Open-mindedness

On Tango Voice recently there were some interesting comments in a liberal style:

"I am an old man, 70 this year, and dance a simple style, but it seems a shame that younger dancers should be discouraged simply because I, and possibly you, are old and grey in spirit if not in fact. If dancers are fit, and if they can do figures I can’t, and as long as they respect the two or three foot floor tile I claim for myself, well bully for them."

and,

"The evolution of tango was refined during the “golden age”, but it seems, especially with followers putting as much time and energy into learning to dance as leads, that the evolution continues. I may regret that this has largely passed me by, but I have nothing but admiration for those that can dance a musical Salon Tango that incorporates the “Nuevo” repertoire."

Someone else said:

"Personally, I prefer a chest to chest, simple dance with musicality. But I don’t close the door on individuality of style, especially if it’s musical and emphasizes the connection and the embrace.

I do realize that the tango like many other dances, musical styles and everything else is always in a state of flux and evolving. Personally I do not like the evolution to non-tango music and poor execution of moves. But I do have great admiration for the modern top tier dancers like Gustavo & Giselle, or Chicho or many other argentine tango dancers of today. They are very accomplished artists and their dancing is orders of magnitude better than the vast multitude of self-styled “milongueros”.

Too bad I don’t have the youth, skill and talent to equal them, but I certainly respect their talent and their tango." [sic] 

This gentleman is also 70.

Not all that long ago, I thought Chicho's dancing or any famous performer were examples of great "tango".  I preferred when it was to traditional music but I thought it all amazing.

These days I think rather that happily in our part of the world people can dance freely and in whatever style they like, to whatever music they prefer and go to whatever milonga or dance takes their fancy. That said, clarity when you begin, over what you are learning, what you expect to dance, what you can dance, would really help because not all paths lead to the same place.  For instance, there is a chasm separating what Gustavo does - even though it's to traditional music - from the traditional social dance called Argentine Tango. That is why I am surprised and puzzled that a dancer who prefers a traditional dance admires a Gustavo-type dance.

But, you say, when they start out in classes by, say, the Gustavo-style teachers (my first teachers learnt from him) new dancers may not want to become dancers of traditional tango.  Like most, I did not understand the differences, not for months.  But many people in class do want to dance socially.  And in Europe we see dancers, becoming better and more experienced, tend to like traditional music and a traditional setup.  More milongas are becoming more traditional in music, in invitation and in the conditions for dancing like appropriate seating and lighting.  This includes many younger dancers.  In Berlin I was struck that the milongas with best music and dancing attract a largely young crowd.  There are many good girl dancers in Berlin, young or youngish dancing traditional music with good young and older guys. What these people dance rarely bears any relation to the Chicho/Gustavo type dancing.  Not all young people like this.  The international group of lovely, warm, welcoming people in St Andrews, Scotland for example dance a very close embrace to mostly alternative music.  

Like many, I have changed and in a relatively short time.  I went, unwitting, to nuevo style classes.  Within a couple of years I was choosing rather to dance traditional tango, socially.  Had I my time again, had I known what a milonga was, I might have gone along and watched and listened and seen what happened because you learn much that way.  Provided you know that learning to dance tango is very much a question of just showing up at the milongas, not once but for a while, then things start to happen, slowly.  Some people understand this instinctively.  I was not one of these. I was impatient.  Many just want to dance as much as possible no matter to what or with whom though this tends to change with time.  Just turning up though - and it can be easier and more fun going with friends - you see and hear how things really are and you always have freedom of choice, over whether to dance or not, to what music, with which partner and when you come and go.  And you have the milonga chat, the really valuable information and stories and jokes.  Even if I choose not to dance much at a milonga, something good or funny or interesting always happens.  Besides the music and the dancing, conversation, exchanges, life just happens in the milongas.  Peoples preferences and characters  in all their variety are visible and it is absorbing and wonderful to see and to enjoy.

There are places in Europe, even in the UK where dancing in the Chicho/Gustavo way even in the inner ronda or dancing in the centre at all actually, just isn't on. So people who've been to classes and paid and paid and paid for months and years to learn what they think is Argentine Tango then turn up at a milonga run perhaps by people who are not their teachers and they risk being complained about even thrown out eventually or at best they mess up the ronda and wonder why people don't seem happy with them. Going from class to a milonga they might as well have gone from Earth to Mars.  Actually, there are still not enough milongas like that in the UK where the host would step in and have a quiet word. In some, anything goes.  Haphazard music, random tandas, no cortinas, mixed music, little discernible ronda, direct invitation, open hold dancing, poor seating lighting and  floor are all tell-tales. 

But many of the weekend events in Europe most certainly expect a certain style of dance and adherence to traditional etiquette and you can't get in except by registration and selection - on who knows what grounds.  People wonder how you get from class, to the elitist encuentros and the answer is: you don't. You do lots and lots of social dancing because it isn't just a matter of dance hours.  It is different in essence from class dancing. 

Even if dancers do stick to their own two or three feet on the dance floor, completely different tango dance styles in my experience don't mix well.  At least I think many trad style dancers don't feel what they do mixes well with a nuevo style in the same place.   For traditional dancers, it can be worrying at best, anti-social at worst.  Besides, nuevo style dancers don't tend to have the same conventions about e.g. invitation, or about clearing the floor during the cortina.

Tango dance classes do sell even when they are expensive, time-consuming and when what happens there bears no relation to what happens in the real milonga, even when students go to class and to the milonga.  I think that trying to learn this improvised social dance in a class is about the best thing you could do to harm your chances of ever being able to dance it. But my real point is different: teachers who dance for status and money are never going to relabel their workshops "Tango [sic] for performance" because they know the scales would fall from the eyes of the same people enraptured by the "tango" they've just seen performed. That is really what turns my stomach about these performances even while I remember my previous feeling of admiration. There's the swagger and braggadocio of it all and the fact that it's almost always about moves over music but let's put that aside as a matter of taste. What I really mind is the deliberate sleight of hand, the "this is tango" - now pay me to learn what is never going to translate into social dancing in the milonga and when we've bled you dry most of you will (sensibly) give up. And of those who don't, years in the milongas will slowly rub away the harm done in class.

We though, social dancers, can tell the new dancers about the real dancing in real milongas, socially where they choose and are chosen by the people they just want to dance with, who make them feel good and they can get up to music they enjoy when they feel like it.  That is why there is an explosion of good new, young girl dancers in parts of Europe today - just because they are going out dancing tango socially with guys who can already dance.  Guys, incidentally who don't tell them "You're so tense. Relax, can't you." (A woman told me this yesterday, it's very far from uncommon).  No, so the good girl dancers go dancing with guys who just dance with them, nicely.  And there, in the right setting where it is natural to dance what others are dancing they can try nuevo, or alternative or dance traditional Argentine tango socially and know each of these for what they really are.