TANGO ARTICLES
Follower's Defaults
Tango improvisation can be an elusive animal to understand and master, so subtle and fine are the details which lead us down the path of learning, sometimes to success and sometimes to frustration. I'd like to offer one insight that, in my experience, makes a significant difference in the journey of the student along that road. I'd like to make a distinction between the architecture, or language of tango, and the physical contact or connection used to speak that language.
Now then, if we talk of connection, we typically refer to the amount of force or pressure used in a tango embrace. This connection is partner-specific and non-transferable. Stronger vs softer connections depend on personal preference, based partly on our level of sensitivity and training, and partly on our personality and cultural upbringing. The connection is unique, the way a handshake is unique. The architecture of the tango, on the other hand, is the same no matter what the quality of the embrace. It is the structure which allows strangers from opposite sides of the earth to dance together without a word, which evolved organically during those magical decades in Buenos Aires between the late 19th century and the early 20th. This simple structure has endured for nearly 100 years, through dozens and dozens of individual interpretations and styles of tango. We are now in the great Tango Renaissance of the late 20th century and early 21st, and we have a problem. The problem is that some of us are forgetting this underlying architecture, and focusing purely on the idea of connection, or on the idea of personal style. Connection is indeed required for tango, but without basic grammar and structure, tango dancing can easily become confusing and frustrating. We can't appreciate a charming accent, or a tone of voice, if we don't know how to speak first.
Let's talk more specifically about this architecture, this basic language, and give it a more practical name: "the follower's defaults." So, what are follower's defaults? The inventor of this english-speaker's term is Daniel Trenner, an influencial North American teacher of tango who came upon the Argentine social dance by chance in Buenos Aires in the late 1980s, the earliest days of the Tango Renaissance. His "follower's defaults" refer to the grapevine turn pattern (front, side, back, side, and so on) and the walk to the cross. Now, lest you think Daniel is crazy, I'll mention another great teacher, this one from Buenos Aires, who emerged around the same time with a strikingly similar way of analyzing tango. Gustavo Naveira, too, identified giros (grapevines) and salidas (walks to the cross) as the two defining components of tango improvisation, and invented a geometric vocabulary (cruce adelante, cruce atras, apertura) to explain how every other element in the tango is based upon these primary two. Daniel, also, never teaches a class of any level without referencing how other elements are created from this underlying structure. There are other systems of organizing tango, of course, but this one has been most influential by far in shaping modern tango teaching around the world over the past twenty years. The countless nuances of style, emphasis, musicality, and rhythm found in tango dancing make much more sense when layered on top of this architecture.
I'm aware of two other teaching methods which do not incorporate the default system, but I haven't seen either of them achieve as much success in educating social dancers. The first one is the figure-based method, in which the teacher shows a sequence of 8 or 12 or 54 steps and the student simply copies it, without lead and follow technique. This approach was used a lot in Buenos Aires in the 1980s when no one knew how to teach tango yet. Remember that before then, there had been no tango classes at all. If you wanted to dance, a friend or family member would drag you around the floor, and you would stumble through it intuitively, by trial and error. The figure-based method was also used, and continues to be used, by stage tango performers who have little experience or interest in improvised social dancing. The figure-based model can actually work well if the goal is simply to memorize choreography, but since we are interested in improvisation, we can eliminate that approach until, perhaps, a very advanced level, when the student already knows how to improvise based on the default system, and understands figures and combinations in terms of the basic building blocks of the grapevine turn and walking to the cross.
The second alternate method I have seen is what I would call the imbalanced model, which tends to create a lopsided partnership by under-emphasizing the following role and over-emphasizing the leading role. In the imbalanced model, we imagine the follower as a blank canvas on which the leader paints his vision. Women are instructed to wait and listen, and men are instructed to create and control every move she makes, whether it be a weight change, a pivot, a leg in the air, a tap of the foot. I would say this is partially accurate, but not completely accurate. Good tango dancing is a 50/50 partnership, and if we take responsibility from women and give too much to men, we create an uncomfortable 20/80 partnership. As a result of this kind of teaching, many women believe that their part is the less important one, and that they do not need good technique, but only a good leader, to dance well. This is an unfortunate misunderstanding which encourages women to dance poorly and men to use excessive force. One of my Argentine colleagues likes to joke, "Ladies, don't turn the milonga into a muebleria (furniture store)!"
But rather than throw out this model completely, let's say that it can be useful, but in the same way that learning figure-based choreography is useful, only at the very advanced level, after the student is completely fluent in tango improvisation using the default system. The ability of the leader to leave the realm of known tango, introducing new shapes from his imagination, is a desired skill at the advanced level, as is the ability of the follower to temporarily suspend the flow of the dance under these circumstances. However, without the tango defaults, there is precious little to identify a partnered relationship as tango. There is no common language which everyone in the room, not to mention everyone in the world, can share. The promise of the imbalanced method is total freedom, no rules, no boundaries, but after watching this methodology in practice over the years, my conclusion is that this is a false promise. We shall see now that by using the defaults, we find the freedom we are looking for in the tango, and realize that it has been there all along.
Let's put those two alternate models aside for a moment, and return to the follower's defaults of the grapevine turn pattern (front, side, back, side) and the walk to the cross (some argue that the walk to the cross is a linear version of the grapevine turn). Without these two structures, technically speaking, we have no tango, since all other vocabulary (boleos, ganchos, barridas, paradas, etc.) is derived from them in some way. For those of you wondering about ochos, by the way, they form part of the turn, and are that way included in the defaults. In this paradigm, we give the follower known structures to practice, and she becomes very good at dancing them. We ask her to step on the downbeat of the music and to make her steps the same distance apart, and at the same distance from the leader, unless otherwise specified. We ask her to follow the grapevine pattern when there is a turn, and to walk to the cross when the leader is on her right.
What, you might ask, is the leader's job then, if the follower already knows her part? In answer to this question, imagine a sports car on cruise control. The car goes by itself, but without steering, it will likely crash into another vehicle, or plummet off the side of a cliff. The leader's job, of course, is to drive! Driving comes with the responsibility of navigating the dance floor, of course, but once this skill is mastered, driving rises to the next level. The leader who understands that the defaults come standard with the equipment, so to speak, will not waste time re-inventing the wheel. Although a beginner follower might need help dancing the basics, with all other partners, he will turn his attention to musical interpretation, combining the sequence and timing of the basics in different ways. As his skill increases, the leader creates complexity by manipulating the position and timing of her defaults with his own improvised steps, which begin to interlace and interrupt, compliment and contrast with hers. A back step becomes a boleo, a side step becomes a barrida, with no additional force, but rather with coordinated musical timing. The driver can switch to manual when he needs to, but cruise control allows a smoother ride for the majority of the journey. Voila, Argentine Tango, the most sophisticated and powerful partner dance the world has ever known.
To visualize the leader/follower relationship more clearly, imagine a painter sitting in front of a blank canvas, but instead of the canvas representing the follower, let's say the canvas represents a three-minute tango. Now, we leave the painter alone with the canvas in an empty room for three minutes, and what happens? Well, if he has no materials, no brush and no colors, nothing will happen. We will return to the find the canvas still blank, and the painter frustrated. However, let's say we give the painter a brand new brush and call it "the follower." We're on the right track, but we need something more.... Ah yes, how about a fresh palette of watercolors! Or a set of bright acrylics! Now we are in business! We'll call the paints, "the follower's defaults." Now, we come back in three minutes and we have something to look at! The first few times, the painter might create something rather simple, maybe just a few lines and circles in red and blue, but as he practices and gets to know his materials more intimately, he will learn to blend the colors, to create many different kinds of brushstrokes on the canvas. Soon, he will develop his own style.
When followers focus on dancing the default movements well, and leaders shift their attention to interpreting the music with those defaults, the division of labor relaxes back toward 50/50. The trick is remembering that every complex element in tango comes from one of the defaults, much like every color in the rainbow comes from one of the three primary colors of red, yellow, and blue. In the default system, a boleo is an abrupt, well-timed interruption of a front step changed into a back step (or the reverse). The result is a swing or a flick of the leg either into the air or across the floor in an arc. The step used to create the flick has momentum because it belongs to a turning structure, and can therefore be interrupted to create the effect. Without the defaults in place, there is no momentum, and either the shape of a boleo is memorized or a great amount of physical force is used to cause the woman to kick or throw her leg into the air or across the floor. An equal amount of force is then required to bring the leg back and get the flow of the dance going again.
I have observed in my students over the years that both leader and follower become stronger and better dancers when they use the default system. In this paradigm, there is always a logical next step for the follower. She moves in a flowing sequence of steps that are always the same size, the same distance from the leader, always the same tempo of the walking beat. The leader, freed from the need to create her steps from scratch, can turn his attention to navigation and to musical interpretation, inventing variation after variation. In response to the arguments which will inevitably come, using the default system in no way limits the scope of improvisation in the tango. In fact, quite the opposite it true. One of my teachers used to say, "Freedom without discipline is chaos, and rules are made to be broken!" Many of the most brilliant inventions in tango improvisation have come from dancers breaking the rules, either accidentally or on purpose. However, if we have no rules to begin with, we have no frame of reference, no way to appreciate innovation and playfulness and surprise. I invite you to try the defaults on for size, as a skeleton of tango improvisation. I think you'll find that your partner connection improves, and that advanced elements which were previously challenging become easier. In particular, I'd like to see how you begin, whether as leader or follower, to leave your unique stylistic imprint upon this simple structure in the way that you move through each step and in the musical choices you make on the dance floor.
© copyright Sharna Fabiano 2007
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© copyright Sharna Fabiano 2007
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Ultimate Partnering - An informed piece on the real meaning of imrpovised partnership in social dance, by Richard Powers, founder of the Stanford Tango Weeks, the very first tango festivals in North America. See also the complete list of Richard's articles.
Changing of the Codes (1998) - Observing how the roles of leader and follower have been influenced by contemporary changes in gender roles in western culture, by Daniel Trenner, one of the most important figures in the early development of tango in North America. See also the complete list of Daniel's articles.