Dancing for themselves

My son, aged 7 at the end of dancing to a milonga, solo. 

I have a much-loved video of my young son dancing solo to the milonga Ella es así by Edgardo Donato, complete with bum waggles and twirls. 

Solo dancing is wonderful in whatever genre.  I see, in salsa, people possessed of a confidence I can only marvel at dancing both together and apart in the same song. That must be something you figure out together when you have experience or a natural confidence in dance. 

A guy dancing for himself when he has an inexperienced partner is something to recoil from. 

Early in my tango dance life women would complain about guys who "danced for themselves". I remember lots of bad dances, avoiding guys in classes, but maybe everything was too new, or maybe all guys danced like that so I thought it was normal.  I vaguely recall wondering what exactly these women meant.  It was perhaps not until a year or two later that I corralled these experiences into a concept.  Few seem to reflect and extrapolate thus far upon their experience.   

I went to a salsa event and danced with a guy who has danced for twenty five years - the dance was small, subtle, competent and connected.  Then I accepted a dance with a guy with whom I had been chatting.  He had danced for just a few years but could not only recognise rhythms I could not but apparently dance them.  "OK, but don't let me go.  I don't do that dancing on your own thing".  He laughed. He seemed very comfortable dancing but I was getting lost, staring fixedly at his feet (never a good sign) in an effort to keep up with him. Perhaps the track was too unfamiliar and too fast for me but for years I hadn't experienced the feeling that I was at fault in dance. I was shown that, dancing tango, there are no mistakes, there is just what happens and the unexpected is usually an opportunity for something fun. When I dance in the guy's role, which is most of the time, if she (or he) can't keep up with me, dancing say, a rapid milonga, I dance half time or less, I adapt to whatever they can do. I didn't know the music, or this guy and I am fairly new to salsa.  I was in his city, which I barely know, a venue I didn't know and he did, dancing a dance he knew and I don't.  I was in his hands, all those things plus the simple fact of dancing the guy's role implies a responsiblity. Guys tend to know this instinctively.  They are used to it and it's what they like.  It's part of why very often, they balk at dancing in the other role. 

"You just have to feel the beat" he laughed at me. I can't remember when I last felt so disconnected  with a partner.  I floundered, felt lost, a blunderer. With my twelve plus years of dance experience why did I feel so un co-ordinated?  I understood he was joking, yet still meaning that I was the problem, that I could barely dance.  My lasting memory is of the confusion, shame, embarrassment of feeling terribly uncomfortable; yet you have to act as though everything is fine and you're just an incompetent, una tonta.  The worst of it is that everyone else  - your potential dance partners - then think you can't dance.

I am sure he didn’t want me to feel like that but he danced for himself rather than with me.

The flip side of this fortunately brief experience was that I appreciated even more the men who have put me at ease dancing salsa, dancing with me, guys with whom I felt relaxed. Virtually all of them have been experienced. On the two or three occasions when I have been inveigled in to to dancing with inexperienced men, it has been predictably disastrous. When it works well it is nothing to do with what moves they have.  The less I realise they are doing moves, the more in fact I have liked it.  It is because they are experienced, because we stay connected, because, as a new dancer in this genre, I feel safe with them. I was lucky that my first dances in this genre were with a guy I already knew and trusted from tango who was also an experienced salsa dancer. From that you can relax and trust them and then the fun can start.

A couple of weeks later I received a message:  Ya sé que no bailo bien, pero tampoco es para que me dejes de hablar.  

Hmmm.... I thought, but replied, although with more of the misgivings I had had before that dance.