Do you know why our webpage is called Tango de Buenos Aires?
Simply because it is the city where we learned it, where we trained as dancers, milongueros, and teachers. It is not the name of a style... it simply refers to having learned it in that place, precisely where its roots are, where tango is primarily a social dance that is danced in milongas. And this is the essence, the core of our approach when it comes to teaching it: so you can learn a tango to dance it in a milonga (understood as the place).
I say all this because there are still many people who, when they arrive at the class, say to us: "I learned the milonguero style" or "I learned the salon style" and I could continue naming "styles" or rather commercial names. Without making negative judgments, I choose to think that these names simply appeared spontaneously due to the innate human need to name things. What is not good is that perhaps someone told them that if they dance milonguero style, they cannot dance salon tango or vice versa...
There is also stage tango, where dancers with extensive training in dance and other artistic disciplines express themselves with more expressive and impactful movements, and within that tango, there are also styles... each couple, over the years, will build a unique and characteristic way of their own. But this is another type of tango.
Talking about style is something very necessary at this time. It is a very extensive topic and can be articulated in many ways.
In our opinion, we need to focus on the "for what" we dance tango.
We dance tango (social) to connect, socialize, communicate, create beauty, etc., and not to divide, exclude, and compartmentalize.
Therefore, we should be integrating forms of dance (including technique) to be able to dance and adapt our dance as best as possible to the dance of others. Although clearly, there will be more connection with some than with others, this is normal.
As the lyrics of the tango "El Tango es el Tango" say, written by Juan Bautista Gatti with music by José Raul Iglesias, which you have surely heard many times sung by Alberto Castillo and the orchestra of Ricardo Tanturi:
....
Tango is tango…
whether with boastful edgings or ribbons of love.
Tango is tango…
if it has milonga it doesn’t matter
if it’s from yesterday or from today…
....
In case you want to listen to the complete tango:
[https://youtu.be/vACJoQuy6fg?si=Lzs8B9kZ7076XzfV](https://youtu.be/vACJoQuy6fg?si=Lzs8B9kZ7076XzfV)
So, the most important thing is that the tango "has milonga," that it is a way of dancing possible and adapted for the milonga (understood as the space). Clearly, there are styles, but they should be understood as the 'form' that each one or each couple has when dancing. This depends on many factors such as:
- Chosen teachers for learning;
- The process and assimilation of dance movements that occur over the years;
- External factors, such as the available space to develop the dance (milongas with more or less space or attendance);
- The type of orchestra that is preferred to dance to intuitively (rhythmic, more melodic, etc.);
- Individual capabilities that may derive from having done or not done some other type of dance previously that provides a special skill, a way of moving for that person (such as dancing swing, jazz, rock'n roll, folklore, etc.)
Let's compare this process to calligraphy and lettering (the art of drawing letters): at the beginning, when we learn in school, we all start drawing letters more or less the same, following a drawing idea and learning cursive, print, uppercase, lowercase, and a whole series of rules for correct tracing. As the years go by, after much practice, our letters take on their own form, a style, and if we later learn lettering, we make them an art... The same thing happens in tango.
We all learn an alphabet of movements and techniques necessary to start the development of the dance; then, it will depend on a natural talent combined with the ability of each one to continue developing the "form" of that dance and, only then, a style will appear, as a personal mark, a unique way of dancing and listening to that person.
When you learn to dance, your teachers should teach you a body language of movements and techniques so that you can communicate with everyone and give you the tools to adapt your dance to that of another person. Of course, sometimes the communication will be more fluid, more felt, more enjoyable, and sometimes not, just like in life when talking to a person: there are boring conversations, more entertaining ones, deeper ones, and others where we speak different languages and still try to understand each other as best as possible.
If you are the one leading the dance (leader) and proposing movements and musical ideas, then you should seek to have the tools for this communication to be as fluid as possible and understand, in turn, the level of dance of the other person, to adapt well and propose movements that the other person can follow, understand, and consequently, enjoy. The style of the leader is more of a fixed character, well-defined and marked, and varies only in its capacity for expression depending on the dancing ability of the partner with whom they dance.
If you are the one following (follower), interpreting the message of another person and enriching it with your musicality, you should have a movement technique that allows you stability, flexibility, and light movement so that you can easily interpret the other's proposal and add your possibilities of musical expressiveness (embellishments, for example).
The style of the follower or interpreter of the lead is more variable, and within the fixed character already developed by that person, it has a variable character as it requires constant adaptation to the partner they are dancing with.
That said, style is something that takes time because it doesn't develop by copying. Copying is a first phase, necessary to see and understand; then, the copied movement will take shape. The style will begin to appear when the dance movements are well "chewed" (using a tango term) by our body, when we have already made certain movements ours and can do them without thinking because they come naturally to us... this is a sign that we are owning a movement to start giving it our shape... All this takes time, because to talk about style we have to wait at least 10 years of dancing (and we are not talking about dancing once or twice a week).
To talk about style, we must also include musicality, the way of listening and expressing the music we hear and feel. It's not just about stepping on time, using rhythmic games, phrasing, or playing with the melody of an instrument, the singer's voice, etc. It's about the WHOLE, how we integrate that whole called music into our movements, including the famous pause, which is like the secret ingredient of a recipe: it is not known, but it feels like there is something more.
The pause is the magical ingredient that, combined with all our dance, generates a sensation for us, our partner, and the observer, that captivates us and makes us travel to a timeless world where 3 minutes of dancing represent an eternity of peace and happiness.
So:
CULTIVATE YOUR DANCE AND YOU WILL SEE IT BLOOM
( this image I was able to create it thanks to the beautiful drawing of the Argentine artist Regina Anders that you can find on Instagram @regina_anders )
Here I share options to continue cultivating your dance:
If you want to know more about possible options for the words "leader" and "follower," you can read this article:
Observe this photo:
This photo was taken during the Luna Arrabalera Meeting of 2024 (Alicante - Spain) by the photographer Miguel Navamuel Fernandez. Although you do not see the dance, you can already notice characteristic features of a style, a way of dancing. You can sense the depth and connection in the embrace and even notice the detail of Oscar's left hand fingers that remain open. This is his way of taking care of my hand, or his partner's, and is part of the set of details that create his style, his form.
As a curious fact that everyone always asks is the reason why he does this king of grip.
He does this type of grip to protect my hand, since completely closing the hand would squeeze my fingers too much and could lead to the possibility of using more force than necessary in that grip.
For today, we will leave it here, but there is much more to add, and I may revisit this topic later.
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