Unlocking Musicality in Argentine Tango: Dance, Emotion, and Connection
Music calls you.
When you like a song, it attracts you in a way from which you cannot break easily. One time you are hooked on the music, it affects you. The music awakes emotions in you. If these emotions make you move, then you are dancing.
There is no need to rationalize your responses to the music.
They are spontaneous. The same song does not affect everybody in the same way, and it does not affect you in the same way every time it is played.
When you learn to dance Argentine Tango, you need to incorporate fundamental elements of posture, walking, change of weight, embracing, awareness of your body and your partner’s body, leading and following, basic patterns like the cross, backward, and forward ochos, boleos, etc.
You’ll also need to learn to understand the music of Argentine Tango, its rhythm, phrasing, structure, and the different orchestral styles.
However, when you have internalized all this knowledge through discipline and practice, you will need to forget it and let yourself respond to the music’s call, not as a thoughtful answer but rather as a let-go in which the music affects you emotionally but does not determine what you do regarding your movements.
The music is a friend who dialogs with you, not a boss who orders you.
Let’s take a look at Nestor La Vitola’s dance. He is an excellent milonguero from Buenos Aires, a teacher, and a friend of mine:
Isn’t he very musical? I love seeing him dancing to Pugliese’s orchestra. If you know a little about Argentine Tango, you already know that dancing to Pugliese’s orchestra is among the most challenging achievements in this dance.
One time, in a conversation about musicality with other dancers, he stunned us with this affirmation: “Yo no le doy ni cinco de pelota a la música.”
“I do not care even a little about following the music.”
Wow!!!
This assertion made me laugh because it made me discover the meaning of musicality from an unexpected angle. It is consistent with a general approach to dancing: not using force. This is how I understand his “zen slap” answer: you do not need to try to follow the music. If you are sensitive to the music, if you listen to it, if you –fundamentally– stop judgment, you will allow the music to take over, awaken emotions in you, and move you.
Here is another great milonguero, Blas Catrenau, also a teacher and a friend of mine:
In our lessons, he tells me not to obey the orchestra. Instead, he tells me that I should act like the singer, expressing myself with the orchestra behind me as a backdrop to my performance.
I interpret this as follows: I am like a soloist playing a stellar role in the orchestra. The orchestra is the frame of the work of art, which is my dance.
When I dance, I do not have a precise choreography in mind. What I do have is a structure: first, I need to offer and find a connection with my partner; then, I have to sense myself in this couple, in this milonga, in this tanda, in this song, at this moment; as I start to move, I need to pay careful attention to my partner and our connection; I will deliver my repertoire of moves gradually, starting with simplicity, breathing, often pausing to access the state of my partner, myself, and our connection as a couple, all in a bodily way, without saying anything; then, when I consider it appropriate, I may take some more risk, to open the game, to make it exciting, alive, playful and joyful; that’s it! I then restrain myself to avoid getting carried away by my emotions. I’ll pause longer to prepare for something else, a more complex choreographic idea, perhaps. Then, close to the song’s end, I get myself together, providing a relaxing moment for my partner, and “chan-chan!”, the end of the song, sometimes as a grand finale, sometimes as a subtle “tan-go-close” ending.
Unlocking the True Essence of Tango: Beyond the Dance Moves
Perhaps you were asking yourself: Why a Tango School?
When I receive a new student in my class, I only know that he or she wants to learn to dance. However, teaching to dance Tango involves not only showing the moves but also giving the student a sense of placement, making him or her aware that you cannot just make any move at any time.
I must give the new students a sense of Tango as a whole and make them understand that they are learning a culture.
I heard someone calling Tango a “sub-culture.” I do not agree. All the elements I have learned while studying Tango are substantial in general society and the broader world culture. I learned the importance of my body as the root of my existence. I learned a lot about my interaction with others and how my happiness or unhappiness affects everybody around me. In sum, I learned that everything I do affects everybody and everything in this world.
I have realized the importance of teaching the beauty of Tango.
In my classes, I teach almost all the elements you may have in your checklist that every Tango instructor claims to teach. Name your favorite element; there is a big chance I teach it.
However, the meaning that the move carries within is more important than the element itself.
A while ago, I attended an event related to Tango. I was chatting with a couple. They told me they took some tango classes. They asked me if I made my students change partners in my classes. I replied that yes, but that it was not obligatory, as I knew many couples liked to remain together during the class.
Then they said they were learning “colgadas” in one class and found it uncomfortable doing “colgadas” with other people.
I told them that learning “colgadas” did not make much sense because if they went to Buenos Aires milongas, they would find out that nobody was doing “colgadas” there.
They were surprised, and, I think, a little incredulous of my assertion. Since they never went to Buenos Aires, they could not tell for sure. But I do.
In my more than 20 years of teaching Tango in the Bay Area (and more than 30 years teaching Tango in Argentina and worldwide), I have discovered that the main obstacle to teaching a new student is to overcome all the previous ideas about Tango he or she brings to the class and change them into understanding what Tango really is.
Now, you are probably asking: What Tango is in reality?
My answer is that tango is what happens in the milonga. And when I say milonga, my image is that of the best of the most authentic milongas in Buenos Aires.
This guides my instruction, which is why, along with others who are after the same goal, we created the Escuela de Tango de Buenos Aires.
Embracing the Cultural Roots of Tango
To truly appreciate and master Tango, one must embrace its cultural roots. Tango is a dance that reflects Argentina’s social, historical, and emotional landscapes projected to the world. The music, the lyrics, the movements—all these elements are deeply intertwined with a way of life. Understanding the origins of Tango provides my students with a richer context for their learning journey.
The Role of Music in Tango
Music is the heart and soul of Tango. Each note and rhythm tells a story. To dance Tango, one must connect with the music on a profound level. This means not just hearing the music but feeling it and interpreting it through movement. My students are encouraged to listen to classic Tango orchestras, understand the different styles, and learn to dance harmoniously with the music.
The Social Aspect of Tango
Tango is inherently social. The dance floor is a space where people come together, communicate nonverbally, and share a unique connection. This social aspect is crucial for understanding Tango. Although not obligatory, the practice of changing partners in class helps dancers adapt to different styles and builds a sense of community. It mirrors the social dynamics of a milonga, where dancers interact with multiple partners, enhancing their social skills and empathy.
Technique and Expression in Tango
While technique is essential, expression is what makes Tango captivating. Each movement in Tango should convey emotion and tell a story. This expressive quality sets Tango apart from other dances. I focus on the precision of steps and helping students express themselves through the dance. This balance between technique and expression makes Tango both challenging and rewarding.
Creating an Authentic Learning Environment
For a Tango school to be truly effective, it must recreate the atmosphere of an authentic milonga. This involves more than just teaching steps—it includes fostering a sense of community, encouraging cultural immersion, and promoting the etiquette and customs of Tango. By creating an environment that mirrors the Buenos Aires milongas, my students experience the true essence of Tango.
The Lifelong Journey of Tango
Learning Tango is a lifelong journey. There is always more to learn, refine, and experience. The joy of Tango lies in its endless possibilities for growth and discovery. I instill in my students a love for this ongoing journey, encouraging them to explore, experiment, create, and continually deepen their understanding of the dance.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the essence of Tango lies in its rich cultural heritage, music, social dynamics, and expressive potential. Our tango school aims to impart technical skills and artistic and emotional depth to the dance. By doing so, I offer students a truly transformative experience that goes beyond the dance floor and resonates in their everyday lives.
The creation of the Escuela de Tango de Buenos Aires is a testament to this holistic approach, ensuring that the true spirit of Tango is preserved and celebrated for generations to come.
From Posture to Pivot: A Journey to Excellence in Argentine Tango Dancing
Learning to dance Argentine Tango requires passionate dedication and practice.
Here, we offer indispensable details regarding Argentine Tango and exercises to help you improve your dancing skills.
Whether you are a beginner without any dancing experience, an intermediate dancer looking to polish your dance, or an advanced dancer in search of perfecting your moves, practicing these exercises as often as possible will take your dance to the next level.
We, humans, are unique among all known species. Our upright posture manifests extraordinary qualities. By the way, we stand up and present ourselves; we tell our own story, who we are, what we strive for, our dreams, our ideals, our thoughts, and our emotions. Through working on our posture we work not only on our body but on our entire persona. Therefore, from the perspective of a milonguero, good posture is not merely instrumental, achieved and developed only for the purpose of dancing well, but, in addition to our dance, the way we exist, presented to ourselves and everybody. What we can see in our posture (whether it’s the same or different from what everyone else sees) informs us and shows what we can improve about ourselves.
Technical details and exercises:
Legs and feet together, your weight distributed equally between them.
Shift your weight to one foot, displacing your vertical axis in the direction of the foot that holds your weight.
Keep the inside edge of your foot that is free of weight in contact with the floor (“inside edge position”).
Maintain your weight comfortably on the standing foot by conducting the weight of your body through it to the floor.
Knees close to each other. Your knees maintaining a constant connection to your axis, which passes through the center of your body, from the top of your head to the center of the base of your body in regard to your weight distribution on one foot or between both feet.
Hips level, your ilia (hip bone) parallel to the floor, aligned with your transversal plane.
Torso aligned with your vertical axis, head rests on your torso, which rests on your legs.
Neck and head aligned with the same vertical axis.
Alignment of all your body parts to your central axis becomes essential: head, neck, torso, hips, legs, feet.
Eyes looking forward. Sight aligned with the floor, looking to the horizontal line.
Walk
Definition:
As with our posture, our human walk is also unique.
As with our posture, our human walk is also unique. In the case of dancing Tango, we are required to develop a way of walking which, remaining natural, serves the purpose of walking in the intimate company of our partner, embraced by each other, among other couples, creating a silent poetic dialogue with our bodies and in connection with the cadence of Argentine Tango music. This kind of music was devised to serve such a purpose, and always guides us on how to move in such situations.
Technical details and exercises:
After shifting your weight to one foot, move the leg that is free of weight forward and backward like a pendulum, maintaining light contact with the floor, using the “inside edge position” when passing through the “collect position” when both feet are together.
Then move the leg that is free of weight to the side, keeping your foot in touch with the floor, always using the “inside edge position”.
Last, make small circles while keeping your foot in touch with the floor, using the “inside edge position” while passing through the “collect position” when both feet together, and when stepping into the side position.
Keep your ilia at the same height, parallel to the floor, aligned with the transversal plane.
The movement of your leg is rooted in the ball and socket joint, which connects your femur to your hip.
Release both your knee and ankle joints so they can move freely.
The knee of the supporting leg is in a relaxed, ready state, neither bent nor locked.
Walk naturally, swinging the leg that is free of weight forward, extending it a little, letting your axis move in the same direction and maintaining it vertically through the transition, pushing gently from your back standing leg, and transferring your weight to the front leg at the end of this process, keep your foot in touch with the floor, softly, without dragging it.
Reverse the process to walk backwards. Pay close attention to the back of your foot by pointing it backwards when extending the leg that is free of weight, keep your foot in touch with the floor at all times, softly, without dragging it.
Maintain all details regarding your posture as described before.
At every step, take a back and forth step movement, changing your weight between feet. Practice this exercise going forward and backward.
Use this element to change directions when walking forward to backward and vice versa.
Pivot
Definition:
Rotation of your body’s axis as it passes through the ball of your standing foot.
Rotation of your body’s axis as it passes through the ball of your standing foot. To pivot, rotate your torso in a clockwise or counter-clockwise direction, producing a torque which gently pulls your lower body into a rotation that follows in the same direction as your torso.
Technical details and exercises:
Maintain the “inside edge position” when you pivot.
Step forward after pivoting, aligning your foot that is free of weight with your lower sagittal plane.
Direct your step forward in a circular trajectory around your partner. Orient the center of your torso towards the central axis of the couple.
From the step forward to the next position going forward, in which you will transfer your weight to the front foot, your torso is already rotating towards the center of the couple, so the foot that remains behind, by the pull of this torsion, which takes the shape of a spiral, turns your back foot, first, to the inside edge in contact with the floor, and then, makes it travel to your sagittal line, to the “collect/inside edge position”.
After this “collect/inside edge position”, we research these possibilities: 1. Forward ocho: Pivot more continuing in the same direction of your established rotation and move the foot that is free of weight forward, in alignment with your lower sagittal plane, your torso torquing according to counter body movement, orienting the center of your chest to the central axis of the couple. 2. Forward-side: Pass the foot that is free of weight behind the heel of your standing/pivoting foot while keeping the inside edge in contact with the floor, and continue to the side around your partner.
3. Backward ocho: When you reach the collect position, reverse the movement, bringing the leg that is free of weight back to the starting point when it was behind you. At this point you can collect/inside edge position and from there: a) Continue pivoting the same direction as your established rotation and move the leg that is free of weight backward, aligned with your lower sagittal plane, your torso torquing according to counter body movement, orienting the center of your chest to the central axis of the couple (backward ocho).
b) Reverse the rotation of the pivot and return forward with the leg that is free of weight to the previous position (boleo).
NOTE about knees: the knee of the leg that is free of weight passes behind the standing leg, fitting its convex shape into the concave space behind the knee of your standing leg, moving all around the standing leg until getting its concave back in front of its convex shape, making your feet end crossed. Your standing leg needs to be in a relaxed ready position, neither bent nor locked, while your leg that is free of weight is extended with a tension comparable to the tension of a well-tuned musical instrument string. Exercise: Move your leg that is free of weight around your standing leg back and forth.
Boleo
Definition:
A back and forth movement of the leg without changing weight.
Since our legs move like pendulums, a back and forth movement of the leg without changing weight is possible. We call this “boleo”. This pendular movement of the leg that is free of weight is most often combined with the spiral movement of the leg described above in relation to pivoting.
Technical details and exercises:
Keeping the leg that is free of weight in the “inside edge position,” pivot back and forth, allowing it to swing like a pendulum, while maintaining the details described above about knees and legs.
Do forward and backward ochos and practice the back and forth pendulum in every pivot.
Connection
Definition:
We are supremely gifted with the ability to connect to others.
We are supremely gifted with the ability to connect to others. It is also an intrinsic necessity of our human condition. Our capacity for connection with other human beings predates the appearance of language. Dancing Tango puts this primordial skill into play, connecting us without words.
Technical details and exercises:
Partner up facing each other and walk forward and backward maintaining the same distance between partners. One must lead and the other must follow.
When the leader walks backward, he places his partner to the right as the follower walks forward (outside partner position).
When the leader walks forward, he will walk in front and outside partner position. His left leg will always make the first step outside and in front.
Line of dance
Definition:
All couples on the dance floor move counter clockwise direction.
All couples on the dance floor move counter clockwise direction.
Technical details and exercises:
Partner up and face each other on the dance floor, oriented in a way that the leader walks forward and the follower walks backward, the couples travel on the dance floor in a counter clockwise direction.
Hands on each other’s shoulders.
Walk in outside and in front partner position.
Pause when in front of your partner.
Lead forward/backward movement when in outside partner position.
Systems
Definition:
There are two fundamental ways to combine movement of the four legs of a couple.
There are two fundamental ways to combine movement of the four legs of a couple: 1. Parallel system: The leader’s left leg moves in sync with the follower’s right leg and vice versa. 2. Crossed system: The leader’s left leg moves in sync with the follower’s left leg and vice versa.
Technical details and exercises:
Walk in front of each other, leaders forward and followers backwards.
In parallel system, inside/outside.
Change of system technique: leader’s left step, feet together, left again; followers always move the foot that is free of weight.
In crossed system: 1. On the open side.
2. In front.
3. On the closed side.
NOTE about distribution of weight: Leaders always rest their weight on both feet; followers are always lead to rest their weight on one foot.
Embrace
Definition:
It’s a very humane characteristic.
It’s a very humane characteristic, since we stand on two feet and our arms are free. Social dancing started in Europe during the Renaissance. Before dancing was ritual. In the beginning partners wouldn’t touch at all. Then they took each other’s hands in the minuet. Then the woman was on the man’s arms in the waltz. We can observe the tendency of partners getting closer to each other. Finally the couple dances intimately embraced in Tango.
Technical details and exercises:
Hold hands, like an honest handshake.
Center of your chests in front of each other.
A vertical axis of the couple passes through this center between your chests.
You can imagine a ball bearing as the joint between you and your partner, located in the central axis of the couple, at the midpoint of connection between each partner’s chest.
The right hand of the leader is in complete contact with the follower’s mid-back.
The embrace is neither too loose nor too tight. It must be warm, relaxed, versatile, and consistent.
“Tres amigos” by Anibal Troilo y su Orquesta Tipica with Alberto Marino in vocals, 1944 (English translation of the lyrics).
Tres amigos
Music and lyrics: Enrique Cadícamo.
From my lived pages, I always carry a great memory my emotions do not forget them; time passes, and I remember them more.
Three friends always went in that youth… It was the most talked about trio who could have walked through those southern streets.
Where will you go, Pancho Alsina? Where will you go, Balmaceda? I wait for you on the corner from Suárez and Necochea… Today, no one keeps this appointment. Already, my life has taken a detour. Today, the old guard yells at me: “Who has scattered that trio?” But I still remember my two friends yesterday…
Once, back in Portones, they saved me from death. Encounters are never lacking when a poor person has fun. And again, back in Barracas, I paid them that debt… They always saw us together… That friendship had us. It’s always tied to all three.
We are happy to have a collaboration with the people from tangotunes.com from whom some of you may have heard, they do high-quality transfers from original tango shellacs.
It is the number 1 source for professional Tango DJs all over the world.
Now they started a new project that addresses the dancers and the website is https://en.mytango.online You will find two compilations at the beginning, one tango and one vals compilation in amazing quality. The price is 50€ each (for 32 songs each compilation) and now the good news!
If you enter the promo code 8343 when you register at this site you will get a 20% discount!
Thanks for supporting this project, you will find other useful information on the site, a great initiative.
“El Entrerriano” by Juan D’Arienzo y su Orquesta Típica, 1946.
The story of “El entrerriano” and its main recordings
With this number the three-section structure that prevailed in the old trend tango began to spread and, more than a hundred years later, “El entrerriano” is still one of the greatest classics of the genre.
The canyengue liveliness of the melody amazed the audience from the first bar.
The dancer José Guidobono, who was present, could not dance as he used to because the spell of those musical notes paralyzed him.
When the number was finished, he approached the composer and suggested,” Why don’t you dedicate it to Segovia?”
He was referring to Ricardo Segovia, a landowner from Entre Ríos, who was making whoopee in the Buenos Aires nights.
Mendizábal told him he would honor him by naming “El entrerriano” his new tango.
We are happy to have a collaboration with the people from tangotunes.com from whom some of you may have heard, they do high-quality transfers from original tango shellacs.
It is the number 1 source for professional Tango DJs all over the world.
Now they started a new project that addresses the dancers and the website is https://en.mytango.online You will find two compilations at the beginning, one tango and one vals compilation in amazing quality. The price is 50€ each (for 32 songs each compilation) and now the good news!
If you enter the promo code 8343 when you register at this site you will get a 20% discount!
Thanks for supporting this project, you will find other useful information on the site, a great initiative.
