Oli wrote:
Coleman,


Guess everyone experience similar things and even an argentinean teacher couldn't help much in demonstrating the homogenicity of Tango.
We need a variety of couples.



Oli, ,you are absolutely correct again, we probably need a few argentinean couples, good one, to stay here for longer each time, say a few months, to give us the different flavours. I can't see how we can "see" the homogenicity of tango if they stay here for 1,2 or 3 weeks, you can do better than that on youtube. We need them here to teach you in depth, and not just to show you with 1 or 2 performances at Milonga that "homogencicity of tango" that you are fascinated with.

Very often when you have chance to talk to the teachers after class, in dinner, coffee sessions etc, they will tell you how they perform on stage for you to see and present themselves as can be totally different from how they dance socially in milonga with friends and lovers. Something they would never be able to share with you if they are here for 2 weeks.

How about 4 different pairs of Argentinean couples in one year and each stay 3 months to fill a year?

A point well made, again.

Geoff,

One of the great things about Tango is the way our perception of it can change over time. Anyone first seeing social Tango and starting lessons probably view it is as quite an easy and simple dance with very little movement. This is especially true of those who have previously studied other, more athletic dance forms. But after a short time the men especially quickly discover that Tango is not easy to learn and, as I wrote in a previous post, the more you learn and understand, the more you come to realise how complex the dance can be. But although many continue to have this view for many years and may always do so, there is another level of understanding. For many, a type of Nirvana is reached where the mind is liberated and Tango is again seen as a simple dance. I’m sure that if you talk to the milongueros of Buenos Aires, they would not describe their dance as one of “staggering complexity”. On the contrary, their dance is simple but it has a simplicity that needs many years to achieve. And, although it’s not easy, I think that this is what we should all be seeking – simplicity, not complexity.

Keith

Keith,

I was not talking about tango technically in terms of movement / dance. (Although a lot of the elements of Milonguero or traditional Salon are in fact pretty complicated.) Nor was I suggesting that we should seek complexity.

I simply observed that tango can become very complex! Perhaps because a lot of it is about the relationships between people - particularly in social Tango. As one of the Milongueros once said to me "almost any feeling that can exist between people can be experienced during a tanda."

I think that "staggering complexity" is a fair description of the dance as a whole when one considers all the ramifications...