What happens when two completely different tango dancers dance
What happens when you put two dancers with completely different style dance with each other? In the worst case scenario, when ego is high and skill is low, it becomes a battle. But, if the ego is low and the skill is high they adapt to each other, finding a middle ground.
And the final result is quite interesting.
The defining factor is the dancers’ capacity for adaptability.
As this blog and podcast is focused on people who want to make things work, we’ll focus on that.
Let’s take two professional dancers with completely different styles.
Los Totis vs Chicho & Juana:
Salon with a bit of fantasia vs tango nuevo at its best.
Please take a few minutes to watch the two following videos and compare: steps, lines, elasticity of embrace, choice of music.
Then, please come back here to see what happens when mix those. Don’t get lost in YouTube 🙂
Do NOT watch the next video before watching those.
I am going to assume you watched them.
Now, take a moment to imagine what happens if we mix the couples differently. What happens if Chicho dances with Virginia instead of Juana? Will he impose his style, would he enhance her style with a bit of nuevo influences? Will she decide to keep her embrace’s elasticity? What would this fusion look like?
Now do the opposite:
What would a dance of Juana and Christian look like?
Now check your assumptions:
And here you can find Chicho with Virginia. (They didn’t choose the song I believe, it was chosen to put them out of their comfort zone.)
Good? Chicho brought to the surface the milonguero inside him. Juana and Christian adapted to each other.
The key difference between those dancers and dancers with less skills is their capacity to adapt. Moreover, their style is a matter of choice, not necessity. It’s not that they cannot dance brilliantly in different styles. They can. But they choose to not do it, because they prefer their own style.
Adaptability is a huge topic, and a very interesting one for any dancer who wants to develop significantly.
What can you adapt?
Almost anything:
From bending the knees, to experimenting with passing information from different parts of your body, to modifying your embrace’s elasticity, to choosing different music, to eliminating certain steps, and the list goes on.
In my opinion it all comes down to how you define style and technique.
For me, style is how you look. Technique is how you communicate.
The definition is by no means complete or not even 80% accurate.
But it is functionable.