My Tango Diaries

(Picture courtesy of morguefile.com .) This post was inspired by a comment from another blogger who wrote: "One thing you should also bear in mind is that you can't please everyone with your tango. Some leaders like a follower who decorates a lot and others don't. It's not always possible to tell which is which. As followers, we have to strike a very delicate balance between being dance chameleons who try to adapt to every leader and finding our own personality, our own character as dancers. It's a fine line. I'd love it if you'd write a whole post about it." from Terpsichoral Tango at http://www.tangoaddiction.wordpress.com Coincidentally, I was already working on a post addressing this, so I'll give it my best shot Terpsichoral. Above is a 7-ish minute long video with only a few sentences that I want to point out. Whenever I hear (or read about) anyone talking about the follower's musicality - this is what I think of. The bit that I'...

When I have a music question, I have to go find a sympathetic, and patient , musician to ask. As I've written in previous posts, I don't have the remotest education in music, so just looking something up doesn't really work. The terms don't mean so much to me. Someone has to take the time to break it down and explain it. Thankfully, we're lucky to have tango composer Glover Gill in our community who not only plays several times a month at milongas, but takes time to answer my random tango music questions. So here's the scenario . . . As the music starts, you invite your partner and step onto the dance floor. As you step to the beginning of the next phrase, you noticed that at the next strong beat, where you would normally be stepping down, you're actually in midstep. So, maybe you shift weight a bit, start with the next phrase - and there it is again - where other orquestras have placed the "weak" beat, this one has placed emphasis - a strong beat....

(Warning: my music education is pretty much nada, so please forgive my usage of such technical terms as, well, "bing", for instance.) Enrique Rodriguez King of the Missing Bing Melina and Detlef dancing to "Llorar por una mujer" Scenario - You and your partner are dancing to the lovely "Llorar por una mujer" and you can hear the smooth phrasing build to the traditional end and listen for the end "bing" that signals "this is the end of the song" so you can end your dance smoothly on the beat. Except the bing doesn't come. The song just ends..... No "bing". Sort of like hearing someone sing "Happy Birthday" except at the end, the last line just goes, "Happy birthday to." Welcome to the tangos of Enrique Rodriguez, King of the Missing Bing . Rodriguez gets quite a bit of play at milongas, locally anyway, and his pieces have a nice balance between strong rhythm and silky melody that make dancers pretty hap...