Technique is a real bugbear of mine. It comes up all the time. Perhaps I should carry this post about in hard copy form for whenever someone brings up the T word. It might have a new title: Don't Talk To Me About Technique! People do talk about it though: in the milongas, in practicas, in forums - presumably non-stop in classes. Even when they have forsworn learning figures and movements they still have faith in this vague but apparently so necessary...what? What is exactly is technique supposed to be?
'False friend', to recall:
False friends are words in two languages (or letters in two alphabets)[1] that look or sound similar, but differ significantly in meaning. An example is the English embarrassed and the Spanish embarazada (which means pregnant) - Wikipedia
You can see the misunderstanding can be substantial.
So it is with the false friend: technique. In the language of tango dance class, technique is part of “the basics”, "the building blocks", “the toolkit”, “the ABC” that will let you become competent, fluent, advanced in your tango dancing. It is nothing but a con. A true confidence trick because people who believe they have (by paying for it in time and money) technique or “the basics” have simply tried to buy confidence - worse, confidence that is rarely underpinned by anything of real substance.
"Girls like the one described here I try to stay away from. Despite what she says such a girl is so mentally alert, so self-aware, how could it be 'about us'? Such a girl is actually so conscious of all the 'oughts' - her own, and his, that she is unable to just be. She is talking about incompatible things. How could you 'dance from the heart' when you are thinking about: "perfect balance, solid connection and flawless timing (have patience; it is a work in progress). I want to inspire him with my musicality and entertain him with beautiful, creative styling"?
I suppose she'd say all that technique is practiced with hours of work so it's second nature. And that's the point: second nature, not natural."
Good Lord, I don't want - per that article - to be "inspired" and "entertained" by a girl and most guys I know don't look for that either. They are about the the last things I would look for or that would even occur to me. I want to dance with partners. With them. I don't want them to dance at me, which is what inspiring or entertaining is about. This isn't a show. The reason I avoid such girls is because - contrary to what she says - such things are actually about her, not about us.
Technique is not thinking about your posture, your walk, your musicality, your centre of gravity, your axis, the position of your feet or your chest or your arms or your legs or your head or what you do with any of these things. It is not about the engagement of the core, or the degree of pressure in your hand, or the "connection with the floor".
It is not thinking about your embrace and most of all it is not about teaching someone to embrace someone else. If someone needs classes on how to embrace another comfortably, with mutual enjoyment and that amazing sensation of another personality, that exchange of energy, then they probably are not ready for this dance.
Technique is not about stretching your leg back. Those girls - like runaway trains - are a curse on the social floor and a pain to dance with especially when it is busy. I remember a teacher telling me in one of two private lessons I ever had that the girls he most enjoyed dancing with were those who could really walk properly with extended leg. Sure, if you're a show dancer and how I wish those girls would divert into the show-tango performance track and keep out of the milongas or join milongas for people like them. Clue: they tend to wear short skirts and real eye-catching clothes. Similarly, the girls who think that technique is how your feet and legs look are nothing but a nuisance distraction to the guy or girl dancing behind them - pulling him or her out of absorption in the music and their own partner by their taps, flicks and the affectations of their lower halfs. Next time your friend considers signing up for a class in "Adornments" do remind her that affectation in someone's feet can be so strong as to make one almost ill though it is a great indication of personality. Guys often say they will look at a girl's feet before deciding whether to invite her. They aren't just checking the height of her heel or whether she has practice shoes.
There is no standard technique, no “one size fits all”. This is why the notion of teaching technique is absurd but of course, teaching that stuff sells.
It is famously true that if you don't teach steps your class empties. So it is with not teaching technique. So they teach and those few who get from class to the milonga are by then are in such a poor state of 'sub-beginner' that not many who can dance then want to go near them - unless perhaps they have non-dance advantages. In fact, girls seldom get dances because of their technique. They get them for other things. But a lot of girls get rightly cross that they have spent hundreds, thousands on the classes and workshops (that have affected them adversely if only they knew it) and still pick up few dances. They become sadly resentful of men and the unfairness of life and it is a downward spiral from there. That is quite serious, affecting a person's life considerably. What has happened there is in large part down to dance class teachers but how many dancers join those dots?
Real technique is the wordless sensing of what movement is possible between two different individuals with their respective experiences not to mention all the many differences between them physically and psychologically.
Good technique is the accommodation of the partner and the finding of how you best fit with them in all senses. How this happens is unseen to an onlooker. It is a close coming-to-understanding of another person. It is the confidence to do this, subtly and carefully. Technique is actually the wrong word for this. Technique sounds reducible, scientific, "buildable" replicable in a standard way and it is none of these things. It is wholly personal, wholly unique to each couple.
Technique is nothing more than the habit, gained from time and experience on the dance floor of making dance comfortable, easy and enjoyable for your partner and hence for the couple.
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