Tango Is a Language (I)

You might not consider tango to be a language, but in reality, tango is indeed a language, which can be taught, acquired, comprehended, and employed to convey intentions, emotions, feelings, musical interpretations, as well as aspects of movement such as type, size, direction, speed, variations, and more. Those who know this language can effectively communicate with each other, discern the intentions and feelings of their partner, and dance together harmoniously as a unified entity. Those who are unfamiliar with this language find it challenging to express themselves and respond to others, and they feel awkward and frustrated in dancing together.

Similar to other languages, tango has its own alphabet, vocabulary, grammar, and composition. The various body parts, including the head, arms, hands, torso, waist, hips, legs, and feet, can be seen as the alphabet of tango. We use these elements to make steps, which are the vocabulary of tango. Musicality and communication are like the grammar, according to which steps are improvised to form a dance. Choreography, which combines various steps into a coherent and artistic performance, is the composition of the dance.

Like studying any language, learning tango should start with the alphabet and grammar. Without using alphabet, we can't spell words. Without understanding grammar, we can't put words into proper use. One of the problems in our tango learning is that we focus only on studying vocabulary and don't pay nearly enough attention to the alphabet and grammar. We don't embrace correctly. We don’t understand the functions of verious body parts and often use them incorrectly in dance (see The Functions of Various Body Parts in Tango). Our posture is ugly. Our connection is broken. Our body is stiff, heavy and inflexible. We are unable to dissociate the upper body and the lower body. There is no balance and stability in our movements. We don't listen to music. We don't step on the beat. We don't follow the sentiment and mood of the music. We don't communicate well. Our lead is unclear and follow is clumsy. As a result, although we've memorized a lot of steps, we can't put them together in a meaningful, musical, harmonious and beautiful way.

Like any language, tango has a large vocabulary. No one can do all the steps in tango, just like no one knows all the words in a language. The fact is, we don't need to memorize the entire dictionary to speak a language. For example, in Chinese language there are more than 60,000 characters. The Kangxi Dictionary includes 47,000 characters. The official Xinhua Dictionary includes 8,550 characters. Among them only 950 characters are the most frequently used, which cover 90% of the total characters used in popular literature. An addition of 2,800 characters of the second highest use frequency increases the coverage to 99.9%. Most Chinese characters are rarely used.

Tango is the same. There are only limited steps that are essential in tango, such as walk, salida, resolution, switch between parallel system and cross system, cruzada, pivot, dissociation, cadencia, front ocho, back ocho, molinete, giro, rock, and traspie. These basic steps form 90% of the steps used in social tango dancing. More complicated steps, such as ocho cortado, sacada, sandwich, boleo, rulo, parada, barrida, corrida, carpa, planeo, lapiz, calesita, enganche, volcada, americana, media vuelta, media luna, arrastrar, zarandeo, etc., form the other 9% less common, optional and dispensable steps in social tango. In addition to the above are steps used primarily in performance tango, such as enrosque, giro-enrosque-lapiz combination, high boleo, castigada, back sacada, gancho, colgada, single axis turn, soltada, patada, sentada, kick, lift, flip, etc. These steps are mainly used by professional performers for special effects only. They lack the friendliness of the social tango steps, are difficult, uncomfortable, dangerous and requiring a lot of space to do, therefore are not suitable for social dancing (see Social Tango and Performance Tango).

It is unwise to put your time and money on stuffs that are of very little use, but neglect the essentials that can benefit you most, and it is affected to use professional jargon to carry out a daily conversation. Unfortunately, that is what many tango students are doing. A much better approach to tango is to focus on the alphabet, grammar and basic vocabulary of tango instead of jumping into big fancy words without a solid foundation. Frankly, for most people, the basics are all they need to enjoy social tango. If you understand that, then tango is really a simple and easy dance. Those who are particularly talented and want to become stage performers can go further to learn performance, but that should be pursued after they have laid the foundation, not before, and certainly not at the milonga where even the professionals dancers dance sociably. (See Tango Is a Language (II).)

Driving and Synchronization

Raul Cabral is a tango master, a brilliant thinker and teacher of the milonguero style of tango. He published a series of essays on http://www.raultangocabral.com.ar. The following is a brief summary of his key message on achieving synchronization through proper embrace.

The most important qualities of a dancer have nothing to do with steps. What are essential for the leader are his musicality and his ability to drive the follower. What are essential for the follower are her abilities to be weightless and to synchronize the movement.

The leader is the driver in tango, who uses his body to effect the movement of the body of his partner. Every step of the leader should be expressed through his partner. Driving does not mean that he moves and waits for his partner to follow. Tango is synchronization, or moving exactly at the same time. This suggests that the word “follow” is an incorrect notion because “follow” implies a moment later. Even if the moment is minimal, there is no synchronization. What is correct for the follower is to enter the moving car of the leader and allow herself to be transported by him on their musical journey.

The unique and magical essence of tango, two bodies moving as one, is achieved solely by the ability of the body to communicate the message of its movement through the embrace. Many people, through tango, are beginning to discover the importance of the embrace, which takes us back to the first years of our lives, to the protection of the chest of women. It is the need of that connection that brings people into tango. The embrace is the reason that tango has triumphed in the multitude of societies in the world.

Driving and synchronization are achieved through proper embrace. Since the beginning of tango, there is only one communication in this dance and it is corporal, from body to body, not arms to arms. The two partners make contact through their bodies, which are weighted slightly forward on the balls but supported by the entire feet on the floor including heels. Each partner is responsible for his/her own balance. The man spreads his chest, offers it to the woman and welcomes her into his body. He embraces her firmly, but puts no pressure on her. There is nothing tense or hard in his body. He leads her with his whole body but his main message comes from his chest, from which he communicates the feelings, the direction, the size of the step, the timing, the cadence, the pause, etc. He never loses his contact to her, not even an instant, and he never cuts the flow of communication.

The woman settles into the man’s embrace, molding herself on him until it feels as if he were wearing her. She leans her body slightly forward against him and properly positions her chest so she can receive every minute message from his torso. She stretches her body from the waist on upwards, as if she were the string of a violin vibrating at his slightest touch. Her body is soft and relaxed. It is upon relaxation that her extremities, legs, arms and head, become void of matter, and her torso, especially her chest, becomes the main focus. This allows her to feel the messages from the body of the leader and move in unison with him. Her weight is on the inside of the ball of her foot, but her whole foot including the heel is in contact with the floor. Her arm lands gently and weightlessly on his shoulder. She doesn't hang on him or use the embrace to stabilize herself, but keeps her own balance, thus she is light. She is supple but toned, soft but with nothing loose (hips, for instance). Her presence is notable with subtle but assured pressure of her chest against his. She does not efface herself or break the connection, knowing if she separates herself from him she won‘t get the information from his body. She is continuously tuned to the messages he emits from his chest. Until the tango is over, her chest is permanently in contact with his. This is the most exact way to achieve synchronization.

Tango Embrace

Tango can be danced in a variety of ways. For example, it can be danced in a "virtual embrace," in which two partners dance around each other at a distance, without physical contact. The man leads with visual signals from his torso to indicate movements, while the women interprets these cues to execute each step. A visual lead is difficult to perceive because it cannot be felt and must be seen. The differences between different signals often are so subtle that they are difficult to discern with the eye. It's quite a challenge for the man to send a clear visual signal and for the woman to apprehend it. Also, a virtual embrace lacks the physicality, sensation and comfort of a physical embrace and limits movements that require physical support. Despite these, the virtual embrace highlights an essential distinction between leading and following: one is ploting the dance, and the other is beautifying the dance. It also underscores that leading and following are not only physical processes but also psychological, requiring mental focus and understanding. This awareness is crucial, as we cannot dance well with our feet unless we also dance with our hearts.

Tango can also be danced in an open hold, similar to that in ballroom dancing, where the dancers connect only through their arms and hands, without torso contact. Arms and hands are extensions of the body, so even without direct bodily contact, dancers can still sense each other’s intentions through these points of connection. The open hold, also known by its fine-sounding name “open embrace,” provides more space for dancers to maneuver, making it popular among movement-oriented dancers who enjoy performing elaborate figures. It is arguable, however, that in open embrace dancers still lead and follow with their torsos as they theoretically should. In reality, the absence of direct torso contact often leads dancers to rely on their arms and hands for signaling, which is not as seamless as leading and following with torsos. Also, the open embrace lacks the intimacy, comfort, and soulful quality of the close embrace.

Tango can also be danced using only torso communication, without the use of arms and hands. This torso communication is unique to Argentine tango, making it an intimate, feeling-oriented dance distinct from other dance forms. However, beginners who lack training and feel shy about intimacy often adhere to the habit of relying on their limbs. To help them overcome this habit, tango teachers may ask students to dance completely without using their arms and hands, relying solely on their torsos to send and receive signals. Some teachers even place a piece of paper between the students' chests, instructing them not to let it fall as they dance. While people don’t actually dance tango this way, the skills developed through this training provide students with a solid foundation for the dance.

The most comfortable and communicative embrace is the close embrace, in which partners lean into each other, chest to chest, with their faces touching. His left hand and her right hand hold at shoulder height, his right arm wraps around her body, and her left arm hooks over his right shoulder. The close embrace provides the most intimate connection and effective communication, making it favored by feeling-oriented dancers who enjoy the intimate, cozy, and soulful interactions between partners more than gymnastic movements.

Beginners may find close embrace hinders their movements, but that is only because they are novices. Dancing in close embrace requires techniques different from those used in open embrace tango, such as dancing in a compact way, using small, simple, rhythmic and synchronized steps, the command on dissociation, the mastery of cadencia, the ability to do spot dancing, the knack in floorcraft on a crowded dance floor, the focus on feelings rather than steps, and the emphasis on the elegance rather than flaunt of the movements, ect.

Experienced dancers may also use some variations of close embrace to increase movement possibilities. One variation is the V-shaped embrace in which the two partners are connected with one side of their torsos and leave the other side open. Another is increasing the lean of the body to allow more space between their legs. The combination of the two is yet another option. These variations require more flexibility and stamina of the body, and are less comfortable than the standard close embrace. In actual dancing the embrace often varies. For example, when dancing ocho the woman may alternate from one side V-shaped connection to a chest-to-chest connection to another side V-shaped connection.

The choice of embrace dependends on many factors, including physical conditions (flexibility and stamina of the body), dance styles (movement-oriented or feeling-oriented), purposes (social dancing or performance), environment (floor density and milonga codes), music (fast or slow tempo), movements (fancy or simple, large or small steps), maturity (age and experience), and genres (tango, vals or milonga). Every embrace has its merits and limits. In the milonguero style of tango, close embrace is used to facilitate the communication of feelings. In the Villa Urquiza style of tango, a loose embrace is used to ease fancy footwork. In stage tango, open embrace is used to deliver intricate performance (see Three Theories on Leading).

The close embrace earned tango a reputation as the "dance of the brothel" and led to its rejection by "polite society." The emergence of the open-embrace style contributed to the spread of tango. Some young generation dancers saw an opportunity for more elaborate performance in the open-embrace style and launched the tango Nuevo movement, which gained particular momentum outside Argentina, where intimacy between the sexes is often culturally discouraged. As tango moved in this direction, it began to lose its original feel. Gymnastic tendencies, antisocial behavior, breaking of the embrace, adoption of non-tango elements, shifts in gender roles, alternative music, same-sex partnerships, and other efforts to reform the dance emerged in succession, transforming tango into a hybrid form. The old guard in tango's homeland, the Argentine milongueros, strongly defend its roots. Their style of tango, known as the milonguero style, danced in close embrace, remains the dominant style in Buenos Aires today. Still, the battle between traditionalists and reformers continues. (See The Fourteenth Pitfall of a Tanguera.)