Dance: How to get out of Tango beginner stage faster, or 3x3 (x2) drill method.

 You started learning Argentine Tango some time ago. You learned basics to move around (walk, ocho, giro) and some figures. 

You finally decide to go to a milonga outside of your studio, like out of town event or a festival. There are many new people/strangers.

Here is a (bad) scenario that may happen, when you are under-prepared. 

Let's say you are a follow. He asks you a dance. You accept. He takes you to the floor. He is a stranger, and you don't get his lead at all. "Is this an ocho? The giro is too fast. Are you waiting for me to do an embellishment?" While you stumble all the time and had to lean on to him too many times, the tanda is over. He escorts you back to your seat.

Unfortunately, there are many leads who saw your wobbly dance and apparent lack of skills. They thought you are difficult to dance with. And they choose not to dance with you, as they are there for their fun (meanie selfish bastards).

You sit out a lot of time of the party. You feel disappointed and rejected. "Heck, Tango is not for me. This is enough."

The world loses another future Tanguera.

Beginner stage is a hard place to be in. While you can have a partner in your class, in an event it is not always the case. 

Social Tango dancing is like sparring in boxing. You don't try to spar when you don't know how to throw punches. You have a good match (dance) when your skills are close. Good evenly-matched Tango is not possible, when one of the couple lacks skills and technique.

And, there is a level of skills you have to have to freely enjoy social Tango dancing. Tango skills are like riding bicycle. Once you can ride it, you know you are riding it. 

But before that, you cannot and you keep falling, which is your beginner stage. To ride bicycle, you as a child used third wheel, parent's help, etc. But above all, you tried repeatedly until you get it. That was how you developed muscle memory for riding bicycle.

For your Tango beginner stage to be over and you can dance, you need the same thing. Repeated drills and muscle memory. And that should be done with solo practice.

Guess this has been too long for an intro.

Here is a solo practice method to take command of your Tango dance muscles faster and get out of beginner/veteran beginner stage, with an example of a basic move, back ocho. 

Use a mirror for instant feedback.

(1) You do back ocho by yourself in front of mirror. If you lose your balance, that means you would be leaning/pulling your partner, which is not good. Be able to do your back ocho by yourself. 

(2) Change size of your motion. Think step 1 (your default) version was size M. Practice size S and size L. You have 3 varieties in your back ocho. Notice how you pivot and stretch changes.

(3) Change your speed. Think step 1 (your default) version was speed R (regular). Do this in F (fast) or S (slow). You have 3 varieties in the speed of your back ocho. Fast is good for Vals, Slow is good for Piazzolla.

(4) You have 3 sizes (SML) x 3 speeds (Slow, Regular, Fast)=9 different back ochos. You have a lot to practice already. But once you get it, you have your dance muscle memory to use for different songs and different partners.

If you do these drills, you'll have a good command on your body and your Tango dance. Great thing about having muscle memory is that you don't have to think. Your body does it. You know you are not a beginner, once you get these. You may even have enough room for launching embellishments and add nuances (foot play etc).

You can try other basic moves (forward walk, backward walk, giro, etc). A giveaway that you signal as a beginner is non-basic moves, such as shuffling instead of doing giro. Ballroom tango frame is another giveaway. Having muscle memories for basic steps is important.

Last (x2) is for F and L (both Follow and Lead). You switch your role (like, "lead back ocho" as step1) and practice the 3x3 versions. These are more like aiming at professional-kind of work, but they work.

You cannot measure love. But you can measure skills. You claim to love Tango? You can show your love for Tango with your skills. The other way around? Not so much.

If someone plays Chopin's Etude or Bach's Goldberg variations effortlessly, she must be a pianist. I'd assume a lot of work went in, regardless of her actual practice history. 

She claims to be a pianist and has a difficulty in Fur Elise? Trust her not so much.

Kids who want to ride bicycle just keep trying, even if they keep falling, and they get it.

These drills are meant to help who want to "get" Tango faster. Got out of your beginner/veteran beginner stage and have more fun (or don't get sitting out) in events.

Dance: "Mini-Milonga Marathon & Musicality Workshop, 1/6-8, Studio22, Dallas; two different Tangos and how can we mix them well"

Professional Tango instructors, George and Jairelbhi Furlong, host two milonga monthly at Studio 22 in Dallas on 1st Saturday night and on 2nd Sunday afternoon.

Once or twice in a year with a calendar trick, the Saturday and Sunday come back to back. Then they add Friday milonga and make it three consecutive milonga.

Inviting music professor John from Austin, they add musicality class on Sunday as well.

Altogether, there is a weekend-long event.

In OKC, we are slowly restarting Tango after covid. Now we have two places holding milonga (1st and 3rd Fridays at idance, 2nd and 4th Fridays at Adelante). Maybe one more at OKC swing dance club, but I've not attended it. Overall, we can have four milonga per month. We can have two more, as idance offers a Tango room in their socials on 2nd and 4th Saturdays. 

But with small community and with technical dance as Tango, it is not always possible to meet technically efficient dancers and dance great.

Enough complaints. A part of my Ney Years Resolutions is to add more dances.

So I went to Dallas.

Judging from their milonga and the way the locals dance, I was under impression that in Dallas more sporty-dynamic type of moves were currently popular.

As many Tango dancers know, Tango has sensual/nice-and-slow/intimate dance-aspect and dynamic/sporty/fast/athletic/showy-aspect.

Sensual dance is often loved and emphasized by social dancers. Technical sporty dances are presented by professional stage dancers.

Although they are not mutually exclusive, people somehow tend to pick one and stick with it. The song, dancers' skill levels, and matchup affect the pick.

What happens then is that, when slow/nice dancers are dominant, they are nice but sometimes look limited in techniques. Thus, limited in viewing pleasure (unless done really nice). When fast dancers are dominant, they can look like floorful of intermediate dancers. Fast dancers tend to use the moves in patterns, and they may or may not be pulled off with the song (ouch). Moves not done with the song is what make them look like intermediate to my eyes.

The way I see it, mixing the two aspects well is essential to be seen as advanced Tango dancers. And it takes both lead and follow.

Slow and nice can allow graceful and/or playful embellishments by the followers. Feels quite nice for leaders, too. Sometimes, not to mess with her moves and fun is the major job for a lead.

Fast and sporty is also fun and add dynamic "dance" look. Moving fast and beautiful in three-dimension, together, is what dancers can achieve here. But it is not easy for her to add foot play or little gesture moves when asked to execute fast giro.

Tango dance can be modular. Dancer weave moves parts by parts. Advanced dancers can present the slow-nice and fast-dynamic both together with music. But such dancers are one or two among fifty, even in a big city milonga.

Dancers come and go. Preferences and popular patterns change. Dancefloor dynamics and the look are not the same. That adds some fun for visiting.