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Dancing together

Anders Torne

Michele Benigno

Date:    Tue, 9 Dec 1997 11:54:15 +0100
From:    Anders Torne <andto@IDA.LIU.SE>
Subject: The Tango list

[...]

About dancing

It feels good to embrace a woman in tango and I always blame myself when there
is an incident on the floor - so I tell myself I must do better, dance better,
lead better, more feeling, more commensurate with the music, look out, stop,
make small molinete, two times, lead to cruz, start over......

... and often when I ask a woman to dance for a second or third time - she
says - "Yes, please" or "Yes, I love to" or even - "I thought you would never
ask again" (in Swedish, though) ....................This is my reward.

And, sometimes they ask me how they follow and I always say "You feel like an
angel in my arms" or something similar, independently of whether they as
angels are inexperienced or lovely to lead - this almost always makes them
follow better, dance better. (Observe, a woman is never bad to lead).  Now,
sometimes it sort of gets crowded where you have your feet (usually beginners)
- even if it is always my fault (of course), I make a kind remark that tango
is different, its like a pyramid and then the next dance works much better.
Then I ask her a second time and it works even better.

I take tango and the list seriously, like a hobby, and I hope that the list
can manifest its ability to be a serious forum for exchange of experiences and
opinions, together with all the other functions of the list as defined in the
list rules.

[...]

Sincerely yours,

Anders Torne
Linkoping University
Sweden

Date:    Tue, 9 Dec 1997 09:43:37 EST
From:    Mexben <Mexben@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: A Matter of Trust

I am not sure whether a man "taking care of his partner" is the secret to
Tango Argentino. All I know is what feels good and works for me (as a
follower). I prefer to be embraced. When a man asks me to dance and he solidly
embraces, I get the feeling that this partner is going to share in the dance
with me. It is not a point of  being taken care of on the dance floor, but
more of  communication between two people. I have danced with men that have
their own agenda, without regard for their partner's weight. This either
arises from having little experience with Tango or being more interested in
their own dancing. Men and women both get absorbed in their own steps and
their own agenda on the "pista".

In my opinion when men and women come together to dance Tango or for that
matter any other dance, dancing is about sharing - sharing a common experience
to produce a beautiful movement for the two dancing and those around them. If
I am more concerned about how I look and my steps, I can silence the noise in
my head to be in touch with my partner. I can say this because my regular
dance partner and I just went through this. We both were more concerned with
ourselves and our own dancing than coming together as a couple on the dance
floor. When we both became aware of this, we became more responsible to each
other in the dance. Yes, sometimes it just plain feels good to have a man
embrace me and feel secure in the embrace. I do not think it is so much about
a man taking care of a woman as much as it is about mutual respect for each
other.

Michele Benigno in Denver