Woman Is Art

               In my last post I talked about the woman’s role in tango. I said she is the song as her partner hears it. I’d like to expound upon that subject further:

               Throughout history women have been the focus of mankind’s artist expression. Beginning with the first fertility symbol and continuing to this day with Taylor Swift. Men are endowed by Nature with a spellbinding attraction to the opposite sex.  

               Try to imagine the role this plays in tango. A man and woman are dancing; he hears the music and tries to convey to his partner what part of the melody moves him. All the while Nature has him under its spell.

               He asks her to move forward, side and to pivot; she does so. Seasoned by his infatuation, her motion appears to him as something that is beyond words; it is as if she can hear the music as he does and is moving in perfect synchronicity: she has become the song!

               He leads another back step. This time, for reasons unknown, she takes one step backward and then another to the side and forward. The rose-colored glasses are broken and his attraction to her dissipates. It happens so quickly that he is not able to hide his disappointment and that feeling is translated to her through the embrace. The dance is diminished.

               To men, women are art. We are programmed by Nature to see them this way. When the follower anticipates, she is moving to her own rhythm and loses a great gift that she has been given.

             

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The Monster That Ate Tango

Tango is almost entirely dependent upon the woman. If she responds only to the cues she is given, the dance is a tango; if she moves on her own the tango disappears. Each step is a collaboration and the result is a spontaneous and unique interpretation of the music.

          During the dance the leader is doing many things: listening to the music, navigating, choreographing and conveying his intentions through body language. The follower is doing only one thing: she is being the song as her partner hears it.

It may seem that the follower has the easier task but that is not the case. She is constantly tempted by a demon called Anticipation. It inhabits that space of time in between each dancer’s steps. It lives and dies a hundred times a song. This creature has no place in the tango embrace; it is an abomination that destroys creativity.

          I think that a woman’s ability to wait for the lead is a sign of respect and respect is something all men crave. Respect enhances a woman’s appeal and adds mystery to the outcome of each step.

          Respect is a word with many meanings when applied to the follower’s role in this endeavor. She must give it to her partner as well as to herself. She must be confident in her ability to discern what she is feeling and to act on that information without fear or hesitation. She must believe in her own infallibility or else the tango dies and the monster wins.



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Tango Stereotypes

               One thing I love about tango is the diversity of its participants. Through this dance I have met people from all over the world: Kazakhstan, Romania, Russia, Siberia, France, Morocco, Argentina, Panama, Venezuela, Colombia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Japan, Liberia and many more places. Sometimes I feel as if I have met a person from every country on the planet.

               It is important that we treat everyone as individuals but it is easy to see similar character traits in people from the same culture. Here is what I've found:

               Only the Argentines love tango more than the Russians. Both countries are hard places to live and both peoples love hard with bear hugs and painful kisses that come at you so fast they bruise your cheeks.

               I have never met people more sensitive than those from Germany or Japan. Both cultures are big on etiquette and procedures so make sure you are mindful of these things when you are dancing with them.

               No one will love you more than the Irish or the Italians. They are great lovers so don’t fight them when they are giving it out, just take it and be glad.

               You will not find a more understanding person to dance with than someone from Indonesia. I don’t know what’s going on in that country but whatever it is we should be teaching it here.

               No one speaks more passionately than the French.

               And finally, you will not meet a person more polite than someone from Charleston, South Carolina.

               The nice thing about tango is that it takes you beyond the stereotype, beyond our biases and preconceived notions. Through the embrace we discover the individual stripped of the filters we use to view them from afar. As we move to the music as one person, we can escape all our prejudices and see someone as if for the first time.

                It is here that we get to view the person we are dancing with for what she or he really is: a person; one who has feelings, who is passionionate; a creature that is capable of love and therefore special in the universe.



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Hold Me Just A Little Bit Longer

              The end of a song is a critical moment in the lives tango dancers. Just how important is difficult for leaders to understand. It is here that we are graded. This is the point in time where the woman decides to save what happened as a memory or to forget it entirely. It is here that the differences between men and women are most profound.

               Men tally their performance by rating how well each set of maneuvers was carried out throughout the dance. They might score themselves on musicality or balance or choreography. Each man has his own set of criteria with which to measure his feat.

               I think a woman rates her experience by how she feels. Her emotional state at the moment she loses contact with her partner is when her body will decide whether or not to create a mental record of the encounter and if it was pleasant or unpleasant.

               For years I was under the impression that the end of the tanda was the moment when the music stopped playing. At this time I would abruptly disconnect from my partner and look into her face for some sign of approval. I was often disappointed by what I saw.

               The reason for my poor performance lay in my attitude towards women. I believed it was disrespectful to touch them beyond the sound of the melody. I think many ladies found the suddenness of my release to be an emotional downer.

               Lately I have been experimenting with how I disengage from my partner at the end of a song with very favorable results.

               There is a point somewhere after the two second marker where the woman’s body seems to say, “I am ready to let go.” 

               It is as if I can see the vibrations of the sound of the song disappearing into the walls when I feel her body lift and prepare for departure. At this time I release her from my grasp.

               This brief, music-free embrace can seem like an eternity…if you are lucky. Enjoy it. I think she will too.


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