Close or Open?

Ladies and Gentlemen - when you have invited/been invited to dance, it is both people's choices to dance close or open.

If you're uncomfortable dancing close embrace, for any reason, look into your partners eyes, smile cordially and put your hands out in front of you in an open embrace. Do not budge. Your arms become a barrier so that the other person has to accept. Should the other person object (clear sign they're disrespectful) you can say...

"I'm not comfortable dancing close embrace..." with you.

"I'd like to try open embrace first..." because you smell like my college roommate's month old laundry. Remember to smile politely.

If you'd like to dance close embrace, then open your arms wide, like you're about to hug the person. Your arms are not in front of you, they are on either side of you, about to accept the other person into your arms. This is the key difference between open and close - in open embrace your arms are in front of you, blocking the other person from entering, in close embrace your arms are open wide ready to invite the person to hug you. And then you lean into them and begin to dance.

Usually I will dance close embrace with a new partner. It's easier to close my eyes and concentrate on finding a connection and maintaining it. When two bodies are melded together, it's easier to find that connection. I generally will want to dance close with a good lead - I want to feel their shoulders, their upper and lower back and really get a sense of where their feet is.

As for why I will dance open embrace - generally if its someone who creeps me out and I've somehow lapsed into momentary insanity and said yes and accepted their dance. I will also dance open if I can't stand a lead's posture (I can't begin to impart how important this is). Bad posture will kill everything in a dance. I will dance open if the lead is a beginner. OR - OR, I will dance open if the lead is really good and I'm dancing tango nuevo to alternative tango music. There are some songs I do not want to dance close to - Tango in Harlem, No Diggity, Fever, etc. I absolutely love alternative tango music and some of them are best danced open, nuevo style.

Posture:

There are many postures in tango, many schools of thought. Pick and choose your own wisely.

If the lead is the Hunchback of Notre Dame, things get real difficult. Many leads from Buenos Aires bend their backs (I can't stand it!), making the female arch her back and stick her butt out. This looks really cool, but kills my lower back. I will upon occasion adopt this posture - if its someone I really want to dance with. If I don't want to arch, then the only connection I have will be from the shoulder where my arm is wrapped around them. This makes it super challenging - sometimes so challenging I give up.

My favourite posture is what I call the hug. When you go to hug someone, you don't stand stiff. The stiff posture is ten times worse than the Hunch or the Bend. It's like dancing with a telephone post. Try pivoting with that. When you hug someone, you lean into them just a tiny bit, so that your chest touches. Then you wrap your arms around them and hug. The hug is comfortable, sweet, sincere and well connected. It is not a squeeze and it is not hugging a pineapple tree. Some men's embrace is so light I wonder if they want to touch me at all. A hug is loving. And so is close embrace.

And some leads will change their embrace depending on the song, the tanda, or their moves. You may not be completely connected/attached at all times. Some men have a preference of having their follows connected at all times, others will allow you to disconnect so that you can do what you need to do. Personally, staying connected for an entire 3 minute song will drench my shirt. Not comfy.

And here's a myth I would like to de-mystify. Tango and connections can be hit or miss. I've danced with some amazing dancers before and felt... blah. Some of my friends have raved about so and so. And when I dance with this amazing so and so - nothing. Meh. Sometimes your connection will be great, but the other person thought it was okay. I've had a few leads fall in love with me when I felt bored. I've danced with some amazing dancers and thought - WTF?

By the by, if you can't have a good connection with your tango teacher, fire him/her. If your teacher can't show you how a good connection feels, they're not for you.