There’ll be some gorgeous traditional Tango music, tempting nibbles and Argentinian wine. As always, the hall will look beautiful with flowers, candles and dressed in TangoAr’s distinctive black & red; so come and join us for some great tango and good company.

• DJ Ricardo.
• Beautiful atmospheric venue with lovely wooden dance floor.
• Argentinian wine and selection of soft drinks.
• Delicious light food with an Argentinean twist.
Entry: £10

When: Saturday 25^th February. 8pm- 11.30pm

Where: St Luke’s Parish Hall, Erleigh Rd, Reading RG1 5LH

www.tangoar.com

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Sunday 12th February at 3pm.

This month’s Milonga Portena tea dance has a special theme as it’s Valentine’s weekend. There be a glass of pink fizz to greet you and the hall decoration and the food will have a Valentine’s theme. Plus, there’ll be prizes for the most romantic outfits (man and woman), so dress up and wear your heart on your sleeve!

Gorgeous Venue with a great dance floor
Fabulous delicious cakes and savories
Glass of bubbly
Fantastic music specially chosen by Ricardo.

See you on the dance floor!

Venue:
St Luke’s Parish Hall
Erleigh Rd.
Reading RG1 5LH

Time: 3pm – 6pm
Price: £10

Ample free on-street parking.

http://www.tangoar.com/events/milongas-35.html

That ever-so-sad dance

More Carlitos And Noelia

In ‘Twelve Minutes of Love’ (‘TMOL’) you describe how you found tango by chance. Do you think that if it had indeed been a knitting club there that evening, tango would have eventually found you anyway?

Yes. You know what they say about tango – you don’t choose it, it chooses you. And anyway I would have lasted about ten minutes in a knitting class. I lasted about that long in a salsa class. In tango, I’ve lasted ten years and still counting.

What do you think a non-tango dancer would make of TMOL? Would it entice them to try tango?

I’ve had letters from readers who are inspired to take up tango. Others find the idea scary. A few people told me they signed up for classes after reading TMOL, but found it too daunting or emotionally fraught. In other words, the book acts like a mirror for each reader. And so does tango itself. Anyway, TMOL is not really about tango. It’s told through tango, but it’s about life in the 21st century – how to live it fully and passionately, how to love, the choices we make, the fantasies we follow, the price we pay for them, the knowledge we gain and the illusions we lose. Tango, as we all know, is a metaphor for life’s journey.

One of my favourite quotes from the book is ‘Gringos want flash’ – excellent! But do you think this is still true today?

Perhaps not as much ‘flash’ now, as tango travel to Buenos Aires has become very common and anyone with half a brain will find out very quickly that authentic tango is not about flash. But people will always want the fantasy of tango. The ‘flash’ of performance tango is one of the symptoms of that fantasy. Tango is about fantasy, even if you’ve been dancing socially for years and feel that you know everything about it. Social tango gives you a parallel reality. And in that reality, you have permission to imagine things about yourself and your life that are very seductive – and not always safe of course. That’s why it’s like a drug. That’s why we get hoooked on it. Because we can all feel like artists on the dance-floor, for an evening. Tango brings out of us both beauty and demons.

You chose to visit Buenos Aires relatively early in your tango ‘career’. With the benefit of hindsight, would you recommend doing this?

Yes – go as soon as you can, or you might spend two years doing stupid ganchos in some studio without knowing how to walk. Tango is an organic thing, it came out of suffering, not out of a textbook. In that sense, Buenos Aires milongas give us an insight not just into Argentine tango, but into the unique society that gave us tango, and the two are inseparable. One of the reasons why tango appeals to so many people is that it was born on the fault-line between the New World and the Old World. It was a wunderkind of cultural mutation. And there is no place like Buenos Aires where you can feel those tango vibrations.

Ok I’m desperate to know – what’s Clive James like to dance with??!!

Nice. But I’ve danced with him very little. Our friendship hasn’t revolved around dancing, but around literature and social observation.

What’s your favourite milonga anywhere in the world? And what makes it your favourite?

Niño Bien in Buenos Aires. There is always a good vibe there, a good mix of ages and faces. It’s traditional, but not antiquated.

Describe your favourite tango shoes.

A simple, cheap burgundy pair of sandals I bought in a nameless cobbler shop in San Telmo from two ancient cobblers who had to blow away the cobwebs. As I tried them on, they paid my feet the most touching compliment ever. I nearly hugged them.

Which tango track have you been humming most recently?

‘La melodia del corazon’ – because I like to play it around my man, who is not a dancer, thank god, but loves tango music. He says that it is precisely the liveliness and the major key moments in tango tunes like this one that make the sadness of it so heart-rending. [GREAT choice - this song moves me possibly more than any other – T.]

Do you still dance?

Once a dancer, always a dancer. But I dance incidentally now, not devotionally. Writing the book – which spans ten years of living – took the tango sting out of me. That, and a few other things which are in the book…

Which dancer/couple most inspire you?

The most graceful woman dancer for me is Mariana Montes. [one of my absolute favourites! – T.] Carlos Rivarola is pure class, he has a timeless quality. Horacio Godoy and Cecilia Garcia do what I call molecular tango. They dance with every fibre in their bodies, as one. My eyes water when I watch them.

Is there any particular place you wish you’d danced or hope to dance in the future?

I want to tango in Istanbul – because like Buenos Aires, it’s a city of great sensuality that straddles two worlds.

How does it feel knowing that potentially millions of tangeros all over the world are reading about some of the most vulnerable, poignant moments of your life?

Millions would be nice. But seriously: what’s the point of writing about tango, and about life’s quest, if you can’t be honest with yourself, and therefore with your readers? And anyway tango by definition makes us vulnerable, if we do it properly. Tango music is about the human condition, with all its paradoxes. And part of that – along with the beautiful fantasies and the narcissistic delusions – is to be vulnerable, open to blows, open to possibilities. It’s to be fully human. For me as a writer, anything less than that is false, a mere ‘exhibition’.

Do you think ‘less-emotional’ people have a more positive experience in tango?

Perhaps ‘less emotional’ people have an incomplete experience of tango. It means they’re not fully open to its exquisitely painful beauty. But even the most anal-retentive nerd and the most autistic perfectionist you’ll meet in tango will be touched by the music and the body contact. Even if they are fixated on steps. People are emotional in different ways, I think. Tango touches everyone who comes into contact with it, otherwise we wouldn’t hang around for years. We’d go and hang out with the ceroq crowd, grin like muppets and drink mojitos. Now that’s a ‘positive’ experience.

But yes, I went all the way with tango – it’s my temperament. I went to the edge and over it, briefly. I don’t do things by halves. But in the end, because I am first a writer and second a dancer, I could not transcend tango only by dancing it. I had to write about it. That has made my tango experience complete. Writing this book has made me understand the true nature of my tango-life quest.

And finally, what can we look forward to from Kapka Kassabova? Any more tango works in progress?

I don’t like to repeat myself in my writing, so the next book will have nothing to do with tango, just as my previous book was a mystery novel set in South America. You have to keep yourself fresh, or you become a bore. In tango and in life.


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See? I told you, you’d like her as much as I did. ‘Twelve Minutes of Love’ is published by Portobello Books and is now available in bookstores worldwide. Love this book. Love Tango. Love, Tanguera xxx




You can find out more about the book at the Twelve Minutes Of Love Website, watch the trailer which features some really good animation not to mention the lovely Laura Julia De Altube by clicking here, Or get your hands on a copy from amazon.

She wowed us a few months back when we featured her video in a “dancers we love” episode and now we are lucky enough to have had a moment with the exceptionally affable Mamié Sancy…

Tell us a little about your work

MS: I work at Chilean Air Force as researcher focused on corrosion of aluminium alloys for aerospace applications. I got a B.Sc. in Chemistry from University of Santiago of Chile and a Ph.D. in Chemistry from University Pierre et Marie Curie with a work focused on copper corrosion. I got a postdoctoral position on cast iron corrosion at the UPMC and later another postdoctoral position on modified electrodes used as biosensors at the USACH.

How long have you been dancing?

MS: It was winter of 2002 and I was with some friends in a one of the most bohemian neighborhoods of Santiago and suddenly, we hear Tango music from a Santiago Fire Brigade where Karina Anton (Arg) and Laura Vásquez (Chi) were given a Tango lesson. Immediately, I was very interested because I remembered every morning in the summer when I was child. I would take my summer vacation with all my family and my Grandfather always turned on his radio at 8:00 am and listened to tango until midday!! It was horrible for my sister, my cousins and me at the time! However, I have very nice memories of these summers. So, when I entered to this Tango association, I felt really interested and I started my tango lessons with them.

What first attracted you to Dance?

MS: The Tango music fascinated me immediately, I loved its nostalgic and melancholy sounds. But also, in the beginning, I felt attracted by Tango because I visualized it as a sport that wouldn’t impact my right knee. I always loved to practice sports, however, since the end of 2001 an injury in my knee has effected me. Now, I often practice pilates and I feel much better!

Do the people that you work with know about your fame in the Tango world?

They know that I love tango, even they have even caught me dancing alone in the lab more than once. It the same with my family too, all of them know that I love my job but I also love Tango.

What is your favourite aspect Tango?

The Tango allows me to dreams even when I am awake.

& your least?

Jealousy and envy ☹

How often do you dance, and do you ever wish you could dance more (or less)

I dance frequently on Friday or Saturday night and sometimes on Sunday evening. During the week, unfortunately I cannot go as often as I would like because I must get up me very early in the morning, but, some Tuesday evenings I go to “milonguear” and I come back home close to midnight.

How would you describe your style of dancing? (salon, milonguero, other)?

MS: I try to adapt me to each leader who invites me. I try to respect his style and if He dances with short or longer steps, I try to do it as He does it. With or without turns, with my legs flexed or stretched, with my hips in front of him or making a lot of pivots. However, I must be honest, more than once, I have forgotten that I am dancing with someone else and I have danced like if I had been alone hihihihi!

In Chile, the most of people dance in close embrace, so I frequently dance tango like this and I love to dance like this. But, if somebody invite to dance in another way, I enjoy it too!

What is your favourite form of the dance (tango, milonga, vals?) or what is your favourite track/orchestra to dance to?

MS: I love the three forms, tango, milonga and vals, but depending of the time, place and partner. When I started my tango lessons, I loved tango, but after, once in Santiago, I saw Gustavo Chidichimo and Virginia Martorani dancing milonga in close embrace and I loved it! Then, I met Alejandra Arrue and Sergio Natario dancing close embrasse in Santiago too and I felt really in love of close embrace.

Concerning the orchestra, it’s almost the same, depends of time, place and partner. I love D’Agostino/Vargas, Canaro, Típica Victor, Donato, Calo, Di Sarli, De Angelis, Donato Racciatti, D’Arienzo, etc, etc, etc, etc. I love tango music.

Would you ever think of leaving your regular job for a career in Tango?

MS: I love my regular job as scientific researcher, I love to study science and to be in contact with the scientific world. I could not leave it, I need it as I need to dance tango. If I am with Pipe and/or my tango friends, I love to go to milongas and/or to organize tango parties at home or at some friend’s homes or to go to some restaurant and speak about tango. If I am alone, I also like to listen tango. But I also love to practice pilates, bicycle, to take advance of every free time for reading and/or watching/listening a TV/Radio programs related to economy and politics. If I must go to Paris by a researcher stay at the UPMC, I love to learned and study there and I also love to dance tango there or to be invited to some tango’s WE, even if the next Monday morning I will arrive more tired than I left.

I love to dance for me and for and with my partner, in fact, I don’t feel relax when I have had to dance in an exhibition. Always, the five minutes before, I feel pain in my stomach and my hands start to sweat and shiver. The first times were really horrible, I was shivering all the first tango and when we finished, I wanted to go out as faster as possible. Now, I try to control myself, to relax me, to enjoy the moment, but it is not easy for me!

If tango would be my regular job, perhaps, it would lose the sense what it have for me and I would not feel completely satisfied.

Is tango an important aspect of your relationship with Felipe?

MS: It’s important because both of us love to dance, listen and watch tango, I met him when I started my lessons of tango and as was mentioned before, many times we organize dinners at home or in some restaurant and then we to go to some milonga with our tango’s friends. We love it! But we have a lot of other things in common too that we also enjoy to do it together.

What makes a good dancer for you?

MS: Not easy answer!. Perhaps, a good dancer as leader as follower is who makes feel so well to her/his partner, which, maybe, not only depending of her/his technical level. Sometimes, I love certain dancers who don’t dance well for the most of people and another times, I felt so captivated for dancers who dance very well for everybody!

Who were your influences when you started tango & who influences you now?

MS: The first time I went to Paris by a doctoral stay, on 2004, a friend of mind told that a very famous of tango will dance as exhibition in a milonga, Oxygène, a Wednesday evening. So, I went with her because tango performances were not common in Chile at the time. When we arrived there, She showed me the famous argentine couple and they were Geraldin Rojas and Javier Rodriguez. It was their last performance together in Europe and definitely, that exhibition influenced me a lot, even if I have never seen to Geraldin again in live. I took a workshop with Alejandra and Sergio once on summer 2005, then, a workshop with Javier and Andrea on summer of 2006 in Santiago, then, I took a particular lesson with Javier on Fall of 2009. I had wished to take much more lessons with them and another couples, but, it have not could do it due to my job. Fortunately, Javier and Andrea come again to Santiago this week!

How would you like to be remembered in 100 years?

In 100 years!!!!…..I would like to have children and grandchildren and they can remember me such as I am.

Cost:

Workshops £10 each; Ball £12

Booking conditions:

Firm booking for workshops only taken with partners. Solo names will be
put on a waiting list until partners can be found.


Booking forms can be downloaded from the website: www.herefordtango.co.uk.


Cheques to be made payable to: “Hereford Tango Club”. Please post cheques to Fiona Renton at: Bethany, Preston on Wye, Herefordshire, HR2 9JU.

Enquiries:

tel: 07974 649017,
email: fiona.renton@talk21.com
www.herefordtango.co.uk


The Hotel offers special B&B rates for dancers, please book direct with The Green Dragon.


The Green Dragon Hotel
Broad Street, Hereford, HR4 9BG
Hereford, United Kingdom

Feeling the floor

Most shoes designed for dancing for leaders have a thin sole. There’s a reason for this. You can feel the floor. If you can’t feel the floor though the sole of your shoes as a leader, then you’re probably going to change weight or step in a less delicate way. Imagine trying to pick up an egg with boxing gloves on. The amount of pressure that you feel being applied is diluted. Pick up your egg with a pair of marigolds and it’s a different story. A few leaders, especially ladies that lead sometimes wear dance trainers (such as bloch). In my view, these aren’t as suitable as the springy sole can cause a bouncing step which resonates through the dance.

Staying at the bottom

Staying with the bottom of the shoe there’s really only one thing to avoid and that’s rubber. Trainers that are designed to be street wear and lots of dance trainers have a rubber sole. Whilst the dance trainers are probably a better option than regular trainers, street trainers won’t allow you to turn with the fluidity of a leather or suede sole. Plus there is the danger that if you stick whilst turning, you’re more likely to hurt a knee as the body turns and the feet stick.

Which sole to choose

Leather or suede? Personally, I prefer suede though I know a lot of leaders prefer leather. It’s really a personal preference. In my view though suede soles are more adaptable to different conditions.


Of course, you can wear leather bottom shoes out for a night out, but I like to keep my dance shoes for dancing in. A leather sole can be pretty fast (slippery) on a good dance floor, and even though this makes turns easy, some grip is still needed to get energy into a step and I like to feel the control of having some grip when I need it. Suede soles can also be treated after each night of dancing with a wire brush (about a fiver on ebay) which brings up the fluffy feel again. If you’re dancing on a sticky floor, then don’t brush them and they will soon flatten into a more leather-like bottom. On a slippery floor? Just brush up the bottom to give yourself a bit of extra grip.


An important aspect to consider is the split sole. This allows the shoe to bend neatly in the centre. Split sole shoes usually have a rubber heel and the stepping part of the foot will be leather or suede. The centre under the arch of the foot is then just covered with material and makes the shoes really flexible.

Men have heels too

Dance shoes for men do come with different heel sizes too. Some prefer a very flat shoe; whist the other extreme offers an almost Cuban heel. Complete flats can seem comfy but a small heel will help to slightly angle the body forward.

Which material

The material that you choose for a pair of tango shoes will partly dictate the style. Hard leather shoes, typically more formal, can look very smart but are less flexible. They also have one major disadvantage. The last thing any leader wants to do is to hurt a follower. I’m sure all leaders at one time or another have committed the sin of treading on toes. Buy a pair of very smart, but very hard shoes and you’re unlikely to be dancing a second tanda in the arms of your follower if (god forbid) your foot gets that little too close to hers. Especially if she’s wearing a beautiful open toe number. Stick to soft leather or a fabric and leather / fabric and suede upper combination and if you do get too close, the touch will hardly be noticeable (unless you dive in to steps like an England scrum half).

Style

The most popular styles for shoes are single colour ones. Black usually. Some of the two-colour shoes can look pretty smart too. Just buy what reflects you in terms of style.
How many pairs?
As a leader, you probably won’t need more than two pairs. When I buy another pair, I simply retire my current pair to being a practice pair and keep the new ones for milongas. Depending on the shoes you buy they should last too. The most delicate are probably the soft, fabric combination uppers but even with very regular dancing they should last you a couple of years.


With all this said though, just like tango shoes for ladies the most important thing is that you feel comfortable. One local leader who has danced for around 7 years recently invested in a new pair of shoes. He’s told me they are “magic shoes” for the difference they make.

Terpsichoral Tangoaddict

The writer of the Tangoaddiction blog.


Personally, I don’t like following in flat shoes. I think the tango is designed to be easier to dance in heels and if you don’t you usually find yourself going up onto demi-pointe, which is more tiring than wearing heels would be. I learnt a technique where I distribute my weight evenly between the ball of my foot and the heel (my body weight is over the arch of the foot, not towards the front), so maybe I feel the need for high heels even more than most. However, it’s not necessary to wear the highest heels you can find, especially if you are a beginner follower. You should wear whatever heels are most comfortable and you feel most stable dancing in. But I do think it looks and feels nicer to wear some kind of a heel. And, call me crazy, but this includes male followers, for me.

Richard Slade

Organiser of the Menuda Milonga.


Let me start off by saying that I’m not really sure what sorcery followers employ to be able to walk in various directions, especially backwards in heels. I find it tricky enough to walk forwards in the soft, glove like men’s dance shoes I wear, so hat off to all followers.

From talking to my own partner (or at least listening), I think the most important thing is for a follower to firstly feel comfortable and supported in the shoes they choose. Then of course there’s the ‘feel like a queen’ factor. Attitude helps, so high heels may be a bonus.

As a leader though, I never base my choices of who to invite for a dance based on the shoes that they wear. Be it flats or heels. That doesn’t mean that we don’t notice, and occasionally comment on a foot flattering pair of strappy 6″ spikes. As for leading a follower that is wearing flats, it doesn’t have to be a problem, though it does change the feel of the dance into one where the follower can sometimes feel slightly springier in each step rather than smooth. If I had to choose, I certainly would say I’d prefer a follower in heels.

Look out for Richard’s guest editorial on the subject of mens shoes, coming soon.

Maria solero

A Tango performer & teacher based in London www.mariasolerotango.blogspot.com


I would say that Tango is a personal experience, and for that reason everybody should consider what they, themselves, find most comfortable. In the best cases the body’s awareness becomes stimulated when we start a dance or any physical activity. So the first thing I would say is to pay attention to the new sensations, pains, comforts or discomforts you may experience at the beginning and please don’t let the bad elements become part of your dance. I recommend to my students that they start with low heels, but the heel is not the only important thing to consider at the time of selecting your shoes. They also have to be confortable, just your size (not bigger not smaller) and not platform ones, you should be very close to the floor and from your other foot. Something very important is the sole, it has to be some kind of leather or untreated leather. Avoid rubber ones as you can damage your joints. For those who don’t feel comfortable with heels for any reason, I would recommend dance trainers, they come with special rubber that allows you to scroll, they are very comfortable and not that expensive, but never flat shoes. Even for walk they are not good. We need an arch for protection, to hold our feet in good “posture” and in tango we also require a bit of heel to allow the weight to change easily to the toes.
Then if you have “pes cavus”, which means that your arch is very deep, you will probably feel better with high heels.

You can start with any size of heel or even thick socks as long your choice doesn’t become a barrier for a good technique and enjoyment.

Ken Brown

A thoroughly nice chap and one of our most active friends from the other side of the pond.


I love dancing with women in heels, or flats. Here is what I have noticed. When I first look at a woman to dance with. First I look at the embrace then the shoes. I look to see if she walks on the inside of her feet and keeps her heels about 1/32 of an inch off the floor. This tells me she has the strongest part of her foot on the floor and is able to support herself. When I see a woman who starts off the evening in heels, and changes into flats later, you will notice that the heel is raised higher in the air than it was when they were wearing heels. This tells me she is trying to compensate for the height difference of the heels and may or may-not have good balance. If person dances with the weight forward and keeps their heels off the floor 1/32 of an inch it does not matter wither she dances in flats or heels. The weight is on the ball of the foot supporting the person. Now from a fashion point Heels do look nicer and makes a dancers legs look slimmer and longer, and they make her feet look pretty also. I believe it’s all about balance on the person. I am average height and I dance with people taller than me and shorter than me. It does not matter I adjust my embrace to fit the person I am dancing with. When I dance with my tall friends 6ft+ they dance in heels and become anywhere from 6ft+ to 6ft 5in or so. They carry their balance well and we have lots of fun.

Irving Washington

Some timid soul who would rather not be named.


I know that this is wrong but I have to admit that when I start my cabeceo I initially direct my eyes towards the feet. If the follower in question is someone I know and she is sans heels I will assume that she has had enough and will never take my cabeceo any further. If I have never danced with a follower before I will look at heel height, shoe style and the skinniness of the heel, as these are usually pretty good indicators of the ability of the follower. Its shallow I know but I don’t think i am the only one that thinks this way. I guess my advice would be that if you want to maximise your time on the dance floor and you re a beginner, get a pair of nice tango shoes, I’m sure you will get more dancers from Leaders that wouldn’t usually consider asking you (even if you are effectively tricking them into asking you).

Lynn Collins

The lady that wrote our last post on this very subject TANGOKOMBINAT


TH asked me to write something designed to do two things: firstly to offer some advice to post beginners seeking their first pair of tango shoes and secondly to talk about the acceptability or otherwise of women dancing in flats. Both of these topics are juicy and interesting so let’s dive into first shoes first.

You’re hooked, you’re practising ochos in the kitchen and the supermarket aisle, you attend every práctica, every milonga, you dance to everything with everyone, your confidence is growing, you feel you’re getting it, but what you don’t have is The Shoes. The way I see it there are two possible choices: bonkers and practical. Bonkers is 9cm heel Comme il Fauts in purple with white polka dots. Practical is any shoe that is comfortable. And here’s the truth – the more comfortable the shoes, the more they will look like they were designed by an orthopaedic surgeon on a wet Wednesday. The heels will be low and stumpy, the toes will be closed and the colour and style will make you lose the will to live. High heels might be tolerable, but they are not comfortable. There are hundreds of women out there who, when asked, will swear that their beautiful, stylish shoes are exceptionally comfortable. Uh-huh? Translated this means “They don’t hurt quite as much as others I’ve worn.” Or “I don’t feel a thing once the endorphins kick in.” Dancing in high heels hurts sooner or later, and the higher the heel, the hurter the pain. But there are benefits to heels which we’ll come to, and it is possible to make reasonable compromises along the comfortable-bonkers spectrum. Meanwhile, let’s rewind to look at practical considerations. carry on reading Lynn’s post here…

They all do it. All the Argentine’s. They all leave town and then long for that return. Carlos Gardel, singing ‘Mi Buenos Aires Querido’ at the ships rail, catching the first glimpse of BA on board the steamer chugging up the Rio de la Plata. The author W.H. Hudson, born in Quilmes (oh blessed, beery city), wrote most of his work in a flat in North London, describing the flora and fauna of La Provincia de Buenos Aires and La Banda Oriental in great detail, chronicling his life on the pampa, the gauchos, the birds, and the big, big sky…he never returned, buried in Worthing, Sussex. What memories must he have had cooped up in Britain with its claustrophobia and drabness and smog. What longing to return to a land measured in leagues, free of fences and filled with light.


I left Buenos Aires in 2003. I cried all the way from Palermo to Ezeiza in a taxi, my cat on my lap in a travel cage. We were delayed on the motorway to the airport by the return of Boca Juniors football team, fresh from winning the Club World Cup in Japan, the roads were blocked for miles, traffic at a standstill…only in Argentina. I said ‘goodbye’ to yerba mate, fantastic beef, great wine, fantastic friends, my job, the heat, horses, the chaos, and tango. A tough day. Two years later, I eventually arrived back in the UK, via Portugal and the South of France. I washed up on these shores rather than arrived. Those two years had put me right through a grinding machine of my own making, and I was heading home for Wales, tail between my legs, looking for a place to hide and take stock. The cat seemed unruffled.


A few weeks later, bruised still but needing to dance, I saw that there was tango in Cardiff. I pulled into the car park at Morganstown one Saturday and the first person I saw was Augusto Balizano. Strange, as the last time I’d seen him was at my flat in Recoleta. He used to come round and give me dancing lessons on a Monday night. Augusto had been responsible for starting ‘La Marshall’, BA’s first gay milonga and to see him here on a cold, January day in Cardiff was a bit of a shock. Not long after, another Argentine teacher, Eduardo Bozzo showed up at Morganstown. It wasn’t until February 2011 that I found out that his sister, Claudia, had been my very first tango teacher back in BA. I used to go to her on a Friday night. Strange forces at work in the universe…
Claudia runs La Escuela del Tango, San Jose 364. I used to leave there on a Friday at 8pm after my beginners class (we were never allowed to stay and even watch the intermediate group which came after!), thinking, ‘ I’m never going back, I can’t do this’. I’d been ‘prescribed’ tango lessons by my Doctor. She actually wrote me a prescription. Work was getting on top of me, the country was going down the pan, bank accounts had been frozen and there were nightly protests on the streets of the city. It was mayhem. We’d had five presidents in three weeks and there were four different currencies in circulation in the country, three of them worth zilch. I’d gone in, I was run down, depressed, uncertain about the future. She nodded, listened, gave me some sleeping pills and told me to learn to dance. I talked to a couple of girls at work who I knew were dancers from their semi-conscious daytime state and was told to turn up at Claudia’s on Friday night. That’s how it started. There were many frequent and notable disasters. I remember getting on a bus with my mate Flavio, both of us hopeless dancers, to go to a milonga organised by the school. The coach was filled with tangueras from Rosario, and as we got on board, they hailed us as ‘Los milonguerros’, little did they know…That night, in a sports hall in Martinez, Flav and I sat out the entire night of dancing, rigid with fear, we asked no-one to dance, and no-one asked us. We shouldn’t have been there. Then there were the countless times when I was led from the dance floor to some quiet corner and told to practice more before actually trying to dance. Claudia made us beginners just walk, and walk and walk and walk, for what seemed like months on end, up and down the mirrored studio. I’d go home and walk up down my living room, ‘I’m never going back’. I’d go to milongas even though I couldn’t dance. I didn’t really care. I would pay my entry fee and just watch. Salon Canning was my local. I used to slip out of the flat about midnight, slide in to Canning, buy a drink and sit and watch. La Viruta, La Glorieta, El Nino Bien, the same…I’d sit and I’d watch. I’d go home in the early hours, berating myself for having wasted another night, just watching and drinking. I’d vow not to do that again but the next night, around midnight, I’d be calling a cab, ‘Vamos a Canning, puede ser?’ I’d go to milongas with Flav and the girls from work. Gabrielle, Lesley and Helen. Three tango addicts, pasty white from zero exposure to the sun, these girls lived at night. Slinking home at 7am, an hours sleep, a café con leche y media luna for breakfast, work til 1pm, sleep til 5, work til 9pm, sleep til 11pm, out at midnight, home at 7…they, like so many others, barely existed within normal society, they lived for the milonga, seven nights a week. We’d arrive together but soon they’d be swallowed up on the dance floor, leaving Flav and I to drink beer. Every now and then they’d drag us up for a tanda, whispering encouragement, the wily foxes, nurturing, cultivating their future leads and then off for proper dances. I’d grit my teeth, one day, I’ll crack this.


I spoke to Flavio last night. Two young children have kept him off the dance floor for a good while now. Gabrielle is living in Adelaide, Australia. Lesley has moved, no new address, Helen the same. The country is, as usual, up and down, up and down, economic hardship, prosperity, hardship. A country that has only recently tried to reconcile itself with those awful days of the 70’s when, in Buenos Aires, the sight of a dark green Ford Falcon, transport of choice for the security services, would send its citizens scurrying for cover, the disappearances, the torture. Both the Junta’s infamous ‘Triple A’ death squad and the opposing Montonero insurgents carried out atrocious acts in the name of their ideologies. The memories are too recent to have been erased. Buenos Aires has a past that speaks in whispers to the present, whispers that come late at night, with startled, heart pounding awakening. Argentina has been suffering from post traumatic stress disorder since its independence. It surely explains the amazing number of psychoanalysts and shrinks that ply their trade there. Thankfully, the days of political persecution are over, at least to the awful levels witnessed under the military governments. Safety and security in BA are as grounded on good luck and timing as they are in any big city although in eight years of living there I never felt threatened, indeed I felt safer than I would have if I’d been living in London. I spoke to Flav because I wanted to let him know. I’m going back. It’s booked. I’m going over in November, as the heat of the spring is picking up and the Jacaranda trees begin to flower. When the chattering classes of the tea salons only drape their fur coats over their shoulders in deference to the season’s change, when the pavement café’s are full from morning until late into the night, when the rollerblading delivery boys and girls glide down the streets carrying pizza, ice-cream and empanadas and the Portenas turn heads with their deconstructed fashion and reconstructed sexuality. It’s a kind of ‘revancha’, a second leg. This time I’m going back with dance shoes, and confidence and experience and some fancy patterns (though I bet when I go back to La Escuela, Claudia’s going to make me walk up and down for a few weeks just for good measure). This time I’m going to dance at La Glorieta on a Sunday evening, underneath the trees of Barrancas de Belgrano, I’m going to cabaceo at La Ideal, dance Nuevo wearing ripped jeans at La Catedral, watch ‘El Indio’ on Plaza Dorrego. I’m going to walk down Corrientes at midnight and soak it all up. I’m going to fall in love every night, no every tanda. Drink yerba in the street, watch polo in Matienzo, swim in the delta at Tigre, eat asado every day, paddle in the sea at Mar del Plata and hopefully, gallop a horse over a flat estancia under a 180 degree sky. I’ll hear once again all the window blinds in my barrio being lifted in unison at 5pm on a Sunday as the population of the city wakes up after a long, late Saturday night. I’ll drink ice cold Torrontes and dark red Malbec, wince at the harshness of Old Smuggler, and avoid the 5litre demi johns of Crotta, the cheapest and worst wine ever to have been pressed from a grape. I can’t wait. I’m not going to move back this time, maybe to do some digging around; find out if I could. Maybe get my old job back. Wouldn’t it be good?


Whatever it is about this city and its inhabitants that provoke these feelings within me, I am in good company. Gardel, Hudson, and countless others, dreamed of the Avenidas and Plazas from afar, longing to return. Buenos Aires is intoxicating on so many levels. It’s not just tango. It’s the energy, the love of life they have over there, I think because their very existence seems to be threatened every few years by government or corrupt policemen or the military. They realise that to be happy, one has to seize it in both hands, whenever the opportunity presents, as it is as fleeting and elusive as a snowflake on the tongue. Life is cheap. Poverty lives on every street corner and justice is something that only listens to money talking. So what better accompaniment to the capricious nature of existence than the tango? To celebrate, commiserate, empathise and sympathise, fall in and out of love with. When I’m feeling particularly melancholic, I go online and listen to La2x4, the 24hour tango station that broadcasts from BA to the world. Everyday, at 4am and 4pm our time, they play the Argentine National Anthem. One of the finest anthems in the world.



I remember a tango moment, it was July 9th, Independance Day, I was in a taxi going to Salon Canning as they broadcast the ‘hymno’ at midnight, live from Plaza de Mayo, the taxi driver pulled to the side of the road, singing, weeping. I was just awestruck. That kind of sincerity and pride is infectious. You become to love the place as much yourself. As a nation, the Argentines are fiercely proud of their flag, their independence and their country. They may hate their government but only because it gets in the way of their enjoyment of the place. And they bloody love us as well. Especially the Welsh. It’s great. Many consider the Welsh to be the most gallant, honourable and trustworthy of nationalities on the planet, (respect to our forefathers who must have put on quite a show for them back in 1865 when they too were washed up on the shores of Patagonia). I met an old man in Salta one time, up in the north west of the country, who actually gasped and took a step backwards in shock when I told him I was from Wales. He gripped my hand, all vicelike and croaked, ‘Los Galeses, Los Salvajes’. He was well impressed. Hours later, my wife and I were being paraded round a paddock at a Gaucho Rodeo, on horseback, ‘These people are from Wales’ crowed the MC through a PA system. The crowd clapped. Honestly. They must have been thinking, ‘Bloody ‘ell, look! Welsh people!’ Surreal.


If you haven’t been yet, or are planning a trip, go. It’s Paris without the effort. The milongas are like here. I’ve written somewhere before that there are good ones and bad ones, bad dancers, great dancers, annoying people, lovely people, people giving lessons in front of you, all the same stuff you get when loads of humans get together, great friendships waiting to be made, warmth and openness, frustration and ardour, so going out dancing is just as much fun as it is here, so never feel put off or in awe of the place in that respect. Most of all it’s a great city which will provide you with an unbelievable experience, both in and out of the salons. You’ll see those guys with ramrod straight backs dancing next to blokes holding a glass of whisky in their right hands in the embrace, drunk and singing along in the ears of their poor partners, all shapes, sizes, all out having a good time, certain milongas are snootier than others, some are just so local community based that they’re like afternoon socials at the welfare hall circa 1973; great dancing, uninhibited no rules fun, loud and laughing. Watch how the youngsters act out there, it’s a joy. They’re so full of fun and friendship. I was always amazed at the school where I taught how close they were to one another, how much spirit and trust and love they had. How the community was essential to the enjoyment of the individual within that community. It comes across best at these local milongas in the suburbs.
At the end of my phonecall to Flavio last night, like a good Argy, he had been telling me how bad the situation was there economically, things hadn’t been going well, etc. I said to him,


’Flav, we need to sit down and talk about this face to face over a mate’,
‘Crispo’, he replied, ’We’ll do it over a bottle of scotch’.


I love ‘em.


A lot of what I’ve written…sentimental claptrap, surely? I don’t think so, and just in case you don’t either, here’s some more. It’s a love affair. I fell in love with Buenos Aires long before I’d set foot on a dance floor. Having learned the basics of tango, now I’m going back to woo her but this time, I’m taking flowers, chocolates and tango shoes. I’ll take her out to the noisy, bustling happy restaurants, walk with her in the Jardin Botanico, kiss her on the balcony of my flat as the sun rises over the city, dance her in the silver blue of dawn and watch as she slips through my fingers, until we are reunited at dusk and the music starts to play again, somewhere far off, and we embrace. I can not wait. La Revancha.


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Mi Buenos Aires querido,
cuando yo te vuelva a ver,
no habra mas penas ni olvido.
My beloved Buenos Aires,
the day I see you again,
there will be no more sorrow or forgetfulness.

It´s a Saturday night, let´s say. I´ve just been at a traditional milonga, i.e. one where the music is played in tandas of four or five songs and people sit at tables around the room, making eye contact and subtle head signals to get dances. But it´s 3.30am and things are winding down, so I decide to hit the major league, to get out of the shallow end, to play with the big boys, even though they sometimes play rough — at La Viruta. Even on the earlier nights, no self-respecting dancer would arrive at La Viruta before 1am and 3.30am is a pretty average time to arrive on a Friday or Saturday.

La Viruta is, rather weirdly, located in the basement of the Armenian cultural centre, in Armenia street, in the heart of touristy, flashy, all-fur-coat-and-no-knickers neighbourhood Palermo-Soho, which is nothing like either of its namesakes in London or NYC. After I enter, I change back into my tango heels and check my rucksack in at the cloakroom, as La Viru is notorious for theft. I check my ego in while I´m at it. It´s not particularly fragile, having been toughened up by several years of merciless criticism by my teacher, but anyone who isn´t in possession of a Y chromosome is likely to take a psychological battering at La Viru, a shrine to Argentine machismo.

First of all, I case the joint, squinting in the low lighting to see who is there — and to make sure they see me. There are lots of the bearhugs and smacking kisses favoured by drama loveys and professional tango dancers (two groups with a lot in common), many of the men leaving threads of saliva at the very edge of my lips, most of the women air kissing me. And cries of “What a pleasure to see you here”. The guys have the advantage of not having to remember my exotic impossible-to-pronounce name as they just call me some variation on Bonita, Linda, Diosa, etc. The million-dollar question is, is it such a pleasure to see me that they might deign to dance with me? Or just enough of a pleasure to ignore my existence for the rest of the evening? I´ve come here to dance with the professionals and they haven´t come primarily to dance. They have come to drink beer, hang out with their friends or just stand around pouting and looking beautiful and icily unattainable, like lovely but prohibitively expensive rent boys. Or almost unattainable — that´s the tease. People here talk about the “histeriqueo” of the male dancers and I would say tease is a pretty close translation. It doesn´t help my odds that, apart from a very light smattering of older people, most of whom aren´t serious contenders, I am basically the oldest woman here. Most of the men I want to dance with are ten or more years younger than me and I could have given birth to many of them. Of course, that doesn´t stop most of them from being immensely condescending and treating me like a little girl.

I´m in luck. I spot Teeny-Tiny (not his real name), a very sweet guy who looks about fifteen. How is he able to be still upright at La Viru, after working for twelve hours’ straight at a real job? We smile at each other, we hug, we hit the dance floor. Like many men I dance with he is maybe 1.65m at the outside and probably weighs 55kg soaking wet, but I feel like I´m in the arms of a master. I shut my eyes and feel happy that he, not I, is the one who has to negotiate the extremely crowded floor. Gliding along the wonderfully smooth surface of La Viruta´s dancefloor feels beautiful and effortless. After a while, we exchange thanks, hug and kiss again and then I am off in search of my next fix.

I position myself at a strategic distance from Music Geek, a favourite partner of mine, and look fixedly in his direction. He shakes his head, but at the same time beckons me over and asks me to sit at his table. He confesses that he is very tired (he also works long hours) and that the slow music is making him feel sleepy (the DJ is spinning some beautiful, heartbreaking ballads rasped out by a famous elderly singer). “I need something fast and rhythmic to get my heart rate up,” he tells me. So I sit talking to him, feeling impressed by his encyclopedic knowledge of tango music and films, through the slow numbers. Then D’Arienzo, the most rhythmic, testosterone-fuelled tango orchestra in the repertoire, strikes up. MG leaps up, and so do I, like a happy little terrier, but then he turns his back on me, grabs another woman and goes out onto the dance floor with her. Ouch.

Cherub has one of those unmistakable lilting accents that even I can recognise as Colombian right from the opening “Hola”. He´s one of my favourite people to dance with, with an exceptionally fluid style and soft, relaxed body, so I´m feeling quietly hopeful when he comes over to hug me and exchange pleasantries. We wait until the beginning of the next tanda, a beautiful D’Agostino, and then, just as I think he is going to propose dancing, he spots a young Japanese woman and rushes over to ask her to dance. Sigh. I wish these exquisitely beautiful women at least had the courtesy to be bad dancers. But no.

I see Mr Pre-Columbus, with the Indian looks of someone from what the Argentines call “el interior”. He basically lives at La Viruta. He is one of those guys that I have never been to La Viruta without seeing there. I think they address his post to Armenia 1366. I look over and we get up to dance. His moves are fast and exciting, and beautifully executed. This is what I came for. It´s a thrill.

Now I feel like I have had a good night at La Viruta, even if the rest of it goes badly, but it’s still going my way. Here is my Sweet Friend. As usual, his best friend, a well-known dancer, whom I am not-so-secretly dying to dance with, just gives me the fish-eye. But the dances with SF are surprisingly lovely. The dance floor is very crowded, there is barely room to move — but there is room to embrace each other. SF is one of the few guys here whom I have a genuine soft spot for. He holds me very close to him, so we take up less space on the packed dance floor. We move slowly (another set of ballads is playing). I feel the play of the muscles in his back as he twists and corkscrews in the typical tango way, feel the breath entering and leaving his lungs, and try to copy its rhythm, and I can feel his heartbeat, very clearly, as if it were beating in my own chest. It´s a beautiful feeling.

A couple of side notes: a friend of mine told me that the reason the closed side of the tango embrace is on the man´s right-hand side and the woman´s left is so that he can feel her heartbeat. The leader, of course, in tango, has to keep his eyes open and a cool head. He needs to negotiate the floor and pay at least as much attention to the other men as to his partner, sometimes. Following is a totally different experience: your focus is divided between only two things, the music and your partner. And if he is musical those two things merge into one in the most magical way. So it´s the woman´s heart which is most likely to be going like the clappers.

After SF, I spend a while as a wallflower, receiving lots of smiles and kisses but no offers to dance and a good many blank, disparaging stares. One guy smiles manically and waves at me when I look in his direction — a signal which I interpret as “Don´t look this way again, I am seriously out of your league”. He is one of the more famous dancers, what the Argentines call an “estrellita”, a giant carp in this tiny fishbowl, so maybe he´s right, he is out of my league.

Then I see Slimeball. I swallow my pride, ignore his track record of behaving like a wanker at every possible opportunity and position myself carefully, leaning against the wall, looking what I hope is seductively in his direction. I feel like a hooker, except that if any money were to change hands he would definitely expect me to pay him. He makes an elaborate pantomime of pointing to himself, looking surprised and mouthing “Moi?” I nod and am rewarded with approximately thirty minutes of pure, unadulterated bliss. He is definitely my favourite dancer at this milonga. The only problem is that I dislike showing my obvious ecstasies, since his ego is already the size of a small planet. No, correction, make that Jupiter. In between dances, we stare at each other awkwardly. He is not the world´s most scintillating conversationalist and I know from experience that he is incredibly easily offended and liable to take everything the wrong way, which makes me afraid to open my mouth. But from the neck down he is my dream partner.

And finally, my last dances of the evening, with Mr Tanguero. How can he possibly wear a three-piece suit and tie in the heat at La Viruta — and, indeed, everywhere? So young, and yet so buttoned-up! With his slicked-back hair and carefully tended moustache, he always looks as if he has just stepped off the stage of a tango show. And he probably has actually. His dancing is really lovely. However, I could live without what they call the “chamuyo” or his tendency to “tirar onda”. Many guys flirt with me, but none with quite so many sexual references or quite so persistently as Mr T. I am convinced, as usual, that it is pure theatre. Argentine guys chat women up to prove their masculinity, to keep their hands in, just out of pure habit, or to convince you that they´re not gay (if they are). His dancing, at least, is pure dancing. Whatever he says, his body is focused on technicalities, not on sexual harassment. Thank God.

The night ends. I extricate myself from Mr T´s clutches and leave as the lights go up, revealing the shabby reality of empty beer bottles, haggard faces and grotty plastic chairs and tables. The coach has turned back into a pumpkin. I avoid the crowds of people lingering outside the entrance, smoking and saying long drawn-out goodbyes, and get on the 168 bus. As I travel on the bus, it´s beginning to get light and as we get further away from La Viruta the passengers change from weary milongueros to equally weary people on their way to work. As I approach the front door of my building, my neighbour appears, to take his giant black dog for her early morning walk. “Buenos dias,” he says.

The original “Another night at La Viruta//Otra Noche en La Viruta” blog post can be found here

“Funny things happen when you dance with another guy,” a male friend tells me, “They just do.”

We are watching the floor at a tango marathon, where several male-male couples are swapping the lead back and forth. In their flat shoes, the followers look a little clumsy and there is a slight inherent comedy to watching the chunkier male bodies perform moves our eyes are used to seeing danced by women. These particular men are not as highly skilled as followers as they are as leaders. One of them giggles a little as his partner camps up the opportunity to decorate, sweeping his foot comically high up the other man’s trouser leg and lightly tapping his bottom with a delicate, pointed toe for good measure as he steps over after a parada.

I welcome comedy in any form, wherever I can find it. But, of course, something more important is — literally — afoot here. Almost every serious dancer reaches a stage at which they want to find out what the dance feels like from the other side of the embrace. And even if you don’t plan to dance both roles at a very high level it is a useful exercise. The men are visibly more relaxed. Freed from any perceived obligation to impress the woman in their arms — and from the fear of manhandling her delicate body — they are able to try out moves which are still in rough draft, can even employ a little force (force which they will, of course, try to smooth away later) without squeals of protest.

For female same-sex couples, the opposite is true. When I am following from a woman I am hyper aware of the need to be soft, to be gentle. Since many women new to leading are, if anything, excessively timid, I am forced to sharpen my awareness of the lead, to pick up on subtler signals. I am very conscious of the relative fragility of my partner’s body — I often follow from women smaller and lighter than I am — and take extra care to keep my own axis, not to burden her with my body weight: all of which is excellent training.

My own ventures into same-sex tango began with the lovely raven-tressed Mariana Docampo at her house on Estados Unidos street in San Telmo. The friend who recommended her class asked me anxiously beforehand, “Do you mind embracing women?” As a result, I was eagerly anticipating milonguero-style snuggling and was rather taken aback to find everyone dancing in a very open embrace. There, on the old wooden floors, in the small, intimate class, and later over beers on her pot-plant-filled balcony, Mariana was clearly a pioneer, fostering a tango scene which is one of the most relaxed in Buenos Aires. Afterwards, we decamped to the nearby cafe Simon en su Laberinto. After we had strewed its sticky vinyl floor with talcum powder, everyone danced with everyone else, with earnest concentration and sincere friendliness, fortifying themselves in between with slices of huge, greasy shared pizzas.

But, although I loved the friendly, inclusive atmosphere, it wasn’t my favourite style of tango and I soon stopped going. I rediscovered leading and dancing with other women after watching Ariadna Naveira & Greta Hekier give a spunky performance (pun fully intended) at Práctica X which inspired me to take classes from Ariadna. At my first class, in the Naveiras’ practice room, Ariadna, clad in a T-shirt which mendaciously proclaimed “I Love Ballet”, gave me the low down. “Dancing with another woman should never be girly,” she told me. “Not like this.” She skipped around the room, miming a loose, open embrace with waggly arms, and intoned in a cheerleader voice: “Oooh, aren’t we two girls having fun together!” She recommended, instead, just stepping right through the centre of the follower’s body, driving through with my step, as if she weren’t there. She fixed me with her huge brown eyes and with a flat hand sliced vertically through the air from her solar plexus to mine, staring intently at me and making a drilling sound. In the course of a number of lessons, she tried hard to instill in me the importance of presence, groundedness and intensity in my walk as a leader. And every now and again she would give me her little reminder: that intense stare, accompanied by dddddrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr (the drilling sound).

So, do I feel any different when I am dancing with another woman? Well, I’m not sure that I do when I’m following. But leading certainly has interesting psychological effects on me. At the risk of sounding naive, I have to confess that I used to find it hard to identify with lesbians who choose to dress in a very masculine way. Though of course it never bothered me — why on earth should it? But suddenly, leading, I understood. Having another woman in my arms made me, personally, feel very masculine. And so did the very fact of leading itself. A good leader is a protector as he (or she) steers the follower — trustingly nestled in his (or her) arms with closed eyes — safely around a floor filled with moving bodies. And good leading, I feel, is very giving. It is the followers who have most of the pretty moves (especially with an inexperienced leader like me), most of the lovely footwork. My role as leader is at times more that of a facilitator. I feel I am displaying her lovely loopy boleos and swoopy planeos to a room full of admirers, as if I had a trophy wife on my arm at a dinner party: me in an anonymous black penguin suit; her in a jewel-toned ball gown. I am struck by an urge to slick my hair back with gel and my chin feels naked without a goatee.

Leading also answers a question that has often haunted me as a follower. How do leaders really feel about our decorations? Well, I can answer that question for myself as a leader, pretty unequivocally. I LOVE THEM. Every decoration is like a little unexpected gift, tied up with a satin bow. It gives me a thrill to feel that my partner is enjoying the music and her own movements and that I am the cause of her pleasure. Or, at least, not an insuperable obstruction to it. And I recognise this feeling primarily from a sexual, not a dance, context.

*Please allow those scare quotes to cover as many sins as you require. Consider them adjustable to your personal level of political radicalism/immersion in cultural theory/sense of irony.

The original “Same Sex Tango” blog post can be found here

Javier Casalla plays tango music that is modern but not Nuevo. He plays mainly on his Violin but he is also skilled with a wide range of other instruments… Take a look at this performance of “Milonga Niza” in an airport departures lounge… The guys sat next to him are trying to play it cool but the little guy in the background knows a good thing when he hears it.





And that is another thing I love about Javier. His Milongas are Milongas, his Valses are Valses and his Tangos are Tangos (well apart from “La Cumparsita… that is a Vals). If not for the obvious lack of an orchestra, his music wouldn’t sound out of place at a Milonga.



It might not be for everyone and it might not be brilliant to dance to (not bad mind you), but if you like tango music, you should take a look.



You can download his self-titled solo album from iTunes or here

It’s a cool London Wednesday night and I am fastening my shiny Alanis shoes, perched on a chair in the dark, grungy, beer-scented space so incongruously known as The Dome. I have my usual ants-in-the-pants eagerness to be up and dancing from the very second the buckles are fastened and am already scoping out the scene. The floor no longer appears as Dante-esque to me as it did on my first visit. Within only a couple of months, my eyes have adjusted to London tango. I’m not entirely sure that this is a good thing.

I’ve heard many complaints recently about how difficult it is to get good dances in London. I decide to play the intrepid naturalist tonight so I can report back on local partner-choice customs for my international readers.

For someone who is accustomed to the more formal Buenos Aires milongas, with their neat rows of leaders and followers eyeing each other during the cortinas, the Dome tango jungle is a wild and bewildering place. The music is played in tandas, but, with no cortinas to signal the changes of orchestra, couples enter and leave the floor at will. I spot a few leaders out there whom I would like to dance with but, having no idea as to when they will next be partnerless and available, I lack a good strategy for capturing them.

Most of those who are not dancing fit into two clear categories. The majority stand or sit next to a specific woman, often engaged in conversation. The women have the unmistakeable gleam of tango longing in their eye, but play a patient waiting game: making small talk and fishing discreetly for an invitation to dance. In Buenos Aires, men and women tend to clump together in homosocial groups: by contrast, the London scene looks, to my outsider’s eye, strangely couple-y. The other, solo men generally gaze at the dance floor or wear a fierce look which defies approach. Only the beginner men scout the room actively and seek out partners to dance with. The beginner men and your crazy faithful blogger.

Since I assume that the men who sport forbidding expressions do so mainly to deter beginners from requesting dances and since — rightly or wrongly — I don’t consider myself a beginner, I set out on a hunting mission undeterred. I attempt the direct approach. “Would you like to dance?” I ask brightly. My quarry is a complete stranger whose playful, syncopated nuevo style I admired from my seat. “I would love to, but I don’t like this orchestra,” he apologises (a punchy Típica Victor track is playing). Suspecting this to be a face-saving white lie, I quickly beat a retreat. Sure enough, a couple of bars later, when the coast is clear, he takes to the floor with his chosen partner. This is my first lesson in Dome-ian anthropology.

I am beginning to get the lay of the land. Most of the better leaders here, at The Dome, prefer to dance with women they know personally. This is an adaptive behaviour which has evolved because of the extremely uneven — and mostly, frankly, rather low — quality of the local dancing and the challenging conditions of this slipperiest, most treacherous of floors. So I behave like a local. I seek out men I know.

Standing by the bar, pouring out my glass of tap water, I face a pleasant dilemma. I am sandwiched between a thirsty 4am Boy and a visiting teacher with whom I enjoyed some beautifully fluid dances at a previous milonga. The visiting teacher is smiling at me. I smile back, but opt for trusty 4am Boy who I’m sure will dance with me once he has rehydrated.

Following 4am Boy’s dynamic, twisty style and myriad changes of direction is a challenge on this skating rink dance floor. Our dancing is punctuated with many exclamations of “Whoops!” “Sorry, I slipped.” “No, it was me, I slipped.” “Sorry, sorry!” “It’s not your fault; it’s the floor.” “Whoa!” “Wheeeeee!” The floor is a demanding mistress: stray one degree from your axis when you are transferring weight and she playfully sends your free leg half way to the splits. It is excellent balance training.

As usual, 4am Boy’s intense, deeply musical dancing leaves me glowing with happiness as we finally leave the floor for the stickiness of the sidelines. But there is further pleasure in store for me later in the night. I spot a dancer I’ll call The Gardener, whose no-nonsense Antipodean attitudes I find refreshing. I used to love his dancing when I was a beginner and am steeling myself for a disappointment as we hit the dance floor. Revisiting former favourite partners after a period of years, when your own dancing has changed and developed in the meantime, is a tricky business. They usually don’t feel as good in your arms as you remembered. But The Gardener is a happy exception to this rule: smooth, controlled and playful. And, over the course of the evening, the floor has gained a degree of grip. I speculate that perhaps the dancers’ sweat has condensed and rained down upon her like a fine dew. Or perhaps she has been lightly scuffed by our shoes. I feel an empathy with Mistress Floor. I too am best at the end of a long evening. Like her, I need to be tempered by tango.

The original “Slip Slidin’ Away” blog post can be found here

See more blog entries by Mari at http://mytangodiaries.blogspot.com


Our out-of-town visitor sat almost the entire milonga, dancing only three tandas all night. I was disappointed not to get to dance with him, but I knew he had taught workshops all day and likely just wanted to unwind. In this Texas heat, I don’t think anyone has the stamina they have at during the Fall and Winter.


When the milonga was over we gave each other a big hug and he suddenly, and emphatically, apologized for not dancing with me, which was really unexpected – and very kind. He went on to say that the music he prefers to dance to simply didn’t get played very much, so he sat and listened. He only wanted to dance to the music that really moved him. I thanked him for choosing to sit rather than dance to music he didn’t care for – and I meant it.


Reflections . . .


This is one of those things we hear about in North America, the milongueros who sit and wait for the music that they love – even if it means sitting all night, but it’s not all that common here where milongas are a very social event. It’s simply a different experience here, and mostly I can accept that. Especially since I know that it can be very difficult for leaders to sit out tandas, when there are more women than men, with all of those (perceived) accusing eyes asking, “why won’t he ask someone to dance?”


Yet for me as a follower, there are few things more disheartening than dancing with a leader who clearly doesn’t like the music that’s playing. I’ve had more than one leader tell me, as he was walking me to the dance floor, often for a milonga or vals tanda, that he really disliked that particular song playing. Another gentleman told me that he felt completely bored by the music that had just started, yet still stood there with his hand out.


Then why ask me to dance to it???


When I’ve suggested that we wait for the next tanda instead, I get a wave, and a “no, no, let’s give it a try.”


I’m sorry to be blunt, but “give it a try” during practica or class. Milongas are for dancing to music that moves you. If it doesn’t move you – if you really dislike it, sit down. Milongas are social events and many times we dance with people simply because we’re good friends regardless of the music that’s playing. But when you don’t feel any connection to the music, is it really fair to your partner to subject him or her to dancing with no connection to the music – especially if you feel like you have to suffer through it?


I would like to draw a distinction here between not knowing what to do with the music, or how to interpret it – and not liking it. There’s a big difference. I know that appreciation for the complexities and possibilities of tango music can take a long time and a lot of listening and walking to the music. Often it does take dancing with people who *do* love it, to really feel it. I’m specifically talking about dancing to music one doesn’t like out of a feeling of obligation or duty.


For example, I love milongas. I almost can’t contain how much I love them. I spent a year being completely afraid of them and sitting them out, so now maybe I am making up for lost time. I seek out leaders who love them too so that I can share that experience – that love for that type of music.


Here’s the tricky thing – I learned to love milonga by dancing with people who loved milonga. Makes perfect sense right? But I danced with them at practicas and in classes – not at milongas. I encourage people who have a difficult time with a particular orquestra like Biagi or Pugliese, or other types of music like milonga or vals, to seek out the dancers who love it and ask for their help. Most of the time dancers are more than happy to share their love of a particular type of music. Practicas are fantastic for this. At the milonga however, I really believe a dancer should not be expected to dance with a partner who, at that point in time, simply doesn’t like the music.


Have you ever danced with someone who felt like they’d rather be doing something else than dancing to what was playing? Do you ever dance to music you really don’t like just because you feel you should?


The original “Sitting Out” blog post can be found here

Milongas and Practicas, Classes and Workshops at Stoke Prior Village Hall, Hanbury Road, Stoke Prior, Bromsgrove, B60 4DN

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