and we will take advantage of her teaching. Spring is sprung.

All you friends at Dance Underground, we missed you too!

Noel Strazza and Active Following

I am hooked on watching the video in the previous post. The reason is that, for me, it depicts beautifully what I see as the principle of "active following". The concept is a little hard to get, and requires a bit of advancement in terms of waiting, leaving space, respect, calmness, and creativity.

Sometimes very modern and "liberated" women scoff at tango and the aspect of surrender. (Frankly I think they look like they could use a little surrender, but each to her own). But really exciting, dynamic and interesting tango is a conversation with two people. I think it shows in the video.

I love this video, and have it in my "favorites" and watch it often. It is better than a cup of coffee in the morning. Active following, has been a little bit of a mystery to me. Detlef seemed to be trying to get it across to me in a private lesson, about dancing back at your lead, without leading, and you know, not just being a dead fish.

I am working on this aspect a lot, and with certain partners it is very welcome. They have to be confident, the leads do. An insecure guy, no matter how nice his dancing, just won't allow the room for it. IMHO. So much is revealed in tango.

Pablo Pugliese and Noel Strazza Tango Performance 1