Tango

Wanted – A follower who wants to dance not follow

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I am getting frustrated – or maybe I am just puzzled, or surprised. Perhaps it’s just my own hopelessly inexperienced Tango …. but I am finding it hard to find followers to dance with who care not so much about following, but more about dancing.

I understand that there is a level of experience when if I give a follower time she will take that time to embellish, to decorate. And enjoy it.

I used to think that this was enough – that this was the indication of a tango followers competence and confidence, and my own progress past a pure beginner leader – precisely because I listened and gave her that time and opportunity. But it seems now to create an all too familiar set of minor gestures – normally with the feet –  that while they can be lovely are somehow not enough.

They feel insubstantial to me. A frothy kind of addition that has little depth of emotion. and that I feel would be the same with any leader that she was dancing with.

Perhaps this just shows my own lack of ability and understanding, but I want a follower to really change the way I dance. I want her to slow me down, to spiral her back as she steps across me, perhaps to even change her weight – (shock horror – surely not!!) – provided she is clear in communicating the fact that she wants to change system, and it is not done frequently or with no meaning –  why should she not be the one to indicate that? I would be pleased to follow such a lead. But I have never had the opportunity.

People use phrases to describe Tango like ‘two people dancing as one”. Yes, of course – a miracle of communication. But that one person should not be me – it should be us.

So often in talking to the talented and graceful women who dance Tango I can feel the mindset that the goal is “not to make mistakes”. That the perfect follow has picked up and delivered against everything that the leader wanted. She has never let him down.

But for me I would so prefer more mistakes – if they are caused by the fact that I missed the way that she wanted to change the way we are dancing to a particular piece of music. Mistakes because I am not used to so much creativity and I need to raise my own listening skills significantly. Mistakes because I am not used to feeling such a strong response and participation from a follower. Mistakes because the energy flows between us are strong and unique.

So I can feel what she is feeling, and learn how to bring her emotions as strongly into how we jointly interpret a piece of music as my own feelings.

Such mistakes would be so wonderful and so very enjoyable.

 

Creativity, Thoughts, Writing

When I was a child

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When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. 

For now we see through a glass, darkly

But as the power of Christmas eve approaches I can still, after all these years, enter exactly the same imaginative landscape that welcomed me as an only child. In this small corner of our house the door has been reopened for me.

xmas-dreams

I smile contentedly. I feel so alive in the most dreamlike of ways.

I am their friend, and we are off an adventure again. We three.

Long may it continue. The other side of the dream is sad enough.

Creativity, Tango, Thoughts

2015 – the year I stop being terrified of amazing women

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As 2014 draws to a close I am approaching two years of learning this amazing dance – only a few months to go – and because it is that time of year I think it deserves a resolution.

I realised recently that I was missing an understanding of the kind of physical dancer I want to become.

Here I have made some progress – the key qualities I am looking for are : Milonguero, Precise, Playful, Still Framed, Musical, Stable and Quiet

I have also thought about my emotional response to – and engagement with – the dance. I believe that I honestly do care very much about the follower. I want her to feel respected and protected, to have the chance to dance what she feels in the music and to express herself.

But I have also occasionally had the chance to dance with truly talented, focussed, balanced followers that from the moment you embrace them are very clearly significantly more experienced than me. So much more talented, surer of who they are and what they are doing.

As soon as they hold me I can feel their focus, their restrained but electrifying energy – asking what I have – wondering if I can give them the experience they are looking for.

And always – on the few times I do get these opportunities – it absolutely and completely terrifies me.

Terrified

So that’s my resolution for 2015. I am going to welcome those opportunities. I am actually going to seek them out, to ask them to dance – rather than hide in the corner, terrified that they will catch my eye and invite me.

I am going to breathe in, focus, and stop being scared of beautiful dancers.

Creativity, Tango, Thoughts

Tango – I have been learning ‘how’ before I knew ‘what’ ..

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I tried to learn.

I listened.

We listen

I asked how to do things, and I was told – this is how that is done. And this one, and now that one. Figure after figure.

I watched.

We watch

We all do this with complex subjects – we have to start somewhere.

Over time the structure builds and the vocabulary expands – but as students we get to a time when we need to be clear. We need a vision – we need to ask ourselves difficult questions – “What am I trying to achieve? What kind of a dancer do I actually want to be?”

I know now that this is where I am. Finally having enough understanding to be able to ask the right question – “How do I do exactly this – in this particular way?”

Perhaps as social dancers attending our regular classes this is in fact a moment of choice that a lot of students – especially leaders – never actually get to. It’s hard enough to learn Tango at all – let alone in a particular and individual way. Selecting and developing a style requires authenticity, confidence and skill and these things take so much time.

With other more literal art forms than dance it is clearer – in photography the difference between a street photograph and a landscape one is fairly obvious – as soon as you look at any image you can identify them. There are clear names, clear categories. We know where we are. We don’t even need to think to get to the next level questions – “is this what I like?”, “is this the kind of image that I want to make?” – our response is naturally along these lines.

As learners of social tango it all seems so different. As we learn we are of course imprecise – so our style is ill defined. There are broad labels – ‘nuevo’ ‘milonguero’ ‘show tango’ but within these are thousands of individual interpretations and even disputes about what they actually mean – for example that ‘nuevo’ is not actually a style at all.

For me this is a very important moment – maybe some kind of crisis. Now I have to be creative. I have to decide. Only once we really know what we are trying to achieve can we pause, then rebuild our learning with a new energy and focus.

I am hoping for a new experience from this moment on – because I am thinking on a different level.

We absorb material within the context of our own personal journey. We can reject some, and absorb others. But now I can begin the process of being the kind of dancer that I actually want to be – I can try to be precise. Because, finally, I am starting to know where I actually want to be.

I want to create an image to express exactly this, to allow the follower to dance like that.

We embrace and try again
We embrace and try again

We breathe, we embrace and as always we try again.

Creativity, Photography, Thoughts, Travel

Federico Frangi – A Photographer with a lot of drive, humility and talent

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I briefly met Federico Frangi last week in Barcelona. We chatted for a few minutes, I admired his work, I bought a small version of the one that he is showing me in this photo.

federico

I admired so much about what he told me. Travelling thousands of kilometres on a motorbike across India. Using a camera that did not need a battery, printing on rice paper. Thinking about the meaning of each of his projects. Projects that took months of effort to conceive execute and present.

Many of his images are available here.

He described how in the photo I purchased Federico had been frustrated because the man had closed his eyes at the moment he took the image. But from that came the idea of presenting the project as this mans memories and dreams.

He talked about his plans to go back and find again the girl who had become one of his most popular images – to help her.

Thank you Federico and I wish you all the best with the next project – and I really hope you find her.

Let me know.

 

 

 

Creativity, Photography, Tango, Thoughts, Writing

Open that door

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So many things just need us to start – to move – get an opportunity, meet someone – and then if we do take that first step and stay for a while we begin to understand so much – our world changes and we are all the richer for it.

Before then ‘it’ was the kind of passion that ‘other people did’ – not us.

Sometimes, at rare intervals in our lives and for whatever reason you receive some kind of invitation, someone opens that door for you and asks if you might like to follow them – or perhaps  simple chance just waits  to see if you will react.

open-doors

But however it happens for that brief moment a door will open for you and you do, or you do not, walk though. And if you are incredibly lucky then  behind that door lies a whole new world.

A world like dance, or writing – or photography – or whatever it is for you that engages with you and presents such an unlimited space for you to play,  to learn, and to progress.

dancers

And playing, learning and curiosity surely defines what it is to be human. To be alive.

Such a precious moment – but so few open the door, and even less walk through.

Don’t stand still. Do it.

Move.

 

My new creative life