Why this is so? What makes Tango so different from other dances? In my experience — both as a student myself and as a long-time teacher of Tango — I think I can offer at least a possible answer to these questions.

Right from the moment a student begins the study of Tango, he/she is faced with two very difficult challenges. The first of these arises from the very strong expectation that the learning process will be similar to the process he/she has undergone with other dance disciplines. Accordingly, Tango — like other social dances — must therefore consist of a finite (albeit complex) vocabulary of definable dance steps — which can be identified, learned over time, and practiced until mastery is achieved. This expectation, we will find, is simply not true — yet it produces the unfortunate effect of misdirecting the entire learning process quite significantly.

The second challenge comes from the extreme resistance on the part of students to accepting the fact that the entire basis for social Tango lies in the difficult-to-learn skill set I call the “lead/follow mechanism.” The overwhelming majority of students I have ever taught have tried their best to either completely avoid approaching this skill set — or at least to put it off until some time in the very distant future.

“It’s too hard and too boring,” they complain. “We want those neat steps we see on YouTube. We’ll get to the lead/follow stuff some other time.”

The result of these two major misconceptions is that most students end up literally rejecting the real path to learning Tango in favor of a fantasy-world road to nowhere, which they pursue over and over without ever mastering — much less actually learning — anything at all.

Let’s talk about the notion of Tango as a series of dance steps. Contemporary “ballroom” dance — as taught in dance schools today — consists of a carefully constructed syllabus of memorized steps, which are designed to reflect the students’ level of mastery. (Quite often, these levels are designated “beginner,” “intermediate,” and “advanced.” Alternatively. They may be called “bronze,” “silver,” and “gold.”) The important concept in this equation is the word “memorized.” The student leader is not taught to interact with a follower, using a specialized body language with which to indicate what is desired from one individual element to the next. Rather, both partners memorize a figure, and repeat it over and over within the class environment until it seems to work efficiently. The assumption of this process is that things will work the same way on the dance floor. However, anyone who has ever gone through this kind of “learning” has quickly recognized that, although it works great in class, it doesn’t work at all on the dance floor — except with the class partner. If a leader tries to reproduce the memorized figure with a new partner — perhaps one who hasn’t been in the class — things quickly fall apart. The only solution to the quandary ends up being something like, “Do you know the (box step, progressive basic, double reverse spin, grapevine, open left turn, twinkle — or whatever) that people learn as part of this syllabus? Here are the steps; let’s try it together. I’ll give you the count.”

Memorize or die.

Let’s say that a good teacher (or a bolt of lightning) is able to get the student past this first predisposition/misconception/utterly nonsensical fantasy that Tango is a series of memorized figures (“Oh, I haven’t danced for a while; I forget all the steps!”) — no, no, no, it’s all improvised — we make it up as we go along. …. Really.

Now, we move on to the second challenge. And this is much harder to get past than accepting the reality that, seriously, there are no steps in Tango. This is where students decide that instead of waiting to embrace the lead/follow mechanism until, let’s say, doomsday, they’ll bite the bullet and invest themselves in learning it right now (okay not really now, because it takes most of us a l-o-n-g time to integrate this very difficult skill set into our bodies), they make the non-negotiable commitment now to stick it out until they learn it — even if it takes more than ten minutes! (The average learning trajectory is maybe six months to a year.)

“Are you kidding me? I don’t have that kind of time to devote to learning a boring skill that nobody will ever see. I need steps, and I need them now!”

Okay, great. Do what you want. But if you don’t get beyond the dancing-as-memorizing-steps syndrome, and if you don’t face the music and master lead/follow once and for all, you will forever be paralyzed by the all-too-common lament we echoed right in the beginning of this Tango Tip: “Tango is the hardest dance I’ve ever tried to learn.”

All Classes will be held at the CMDE Studio CMDE Studio in Hackensack. 84 Euclid Ave, Hackensack  NJ    07601 This site will provide directions to the studio: http://www.cmde.org/directions.html    Kindly Lisa Skates Simply Social Dancing www.simplysocialdancing.com 201 694 7087

• Bill Auer - Cake
• George Ngo - Grapes & Cheese
• Eva Roth - Chicken Stew
• Ingrid Jacob - Plum Cake
• ​​​​​​​Nina - popcorn
  

• Mary Pagano
  
• Barbara Lombardi
  
• Fred Meyer
  
• George Ngo
  
• Eduardo Campos
  
• Jim Wei
  
• Al & Lilian Ko
  
• Bob Brillo
  
• Jesse Barton
  
• Edna Negron