Thoughts on teaching
I recall a comment made by Andrea Misse in one of their group classes with her and Javier Rodriguez (J&A for short) during one of their visits to Singapore, perhaps sometime last year!?.
It was something to the effect that, when teaching group classes, they do not start with the intention of trying to completely replace a person’s pre-existing way of doing things. Instead, they try to complement and enhance what each one of us already has.
Consider this: by the time many of us who are outside of Buenos Aires took up Tango, it is likely that we had already been walking for a good 10-20 years, if not more, and therefore had developed our unique style. Good or bad, this is “us”. So, what is a visiting Tango teacher to do under the circumstances, given that walking (for social Tango) is such an integral element? Well, J&A’s approach as they said during that class is to try to add something on top of what we have naturally, rather than trying to eradicate everything and replace it with “Javier/Andrea memories”.
History of Tango music
For the music lovers out there, here is one person’s (Max Valentinuzzi, who played piano for the various bands in Buenos Aires between 1946 and 1956) narrative on the history of Tango music. This is a fascinating 2-hour radio program which consists of 6 mp3s and is amply “illustrated” with many tunes.
Tribute video
Happened to come across a nice tribute to Ricardo Vidort, a well-respected milonguero who had passed away in 2006. This is a name I first came across on Tango and Chaos I had mentioned before, where you can see some enlightening clips of Ricardo (great insights into the attitudes and techniques of a milonguero by the way). Enjoy!
Tango fantasy
For a moment, let’s indulge in some fanciful thinking.
Fact 1: Tango has been in Singapore for close to nine years.
Fact 2: Group classes with local teachers started at Jitterbugs, a fairly large dance studio in Singapore, since late 2000.
Fact 3: Size of a typical 8-week beginners classes is around 15-20.
Just imagine, 4 such group classes per year, for all of the preceding eight years. And let’s say that 1/3 made it to at least one milonga or practicas and went on to stay in the community for 6 months. This actually means an annual increase of about 20-25 people! Over a period of nine years, even assuming that only 1/2 of the ones who stayed for 6 months eventually became regulars, we are still talking close to 90 new people in our small community!
What an exciting thought: to have 90 people just from one studio alone!
Alas this exists only in imagination, as this is very far from the reality in Singapore…