Category Archives: Tango Technique

Sitges Tango Festival July 18 – 22

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warm tropical nights… milonga under the stars… the crowd watches a demo by Sebastian Arce & Mariana Montes

We carried the rain with us as we flew from from Paris to Barcelona one gray day last July. From the airport we drove through the midsummer drizzle 30 km south to Sitges. By sunset that evening the skies were clearing, though the wind continued through the night. In the morning the sky was still cloudy, but, intrepid beach-goers that we are, we walked half a block to the beach with our giant sunbrella and his & hers beach towels. After an hour the clouds had flown away north (to drench Paris again, no doubt, as they’d been doing all spring) and the day turned sunny and hot. Here’s my personal bodyguard testing the water…

the water is warm!!!

captured web photo… it actually wasn’t this crowded!

Known as the St. Tropez of Spain, Sitges is a small city known for its beaches, nightspots, and historical sites.  A wide boulevard winds along the Mediterranean, with cafés, restaurants (fresh fish! tapas! clams oysters mussels calamari, lobster…) beautiful old houses, historic churches, alcázars, plazas… tango on the beach, anybody?

white sands, white tie…

and Tango.

Sitges became a counterculture city back in the 1960s… and it still resonates hip and cool. One of the hottest gay beaches of Europe, too. Franco was still in power in those days, but apparently rebellious Sitges managed to skate by … or maybe I’m just desperately under-informed.

main beach and plaza

pretty tiled fountain

in the historic center

a beautiful old portal

I really go for historic buildings, and Sitges is full of them.

looks Art Deco to me

This retro wedge-shaped building was one of the landmarks I used to orient myself while walking around the old part of town. The streets are winding cobblestone paths, most not even wide enough for cars, and even though they mostly all lead down to the beach, it’s easy to get lost in the maze (unless you’re looking for the beach, of course). But since being lost is my normal state, I actually felt pretty much at home. Everywhere you look are restaurants, cafés, colorful shops and marketplace stalls selling tango-fashionable loose trousers, and loads of more pretty things.

Every day is market day in a tourist town, and the food on display was appetizing and delicious!

CJS pizzas (just say “CJ’s”)

the olive seller

CJS deli

CJS salmueria

a portal in the historic center

la Sirenita de Sitges

Our room in a small hotel a half-block from the beach overlooks a beautiful house, three floors, dazzlingly white walls with blue shutters, an intense cobalt blue (one of my favorite colors!) with a terracotta roof. Classic mediterranean. Sorry! I didn’t get a picture. But here’s a serene spot on the hotel terrazza, where breakfast is served till noon, and you can order drinks and/or snacks the rest of the day and evening.

Hotel Los Globos

If you’ve had too many mojitos you can just hang out and talk to the resident parrot.

Pieces of Eight! Pieces of Eight! Isn’t that one of the last lines in Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic, Treasure Island?  The Hotel Los Globos resident parrot-greeter talks and whistles loudly whenever anyone walks by. He seems really sweet, but then I didn’t risk sticking my finger between the bars. We humans always want to believe animals have thoughts and feelings just like us. I guess we just can’t imagine anything different, but… birds will be birds! And they have brains the size of a pea. Of course it helps if you use all the brainpower you have!

The afternoon we arrived we walked all around town. The main church is perched on a high point of the malecón, the walkway along the waterfront.

la iglesia principal

There was a wedding party outside the church, with lots of chic people standing around, waiting for the novios to exit. I felt like I’d stepped into an episode of La Reina del Sur, but fortunately there was no exchange of gunfire. I should have taken a few photos but, shy me, I didn’t want to be the intrusive tourist. Later, as we walked along the beach, we happened upon the sweet ending of yet another wedding! The couple was wrapped up in a big piece of  cloth which was then knotted around them, like a giant pretzel. Trapped forever! or so it would seem. A day of domestic mergers in sunny Spain.

Sitges evening milonga

The Sitges Tango Festival had world-class teachers: Miguel Angel Zotto, Sebastian Arce & Mariana Montes, Rubén & Sabrina Véliz, Sebastián Jiménez & María Inés Bogado  (winners of the 2010 Mundial de Tango in Tango Salón), Marcelo Ramer & Selva Mastroti, and Marcela Troncoso. All Argentines, all professional tango dancers and teachers. Miguel Angel Zotto was flying solo — he had a lovely assistant who was filling in for his wife, who had just given birth to twins! Way to go, Miguel! Nice guy, by the way, totally unpretentious, the way I like my tango teachers. <www.festivaltangositges.com>

Ensemble Hyperión under cover at the Jardines de Terramar

Classes were held every afternoon (no morning classes, thank you! you gotta sleep sometime!) at three locations, organized by the customary levels of beg-int-adv. (Or is that beg-int-tango teacher? ja ja) I took one class per day… my usual limit. Ben took lots… the Energizer Bunny. I took a DJ class with Gabriel Sodini, also Argentine. More of a chamuyo, really, a question & answer session, but informative. Gabriel is buddies with our old friend Gato Valdéz, who DJ’d the all-nighters on the beach, starting at 2 am, after the official milonga ended. What a fun time we had!!

the gala Saturday night milonga & show… fabulous!

I highly recommend this tango festival. Super location, super teachers, great shopping, cheap street food, tapas, fish… sun and sand… and reasonably priced classes!

dinner on the beachfront

Life is Good.

Ciao from Sitges!

Catacombs and Celestial Spheres

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Paris is positively popping with Tango! Wednesday night we danced in Napoleon’s former hunting lodge, Chateau du Lac, on a pretty pond in the Bois de Vicennes. They call it the Milonga Imperial. I wonder if Napoleon ever danced here? Judging from his supersized ego, he was probably one of those unfortunate types who always seem to be dancing with themselves. Doesn’t he know it takes two to tango?

Napoleon hunting in the forest of Fontainebleau, 1807

I did manage to come up with a picture of Napoleon hunting… seems like he had a whole regiment tagging along. Wouldn’t that scare off the deer? If Napoleon had been the humble sort who took the time to make offerings to Diana, Goddess of the Hunt, he might have had more luck bringing home the bacon.

Diana, mythical huntress

No hunting at this la Milonga Imperial, only shy cabeceos. After three weeks in Paris we have danced at a variety of milongas. Paris Tango dancers are a friendly bunch, despite the language barrier. They seem to be quite as addicted as we are, and they come in all colors and flavors, the usual package mix, from beginners to…  well, let’s say experienced but not quite ready for stardom, with no plans to morph into instant tango teachers anytime soon — in other words, dancers just like us!

la Milonga Imperial

Parisians can milonga every afternoon and evening at a multitude of venues. There’s lots of milongas to choose from: at least 10+ choices on your average weeknight, and on the weekends, wow! <tango-argentin.fr> lists 0ver 80 milongas every week, a handful of which also have prácticas every day! At least half of these are what we call Matinee Milongas; from 4 or 5 pm to ’round midnite. Parisians don’t tend to milonga past 1, because the Metro quits running at 1:30. And don’t think you can just grab a cab if you’ve missed the Metro; you will definitely turn into a pumpkin or worse; ’cause cabs are scarce, except near luxe hotels. And soooo expensive. But evenings in the City of Lights… just amazing! Especially when atmospheric conditions fuse with technological genius… voila!

The nightly Paris light show is brought to you by an elite team of high tech engineers. Way to go Paris!

Tangueros here use some variation of the cabaceo; however, when it comes to dance floor etiquette… it’s the Tour de France! There seems to be very little interest in maintaining your own little bubble and going round and round in the bigger bubble. All evening long people are passing on both sides, bumping and bulldozing. Ben says it’s amazing they have as few collisions as they do; but then the French have always been good drivers. Unlike San Francisco and Buenos Aires, Paris motorists don’t try to run you down in the street!

Tour de France 2012

A rather swell 4-pc Tango orchestra played for 2 whole hours at la Milonga Imperial. I didn’t catch their name… blame it on my nonexistent French! I don’t savvy word one except merci and vin rouge. It’s a girl group:  3 women (bandoneón, piano, violin) and a token male (contrabajo). They were pretty good! Live music gets a star rating from us! We also like milongas with a good floor and great atmosphere: give those 2 stars. A bar, café or restaurant adds a star; and top-notch DJ’ing gets one too. Maybe we could create our own milonga rating system and sell it to TripAdvisor? Tango Tours R Us? Seriously, though, our friends in several Tango communities are going to be asking… what do Parisians wear to milongas? The answer is: Parisians dress more or less the same as they do in LA, New York, Buenos Aires, or your local dance studio… from boho chic to very elegant. However, no jeans were spotted at Napoleon’s chateau-restaurant.

Porte Saint-Denis

The other night we walked by Porte Saint-Denis on our way to Milonga 323. It’s an historic area full of beautiful old buildings. Porte Saint-Denis, built in 1672, was one of the gates into Paris, like the Arc d’Triomphe across town. It replaced a medieval gate built on the same spot by Carlos V in the 1400s. Milonga 323 has a good floor, but there were only 4 or 5 couples there. The organizer was a petit young woman with a mop of golden-orange frizz; she fussed over us like a hyperactive poodle! She seemed to be trying very hard to attract more people to her milonga. Apparently we missed a big tango event that same evening; thus the poor turnout.

milonga l’Esprit

Milonga L’Esprit has a crazy guy that dances in the center of the dance floor, although you couldn’t really call it dancing: he just bounces back-and-forth from one side to the other, and jerks his don’t-know-any-better partners around. I guess he’s famous cause we were warned about him before we left Buenos Aires! Yep, he exists! Probably wears an invisible shock collar so if he tries to leave the middle… Zap! Ouch!

There are plenty of workshops and classes around, and they cost plenty. We see a lot of PR announcing, for ex: Milena & Miguel, fabulous tango dancers and teachers, etc… but we’ve never heard of them. If you speak Spanish AND French, and dance tango fairly well, you could make a decent living in Paris! (Sorry, no sick days, holidays, vacation time or pension!) We’ve only met up with one Argentine tango teacher, Coco Dias. Reincarnation of Napoleon? Friendly guy, though, invited us to a private party and tango event but we couldn’t make it. Catch you next time, Coco!

Coco’s the Porteño in Paris

There are some darn good DJ’s in Paris. Some are really good (la Balbutiant, Casa de Tango, Milonga Imperial). What I mean by really good, is a milonga that sounds like the milongas of Buenos Aires. Like, the Tango Tunes Top 400. If you occasionally DJ, like I do, you know the drill. First, select your favorite tunes by your favorite orchestras, off the internet or your CD collection or your iTunes; next, you organize them, in tandas and cortinas, to make your playlist. Well, if you make up your playlist with your least favorite tunes by the same great tango orchestras, and put them all together into tandas and cortinas, that’s what I call the music at a not-so-good milonga. Lacking a certain passion, that essential flavor, el sabor del tango. 

Tango Passion

The tango scene is not the only Paris underground: there’s also the Catacombs.

going down?

We toured the catacombs a few days ago: so many bones and skulls piled everywhere, damp stone passages, very poorly lighted… that place gave me the creeps! Ugh! Spooky! You go down down down a spiral cement staircase, 134 steps down to be precise. Not nearly as attractive as these 108 steps in our building. No indeed. They’re dank, smelly, creepy. The bones are mostly laid out in a distinctive pattern, maybe you can guess it from these photos. Are we scared yet?

I’m goin’ in…

death procession

I’ve seen the catacombs under Rome and also under St. Peter’s, so I was somewhat prepared for it, (listen to me lie!) but what surprised me was how small the skulls are. My first thought was, OMG, these are children! But, passing each niche, punctuated by plaques writ or engraved on cold stone, and an occasional puddle underfoot — water dripping thru layers of porous limestone which underlies all of Paris — I finally realized that all the skulls were small, cause people were littler back then! And their average life span was about half of ours today.

Some of the quotations etched in stone are priceless, like the one about how death equalizes kings and beggars alike.

One of the workers at the Catacombs had been a prisoner for many years. During those years he came to be very fond of the view of the city from the prison. He was eventually released from bondage, and found work stacking femurs and tibia underground in the 1770s. In his spare time he chiseled the view of the city he had gazed longingly at for so long. He was killed by a cave-in; his final resting place the Catacombs.

the underground city

do you see what I see?

I was more than happy to climb up the 100 winding stairs and be back in the sunlight! We went to a busy boulangerie-café, had sandwiches and coffee and watched the world go by for an hour or so till we recovered from that subterranean nightmare. Ben kept making silly jokes, talking to the skulls, you know, like, hey, what happened to your brains? geez, you really lost your mind! The guy has a sick sense of humor!

After a couple of hours underground I was so over it. Here’s a cheery hasta la vista, baby!

Be seein’ ya!

Ready to climb the stairway to heaven? Back to the realm of the living?

this train is bound for glory…. praise the Lord!

Now that we’ve had a quick armchair trip to the underworld, how about putting the spaceship in reverse and heading up to the finer celestial elevations? Nothing like a little music to elevate your spirits in this earthly paradise.

Notre Dame

A few nights ago, a packed crowd at Notre Dame time-warped us back to medieval nights, thanks to a wonderful choir of all ages singing Bach’s Magnificat. There was musical accompaniment: several violins, contrabajo, tambourine, organ… really I’m not exactly sure because there was a crowd up there on the temporary stage, in front of the main altar. The conductor, a young black Frenchman, took care of business gracefully, dynamically, and with a reassuring smile. The thousand-year-old cathedral radiated sound like only a thousand-year-old stone and glass cathedral can do.  It felt like we were lifted up into space and touched down on the intergalactial mother ship, i.e., heaven! An unearthly celestial blue glow diffused over us pilgrims gathered to hear the choir sing Bach. Radiant joy pulsed through every single molecule I own. An awesome experience, 5 stars!

choir at Notre Dame

The Magnificat (also known as the Song of Mary or the Canticle of Mary) is a song of praise set to music. It is one of the most ancient of Christian hymms and perhaps the earliest hymm to Mary. The name Magnificat comes from the first word of the Latin version of the canticle’s text, which comes from the Gospel of Luke (Luke 1:46-55) Johann Sebastian Bach composed music for a version of the Magnificat in 1723. In 1724 he finished setting the canticle (i.e., the words of the hymm, in German) to music. Pretty awesome stuff! Ben took some nice photos.

stone reaching for the sky

We’re still having that tempestuous spring weather here in Paris. It’s been raining off and on for almost a week, and the forecast calls for more of the same indefinitely… maybe forever. That line about “springtime in Paris” is totally bogus. I recently discovered that Paris is north of Albany, Boston,  even Bismarck, North Dakota for chrissake! Cheyenne, Chicago, Denver, Montpelier, New York, even Seattle! Geez Louise! We had just enough warm days to figure out which milongas had functioning AC, and now we’re back to going out with jackets and umbrellas! Who planned this vacation, anyway?

Open Studios in Paris this weekend!

Have a good weekend, everybody! And remember, if you don’t like the news, go out and make some of your own!

Ciao from París!

Paris! week 1

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Here we are in gay Paree! Until yesterday I was still trying to finish my last blog from Buenos Aires, and feeling rather behind in keeping up with my own life. That sounds strange, no? Am I both the actor and spectator of my own life? Aren’t we all?

Beautiful Paris, you’re as grand as they say! After a frenetic front seat Grand Prix ride on the traffic-jammed boulevards of Paris, and thrilled to have finally made it to the City of Lights, we find our apartment on Rue de Tolbiac, 13th Arondissement. It’s a comfortably wabisabi turn-of-the-century building located in a charming neighborhood called Butte des Cailles (Quail Hill). There are 2 sets of winding wood stairs separated by a small bare courtyard: we climb six flights up with luggage. The steps are old and worn but not worn out. Just polished by time. Judging by the effort going up, I’m guessing we won’t need a gym! The Stairmeister!  But lovely views from our windows. Church towers, rooftops, courtyards.  Nothing homely in sight. We’re in Paris!

towers of St. Anne’s from kitchen

Our apartment is small but plenty of room for 2 traveling tangueros. We have a cozy living room with green tiled fireplace, wainscoting, plank floors, “french” doors opening onto a small terrace  that looks down to a cobblestone street. So quiet compared to our neighborhood in Buenos Aires!

home sweet home

The bedroom has the same view, looking out at rooftops, a pretty marble fireplace, a comfy queen bed with a big pouffy duvet and pillows in blue & white, and a small desk and chair.

charmant

The only closet is in the hall. We call it the Barbie bathroom. Like everything made by Mattel, it’s ridicuously cute and always on the brink of coming apart.

teeny tiny

Our kitchen is a pastiche of eras and trends, but has roomy chopping-block counters, and a decent 4-burner stove with an oven which unfortunately burns your toast before you can blink. There’s even a washing machine! The kind with the hobbit door that can whoosh a small flood into your kitchen if opened in an untimely manner — speaking from previous experience, naturally.

our petit kitchen

The day we arrived we scouted the neighborhood, walked up to the Place d’Italie, and spent a pleasant hour at O’Jule’s, a popular outdoor café across from the plaza, a relaxing and comfortable spot of green in the midst of the 13th.  St. Anne’s chimes the hours and half hours: We’re not in Kansas anymore!

la Place d’Italie

I love the sound effects of Paris: the rumbling Metro, traffic, church bells tolling the hours, people speaking French, police car sirens; I feel like I was slipped into a Pink Panther movie! Ben likes to venture out before I even wake up, and he usually comes back with croissants or breakfast pastries. He does this to give me a reason to get out of bed before noon. Believe me, he had me figured out in a split second! He is taking photos of bakeries, lots of photos. He says if you want to call your bakery a boulangerie you have to bake on the premises. It’s the law!

sweet pastries on every corner and then some

Yes, that’s all sugar, in its myriad forms. Another fan of french cuisine is this guy, France’s new Socialist president, Francois Hollande:

Power to the people

No doubt he runs on sugar and caffeine too. I have no idea what his campaign promises were, but like every other politician, he’s given to mouthing sweet nothings. Let’s hope he can keep France out of the euro crisis and his hands off random women.

Sarkozy’s booty

Hollande appears to be less of an egomaniac and philanderer than his predecessor, Sarkozy, who ruled France in the timeless tradition of that other famous French blueblooded egomaniac, Napoleon. These days I could care less what labels politicians use: they’re all dancing around the same glittering fountain of gold, projecting pretty false promises of unreach- able achievements onto whatever size screen you are tethered to. Hollande will have at least four years to make his claim to fame. Napoleon did it in 10.

I am da MAN!

Old Napoleon must be rolling with laughter about how much trouble these 21st century politicians can get into. Back in his day, the French “badboy” could do just about anything he pleased, from expanding his empire and war chest through aggression, trade, and diplomacy (like royal marriages, insults, alliances, trade embargoes, you get the idea…) to giving license to his capos to abscond with valuables and antiquities from all over Europe. But, hey, the French love him!! I trust Texan Molly Ivins on the subject: “Never trust a man who doesn’t like whisky and women.” Way to go, girl!

To get a better picture of the royal lifestyle, we toured Napoleon’s apartments in the Louvre. Gold leaf, precious gems, mirrors, sculptures, carpets, tapestries, silver, china, swords, treasure chests… you name it! Everything for the royal family.

just a wing of the Royal Palace

All hail the Conquering Emperor!

how about a little Napoleonic bling?

menage a trois, anybody?

He and Josephine liked to throw lavish parties:

Honey, can you set the table?

As soon as I’m done fixing my hair…!

After only two days of marriage, Napoleon left to conquer Italy. Way to go, Emperor! Josephine, already mother of two by a previous marriage (her first husband was assassinated), assuaged her loneliness with a lover. When Napoleon found out, he was furious but, being a player himself, he somehow found his way back to France and his young bride.

Napoleon and Josephine at a party

Could they be a previous incarnation of Sonny & Cher? Amazing! But their union bore no children, so Napoleon, heeding the biological imperative of reproducing one’s DNA, eventually divorced her and remarried. Apparently they remained friends, so I guess Napoleon has the high moral ground over Sarkozy, IMF exec Dominique Strauss-Kahn, and the U.S. Secret Service.

You’re toast, boy!

The Louvre: what a place!  Echoing halls, all glitz and glam, cool polished marble, the musty breath of ancient art and treasures of every description. Paris writer David Downie says that previous French president Francois Mitterand’s biggest and most successful endeavor was the makeover of the Louvre, transforming it from a dusty, dreary place into a modern labyrinth of Art, complete with a 72 foot pyramid of glass and criscrossed steel that rises above the central plaza, leading down into a giant arcade with theater, shopping concourse, Metro stop and parking lot. I like the way he describes in a nutshell the 9 million tourists who visit the Louvre every year: “Here were smiling hordes stuffed with exotic delicacies from the merry-go-round of Louvre restaurants, casting beatific glances at skillfully lit artworks before loading up on reproductions, CDs, designer sportswear, computers, and gadgets.”* Ka-ching, ka-ching!

Walking around the galleries, the quiet, awestruck murmurs of your fellow museum-goers and art lovers becomes a soothing white noise to foreground your art experience. It really is breathtaking, though, all jokes aside. In just our first week here we’ve been to the Musée d’Orsay as well, and we’ve seen the most awesome art: Van Gogh’s Starry Night Over the Rhone, Degas’ The Dance Class, Cezannes, Renoirs, Monets, daVincis, Goyas, Leonardos; all of it spectacular! (*Paris, Paris: Journey Into the City of Light, 2005)

sweet girl

Paris really does make all other cities pale by comparison. Ben got us both Friends of the Louvre photo-ID passes, good for a year including all special exhibitions. Our first day at the Louvre, new passes in hand, we celebrated with lunch at Angelina’s, a lovely café a few flights up in the Richelieu building.

I had to tweak it cause the background so bright

Standing guard outside the windows are a long lineup of gentlemen in stone:

Dante?

a bookish kinda guy? a writer?

Another day we followed the crowd to La Giocanda (AKA the Mona Lisa). Finally seeing her was rather anticlimactic, after all the other exquisite portraits on the same level — early Italian painting from the 13th to 19th century. Of course she does represent a major breakthrough from the medieval two dimensional portrait (of mostly saints, Christ and the virgen) to what we call modern: a face whose eyes look right into yours, a face with psychological depth that engages you immediately and gives you cause to reflect on all its complexities and layers of meaning. For me, there are many other portraits just as striking, without the lines and layers of bulletproof glass.

a Leonardo? I’ll go back and check…

Ben likes it all, but prefers sculpture to portraits. He thinks this carved marble throne is fit for a king! (cushion sold separately)

throne programmed to repel bad vibes

with matching queen’s throne!

this throne more user-friendly

Outside in the huge plaza a bronze maiden is always ready to provide a fetching backdrop to the tourist portrait:

are they talking about me again?

My favorite Parisien horse stands guard over the Musée D’Orsay:

(back to you, Autumn!)

While a black-spotted golden leopard stalks its marbled cage:

cousin of Romulus & Remus?

Today we were going to walk to the Luxembourg Gardens, but it’s raining and blustery! Darn this Paris spring weather! But tomorrow is supposed to be sunny and warm. Paris is a truly walkable city. Every block has interesting shops, and the bars and cafés are most excellent! My favorite outing is to take the Metro to a point somewhere on the Left Bank, get off, and wander your way back. SO much to see! Even though we will be here 2 months, the pressure is on to visit a museum or tourist destination every day… and even then we know we’ll never see it all.

That’s All, Folks!

Over and out for now. Stay tuned for a piece on our neighborhood, Paris bakeries, and a guide to Paris milongas by a pair of opinionated norteamericanos!

Ciao from Paris!

Last Days in Buenos Aires… sob!

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Fall in Buenos Aires arrived with a vengeance! Before that we had lovely days, and delightfully warm nights. You’d leave a milonga at 3 am, and didn’t need a jacket or sweater. Then, all of a sudden, the temperature dropped into the 60s, dipping into the 40s at night, and that cold wind!!

San Telmo, photo by BuenosAires4U.com

Trees along the streets are turning yellow; leaves are falling, their colors blending with the assorted trash and grunge of the streets.  I took one last shot of the Palacio de los Patos, the view from our apartment.

a parting shot…snif!

People walk by bundled up, with the omnipresent neck scarf and winter coat or jacket. Women have traded in their summer flats and sandals for ankle boots, riding boots, sexy lace-up booties, not to mention faux fur animal print boots! Cold weather seems to bring out the female feline.

on the prowl…

Alas, it’s time to leave our favorite city, time to head north to check in with family and friends. I’m fixin’ to hold my precious first grandbaby! Tagging along with the anticipation and delight of a wee bundle of joy, we tango every night till 3 or 4. What’s to stop us? I almost missed my 11:30 yoga class… so hard to get up in the mornings. I feel like a spoiled girl!  Hmm… I guess I am a spoiled girl! Speaking of children, here’s my sweet baby Teo. See that reddish hair! Yes, there is some Irish blood in the family. Just have a look at our wee leprechaun!

my son Ode & baby Teo

I made a list of my New Year’s resolutions; I know I’m getting them in late; is that like bouncing a check? Or forgetting to file? Seriously, though, the New Year has brought us feelings of accomplishment, that is to say, progress in tango. Ben says he’s keeping his resolutions to himself… (should I be worried?) but I don’t mind sharing what I’m working on. After all, who doesn’t go through the same stages, more or less: the same fumbling bumbling beginner’s hell? (for a silly primer on the plight of the beginning dancer, go to <centralcoasttango.org> and click on Tango Hell.) Here’s a preview of my resolutions:

Posture, balance, embrace, walking… and you thought walking was just putting one foor in front of the other? Think again! My goal right now… ONE of my goals… is to keep it simple, focus on my foot to floor connection, and dance with my partner, not with myself!!  Sublimate your expression, dance HIS interpretation of the music… and when he pauses to let you play, you can renegotiate the contract for a few moments. This brings the yin and yang energies into balance… ¿qué sí? qué no? 

Along with my resolutions, here’s some photos of the last days. We accidentally met some traveling dogsledding skiing tangoing Alaskans!

new friends Jane & Peter in San Telmo

That same day in San Telmo Ben captured this shot of our friend El Indio dancing at his Sunday milonga in Plaza Dorrego:

El Indio & friend

And we also chanced to see Orquesta Típica el Afronte, playing on the sidewalk near the Plaza Dorrego Sunday Fair. These guys rock the house on Wednesday nights at Maldita Milonga, 571 Perú, in San Telmo. We’ve seen them many times and they are fab!

Orquesta Típica El Afronte

We had a relaxing day in San Telmo, spending time with good friends and gorgeous Buenos Aires fall weather.

Ben & me

If you’re young, dance tango, plan to visit Buenos Aires, and like to mix it up with all colors and flavors of other young travelers, then we may have found the best cheap hotel for you:

Hostel San Telmo

Our last days in Buenos Aires we tango’d all over town with our best friends. We had our best-ever privates with our dear friend Marcela Hourquebie. Marcela took us light-years beyond the usual private classes, losing ourselves and then finding ourselves again, transforming our way of being, of dancing, of thinking, of processing, of leading and following. I even learned to be on my own axis 100% of the time (unless he takes me off my axis, of course). Yes, I know I’m the poster child; finally, after almost 10 years of dancing tango, I manage to stay on my axis? About time, girl!

best friends!

Towards the end of our stay we experienced the deepest work. Our brains were de-fragged, our internal processors upgraded, and of course it all carries over into your relationship. When your dance partner is your life partner, you reach some deep practice. Your relationship is stripped to the core and then rebuilt, remodeled, like having your piano brought up to A440, or trying out a new bit on your horse, your hands softer now and your horse more responsive. Always working towards a deeper harmony. Your embrace is fine-tuned, adjusted. It’s fluid, mobile, re-negotiated daily. Taking a step will never again be just another step! If you were the house-mouse living on a touchscreen floor, what would the trail of your steps look like… points of pressure with only faint traces in between? Even better, visualize a blazing light-trail, revealing a minimum of pressure changes as the free foot moves across the floor? This is really too complex for me to explain! Pooh Bear may need to call on Christopher Robin to assist. Have patience with me, cause trying to explain helps me integrate the new structures into every cell, every molecule. Change means work!

Everything you thought you learned in those first few years of tango classes, workshops, milongas – all the money you spent on lessons, shoes, clothes – you find yourself rediscovering the basics, because you’re standing in a new place now, and everything looks different, feels different. You go back to the basics to relearn it all again. You refine your walk, your posture, your attitude. I still love voleos, sacadas, ganchos… but my focus has moved towards elegance, simplicity, refinement. I’ve quit trying to embellish every other step. I’m making more of an effort to really listen to my partner, to be really connected to him. It’s not easy! But I’m also letting go of judgement. There is no such thing as good tango or bad tango; Tango just IS.  

at La Coqueta de Recoleta

More pearls of wisdom from Marcela: Quit chasing the music; let the music come to you, let it come from within, let it fill you, enter you wholly and completely. (No corres detrás de la música; deja que la música te llega a ti, que entra en ti.) This is such an important piece of the puzzle! From the male point of view it has often been said, and nicely I think, “for the man, there is only the music, and the woman.”  Female point of view, anybody? For the woman, there is only the music, and the man. Absolutely fundamental, absolutely imprescindible!

be connected in blue

And who could live the true milonguero lifestyle without great friends to drag you all over town to all the best places to eat, drink, and dance?

best friends!

In yet another angle on the HOW TO WALK WITH YOUR FEET ON THE FLOOR theme, let’s focus on the arrastre, which in English means drag and can refer to steps or to the sound of the bandoneon: you slightly drag your toes on the floor… tracing invisible lines, invisible pictures, invisible perfume crossing and recrossing the dance floor, resisting, then giving into the floor, giving in to the music. Your feet should never stop, but move fluidly with equal pressure in mid-step. Your change of weight should be almost imperceptible. Let your feet talk to the floor, caress the floor…. my goal?…  to dance like her!

Gracias, Marcela!

Taking Mario Orlando‘s DJ class hasn’t hurt my appreciation for tango, either. Au contraire, mon cher! I think I can honestly say that I carry around in my head the BUENOS AIRES TANGO TOP 400  24/7!! My personal background muzak.

gracias, Mario!

And who wouldn’t gain an infinite amount of floorcraft (and I don’t mean steerage!) after months of classes with Raúl Bravo? Gracias, Raúl!!  I hope you’re enjoying your visit to Russia!

Gracias, Maestro!

Can you believe he’s in his 80s? He dances with the skill and energy of a 30 year old, and that’s NOT an exaggeration! Raúl teaches the fancy stuff, the moves, the choreographies, along with the technique that you need to stay on top of your game. Last July, his classes were so advanced, we honestly couldn’t believe he let us stay in the class! Almost everybody there was already a really good dancer or a pro; others dropped in for a refresher from the maestro de maestros, in preparation for the Tango World Cup (alias el Mundial). By the time we left, we were finally feeling worthy enough to take his class — how can I say it differently? Finally worthy… that’s BIG!

Okay, one more Thank you!!! to our Maestro of Milonga (and Milonguero style, and Vals) JORGE FIRPO!

Papito rocks!!

Jorge Firpo and his beautiful sweet wife and tango partner Diana Mestre, have been SO good to us, so patient, so comprensivos, so positive and upbeat 100% of the time!!  How do they do it? Who the heck knows? They’ve got a good thing goin’!  And as dancers they are soooooo fabulous!! He runs his classes like a drill sergeant with a smile, and she quietly and patiently passes on imprescindible tango technique, embellishments and other secrets to us ladies. They have a huge and loyal following, even on other planets! (cause their star shines that bright!!) not to mention their very own Fan Club, Los Fans de Papito! Ben made Jorge a Deputy Sheriff and even gave him his own badge!

I almost forgot to mention the night Guillermo & Dolores took us to Las Cañitas, a part of Palermo that has a few very cool blocks of pubs and restaurants. The night we went I was cameraless, so I swiped these cool pix off the web:

La Lupita, shrine to Tequila & la Virgencita

’round midnight the best time to go

the bar at La Lupita

she reigns over the bar and all of Mexico too

Get the feeling I like the place?

So the day finally arrived, we had to leave our beloved Buenos Aires. I mean, just for a moment, let  yourself feel the angst, the pathos (what is pathos, anyway?). Ben kept reminding me I didn’t need to cry all the way to the airport, as I’ve done the other times. No, I had to be a big girl and stay focused on the future: see my kids, my grandbaby, visit friends and family, then on to Paris.

New Years Resolution No. 1: Let yourself go, be who you are, give your infinite Self up to the moment. Let your interpretation of the music, your passion for the music, flow thru you. Relax, ground, dance WHO you are! Feel more colors, more sensation, more attitude…. accept nothing less than total transformation! 

New Years Resolution No. 2: Feel the lead! Listen to his body, listen to your body…  Don’t just step… flow! let your feet have a conversation with the floor.

New Years Resolution No. 3: Connectivity! Connect with yourself first. Feel that invisible string pulling you skyward, and then feel the roots that connect your feet to the floor. Through them you ground into the earth. When you feel connected internally and externally, your mind able to focus and not running off in a million different directions, connect to your partner. You should feel the exact moment when you complete the embrace, that live circuit engaged. When the circuit is complete your electro-magnetic field becomes supercharged. Then you connect to the floor, to the room, to the circle of dancers, to the music, the musicians, the DJ. I learned in high school physics that the electrical connection can only flow when all the wires are connected and you are grounded thru the floor. Trying to anticipate the lead breaks the circuit. Crossing your fingers behind your back is cheating!

Flying out of Ezeiza, we had quite a rockin’ and rollin’ ride over the Andes – brown with white patches of snow – and we bounced over more potholes in the sky flying from Lima to San Salvador. I sang quietly to myself calling on the wakinyan, the Thunder Spirits, to bring this frolicking pony back to the barn safe and sound! I sang to the wanbli, the eagles, to fly with us and bring us safe and sound to our journey’s end. My flight mantra: “May the wind under your wings guide you where the moon walks and the sun sails…” (from The Hobbit)

The wanbli brought us back to San Francisco safe and sound. We spent a delightful few days visiting family and the new baby! He’s so adorable! Here I am with Teo and my comadre, Teo’s maternal grandmother.

el nene y las comadres!

We made a quick trip to Portland to look at artisan bakeries (part of the groundwork for Ben’s projected café-bakery-dance hall), visit old friends, and tango. We stopped in San Luis Obispo for a few days to reconnect with close friends: tango base camp. They put on a big throw-down for us! There was great dancing, and the music, food & drink, starry skies & view of the ocean from Val & Mary’s stunning hillside retreat was absolutely awesome!! Many thanks to all!! California milongueros really know how to party!!

Milonga chez Val & Mary

We celebrated Mary’s birthday, and had a sorteo just like the milongas in Buenos Aires, complete with prizes: CDs and other fun items.

Vive la France!

the lucky number is…

and the winner is…

Willow’s Short Version New Year Resolutions 2012:

There is no such thing as good tango or bad tango. TANGO just IS.

Don’t run after the music….  let the music run thru YOU.

RELAX 

CONNECT

GROUND

DANCE WHO YOU ARE!

FOLLOW HIM, BUT DON’T CODDLE HIM

STAND  UP  TALL  ON YOUR AXIS

BREATHE

Your GIRO is your signature….  make it your OWN

Don’t just step….  FLOW

FEEL THE LEAD

COLLECT

YOU are a DIAMOND

YOU are an ANGEL, an EAGLE…. DANCE with your WINGS!

Ciao from Buenos Aires!

Next stop: PARIS!