What Jack says is a little mean, and certainly divisive, considering I was trying to make peace by defending the much-maligned "close embrace people" who supposedly are the only ones who criticize other dance styles. So I'm going to try to defend myself.
I dance, and teach, many styles regularly - Canyengue, milonguero, salon, open, nuevo. I don't mind people dancing the style they and their partner prefer and are able to execute successfully with others on the floor. But they must be good at it, so they don't risk ruining another's dance experience. I think we all agree on that. Even good dancers can be seduced by the allure of that cool move they just learned, even though it doesn't fit on the floor and their lead is a little tenuous. And good teachers can be seduced by the demands of their students, asking for colgadas when they can't walk yet. (Would you like to know how much trouble I got in when I stood in for another teacher, and instead of furthering the student's education on single axis turns, I said "let's learn to walk first"?) And we can all be tempted to blame the other guy on the floor, who is always using too much space. And we can all be tempted to lump them into a particular style. We have a guy here in town who constantly uses too much space and bumps into others. Surprisingly, he always blames the other guy. Then there's the imitators who never take lessons but do the move they saw anyway. Ewwww! So, if that is true that only Close Embrace people criticize, why is it that Traditional tango, Nuevo, canyengue people don't criticize people who dance in close? Are they just so much more tolerant? Is there nothing to complain about? (BTW, I've heard some of my favorite dancers derisively called "floor walkers" because they prefer close.) Yes, I defend my teaching style, which I did not come up with on my own. I studied the techniques of the most successful teachers I knew - those who put the most good dancers on the floor in a short amount of time. It's working here, too. Lois Sergio states: Now the most interesting thing is : Those that dance Traditional tango, Nuevo, canyengue, never criticize anyone else. Those that dance all the styles never criticize anyone but... The ones that dance close embrace all the time, milonguero, have multiple problems expressed in many forms." >I now realise that Lois' post was just another veiled attempt to criticise >those >who do not dance tango in the style that she prefers. >Jack _______________________________________________ Tango-L mailing list Tango-L@mit.edu http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/tango-l