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So far, I have discovered 10 skill sets (Essential Tango Skills) that make up most of the fundamental skills needed to become an excellent Argentine Tango dancer. I do not include vocabulary with these essential Tango skills. This is my codification of Tango thus far, which continually evolves. In addition, these skills are somewhat hierarchal, meaning that the first skills are more important to learn to some degree before the next skill and so on. I have created these categories based on my bias of analyzing what I believe is needed to become an extraordinary social Argentine Tango dancer. ESSENTIAL TANGO SKILLS Awareness/ States of Being Awareness and our states of being are foundational and first and foremost in how we dance. I put this first, because our beliefs, emotional patterning, body memory and attitude have more of an impact than all other skills put together. Becoming more aware or changing what goes on between the ears and in the heart, radically shifts a person’s Tango. Connection Connection is so much of what Tango is about. With connection we are able to experience and express so much with our partners. Even with just a little vocabulary, but a lot of connection we can truly dance Argentine Tango as a shared experience with our partner. The "how to" of connection includes many factors including but not limited to: our intuitive sense of connection; our present expectations; our expanded awareness; how we regain connection once lost; and how we use mistakes or disconnects as opportunities to create greater connection. As we create and experience substantially more connection, we drop into what I call the Tango Trance. This Tango Trance is what so many people yearn for, and is one of the biggest payoffs of becoming good at Argentine Tango.  You can find a deeper perspective of this Tango Trance at my blog entry - "Tango & the Kiss of the Divine" and my article entry - “The Tango Trance Connection.” Balanced Grounded Movement - The Tango Walk I have heard so many people say Tango is all about the walk.  I think the word walk is a misnomer.  I prefer saying Tango is all about how we move through space from one leg to another in connection with our partner.  By working on the Tango Walk, we are in effect working on our entire way of moving in the dance. The foundation of all movement in tango is balanced grounded movement, which is how we relate and use the floor as we move through space. Connection, clear leading and good following begins with our relationship to the floor and the balance we maintain. It is important to emphasize how critical balance is to do so much of what is available in Tango. Without balance, we feel bad to our partners, have little ability to follow or lead, and the dance often becomes laborious as the Follow or Lead hangs on their partner. With great balance we are able to execute challenging moves with grace and ease. Our partners enjoy our movement, for we are not pulling or pushing on them. In addition, with balance grounded movement, we can express so much more of our experience within music with style, grace and flair. Furthermore, the Tango Walk is very different than our normal everyday walk which I call the Ape Walk. Cultivating a Tango Walk is not easy. For over 18 months I struggled with the Tango Walk and had to go to movement experts and analyze video performances of masters to see how they were actually “walking” in Tango. I discovered entirely different bio-dynamics are used to move in Tango compared to normal walking. In Tango movement, it is critical to understand and be able to have full control of the plumb line of our axis, as well as the three DISTINCT parts of a step - extension, transfer and collection. Engaged Posture with Core Movement Engaged posture with core movement is critical to allow for most of the communication within the Tango embrace to be transmitted throughout the body. An engaged posture makes the difference between a lead or follow that feels great or just feels so-so or yuk. Engaged posture allows for a luscious embrace. However, some muscles are engaged and some aren’t. Also, the level of engagement differs depending on what is required for efficient movement. A must for upper level dancing is our ability to engage and dis-engage different parts of our body while having everything connected, moving together, and with the ability to respond with any part of our body in an instant to new information being transmitted through the embrace. Engaged, Fluid & Elastic Embrace We need an engaged, fluid and elastic embrace to communicate as a Lead, and listen as a Follow. Without a good embrace, a tango dancer loses their ability to listen and/or communicate. Engagement happens throughout the torso, using many muscles of the back initiating from as low as the sacrum. The arms and hands are just extensions of proper engagement. With this knowledge and ability, we are able to fully lead and follow with less effort and more precision. Fluidity occurs as the distance between lead’s and follow’s shoulders increases and decreases, and we allow that to occur by letting our hands and arms slide around each other without any holding. NO HANDLES Elasticity comes into play as our embrace moves, where we maintain a rubber band-like quality where we are neither rigid or super loose. With elasticity we maintain and create dynamic movement and connection. Once we have an engaged fluid embrace, our ability to express increases dramatically, and the communication propels to a higher level whereby we are able to explore in the moment what we have never done before! Space Negotiation Space negotiation is about understanding and working with how we create space, enter space, fill space, feel space and exit space between each dancer. Space Negotiation is also about understanding and executing the masculine and feminine roles in Tango. The masculine role is responsible for creating space with safety, confidence and clarity while the feminine role is responsible for entering and taking the space with trust, grace and beauty. It is what I call a magic bullet for Tango, because once space negotiation skills increased, so much in Tango makes sense, and vocabulary moves are more easily executed. We are more able to dance the dynamic between each other, turns are easier, as well as staying more connected and fluid with each other. Improvisation Improvisation is the ability to take what we feel in the music in the moment, and creatively express that through movement. In addition, improvisation is the ability to respond quickly to our partner AND other dancers around us while preserving the integrity of the musical impulses we experience. This holds true for leads as well as follows. The skills of Improvisation and musicality work together. If you can’t identify rich aspects of music through the skill of musicality, you will lose out on considerable richness in Tango. But if you can not express what you hear and feel to your partner through the skill of improvisation, you lose out on abundant benefits of Tango and fun. With increased improvisational skill, you change a dance from mediocre or good to great, memorable and fun. Leads & Follows learn how to create more excitement, fun and juiciness in every tanda. Lastly, a good deal of cultivating improvisational skills is our ability to get past our inhibitions. I address emotional challenges we consistently face when we want to explore a new expression of music Musicality Musicality has many dimensions to it such as timing, rhythm, phrasing, question and answer, upbeat and downbeat, and other movement qualities. When we identify and understand aspects of what Traditional Tango and alternative Tango music offer, we express deeply our response to what we hear. The ability to transmit to our partners what we hear and feel in the music is improvisation. Tango offers a unique opportunity to deeply express our feelings of the dynamic range within its music. When we follow the music, we become appreciably expressive and passionate! Quality of Movement Argentine Tango is so much more than steps in connection; Quality of Movement is the juice and passion with Tango. Expressing movement through our bodies goes beyond just stepping such as flowing, playing with momentum, speeding up and slowing down any movement, using other areas of our body to express, pulsing with steps, using lilting, dancing different vertical levels with suspension, low, lower, etc. Tango music offers the full range of movement as shown in nature. You rapidly advance your dance by using the movement qualities of nature’s 5 elements (earth, water, fire, air, & metal). This musicality honors each musical instrument, the space between beats, and creates a luscious exciting way to Tango. A world exists between the beats of Tango. Possessing the ability to change your quality of movement adds dimensions of expression, joy, creativity, interest and passion to your dance more than any vocabulary! Upper & Lower Body Differentiation & Torsional Energy Management Many teachers talk about disassociation, where the upper and lower body are moving in different directions. I like to talk about differentiation or greater association, where the upper and lower body are highly connected, associated, and moving in relation to each other. How we manage the torsion created by this high association is a high level skill. Even within our Tango walk when are working with contra-body movement, we differentiate and manage torsional energy.shapeimage_5_link_0shapeimage_5_link_1shapeimage_5_link_2
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