Re: [TANGO-L] True tango and nuevo tango

[Gary Barnes <garybarn @OZEMAIL.COM.AU>]

As Kos suggests, I will leave aside the largely spurious and value-laden
'new' versus 'true' labels.

There are difficulties of definition, as others have pointed out. The
article largely deals in extremes - but each extreme point is only occupied
by a few individuals. I will look closer to the middle of the distribution,
rather than the outliers.

> (*) I think the substance involves the charge that the new tango is divorced
> from the music and the partnership (to different extents),

This can be true in either form.

I have not seen any necessary correlation between whether people are
teaching/learning the style danced by the old milongueros or that danced by
others, and their level of connectedness with each other or the music. It
comes down to the quality of teaching,  the attitudes of the student, and
their aptitude for dance. For many people with the right teacher,
close-embrace 'milonguero' style is perfect for learning these things; but
for others it requires far more balance and body awareness than they have,
and they dance unmusically and connected to their partner only in the most
banal physical sense. For many of these, learning simple tango  nuevo
technique can allow them to dance with the music and their partner.

> and that it is not
> a strictly improvisational dance anymore in that some or a lot of the
> steps/sequences cannot be reliably led to a person who has no prior knowledge
> of them.

This is true of people at a beginner level in either form.

As Bartek says, 'The social form of tango "salon tango" itself requires a
great amount of training. To master the walk, the embrace, the forward and
back ocho, the boleo, the molinete, the enrosque, the syncopations, the
traspie, the various pivots, the ganchos, and the pencil require months of
practice.'

I agree, and these are precisely 'steps/sequences which cannot  be reliably
led to a person who has no prior knowledge of them'. Many of them can be led
to a person who is new to tango, but has a lot of dance or sport experience
which has given them strength, balance etc and a sense of partnering and
spontaneity  - eg a good swing dancer, or an aikido practitioner. This same
person can be led in many tango nuevo style movements with roughly the same
degree of success, IMHO.

The parts of 'new tango' (in Bartek's sense) that are not leadable, I would
basically consider part of stage tango - although as others have pointed
out, even the old milongueros, given a chance with a favourite partner, will
dance things which only work because of their familiarity.

These non-leadable things may have come from some extension of tango nuevo
analysis or technique or inspiration, but they should not tar tango nuevo
with the 'not leadable' brush.

YMMV