Face it, you don’t know what I’m going to write next.
That is the beauty of language and communication, you only need to recognise the words to understand the sentence. You don’t even need to know all the words, context will often reveal their meaning.
Besides if you knew what I was going to write next I don’t see the point in me writing it.
And yet there persists this idea that the quick fox jumps over the lazy dog for evermore. Maybe, just once, he doesn’t. Perhaps the dog gets tired of always being outwitted, does some exercise and finally catches the fox.
Tango is not a typing class or a recitation. Tango isn’t even a dance, it’s a language. It is life and living. It is molecules colliding at random that at each instance is unpredictable but over big numbers is describable.
Well that’s it, the last Tuesday. From now on LimerickTango classes are on Thursdays.
There has been a tango class in Limerick every Tuesday, except the Christmas break, since we started in January 2006. There’s been some good times.
Roll on Thursday.
Tango is the language you sing in along to the music.
From the first week of September classes will move from Tuesday to Thursday.
Class times remain the same. As does the location (though it is best to check with reception as to what room we are in).
Every Thursday: Limerick Strand Hotel.
Beginners class 7.15pm
Improvers class 8.30pm
Movement Invites Movement have a rather good point in their post Challenging the 8-Week Myth. Their point is that it takes more than 8 weeks to physically adapt to tango so the idea that you can learn tango in that time span is incorrect.
As I have been guilty of promulgating this myth I feel I should clarify one or two points.
For the past two years my introductory tango class has been a repeating 8 week cycle. The idea is that the student works through the cycle a couple of times until they are comfortable and confident. On the first pass things are new to them, on the second familiar and by the third they should be getting to grips with tango. It should also be mentioned that there are things that get covered in every class, underlining their importance. The cycle is in no way an exhaustive examination of tango but it does cover enough to establish a good foundation and allow dancers to get around a floor.
To put it simply it’s not that I think someone can learn tango in 8 classes but that there are 8 lessons to be learned. How many times the student needs to receive the lesson before they learn it is up to them.
…and now to digress.
The argument is about needing 8 classes. “The 8-week myth” implies taking one class a week. A student will not learn to tango in 8 weeks at one class a week. Why, because the distance between classes is too much. Muscle memory will not build quick enough. If the student takes two classes a week then they will learn quicker. Muscle memory will develop faster. Do not jump to the conclusion that taking two classes a week will allow you to learn tango in half the time or that taking four classes a week will get you there in a quarter of the time. Humans are not linear systems and the law of diminishing return kicks in rather quickly. At two classes a week the body will not have forgotten the lessons it learned in the previous class and at the same time the brain will have had enough time to absorb their implication.
Of course this is all academic as I am now changing to a one class method.
Had tango its roots on the shores of Tokyo bay instead of the river Plate I could be a Mr Miyagi character and dispense esoteric lessons along the following plan.
Week 1: Standing up straight, feet together, moving your weight from your heels to the balls of your feet by drifting your torso forward and back.
Week 2: Close embrace, standing in. Maybe just a little shifting of weight in time with the music.
Week 3: Taking the first step. No more, just repeatedly taking one side step or forward step.
Week 4: Walking.
Week 5: Half time, double time, and check steps.
Week 6: Pivoting her axis.
Six weeks and all you need to remember to tango. Less than Mr Vidort’s eight lessons. Everything else you’ll pick up by observation and experimentation.
Of course it would never work. After being told to wobble their weight for a week there would be a flurry of gathered coats and the sound of a flapping door as people ran down the street to sign up for an unending series of steps that they would forget by the next class.
Experiments in musicality.
Three song tandas where each song is the same but performed by different orchestras.
“I saw a tango show once in Buenos Aires”, he said. The tone of his voice indicated that, while he consider it to be amazing, what he had been shown was show tango and therefore believed that he’d never be capable of dancing the tango.
