14 advices to dance socially in crowded milongas.

1. Do not dance when the floor gets messy.

A lot of milongueros have nothing to prove on the dance floor. They know how to dance small and how to milonguear. But like old sailors, when they feel the storm coming, they keep their ships in the harbor. We had a good example last Saturday at Cachirulo where during the worst hours of the night most milongueros remained seated.

2. Dance with a partner who can milonguear.

Last Saturday, Cacho pointed out to me an Asian girl and told me that he would never invite her on such a crowded floor. The reason was that she can’t help kicking her feet high any time she is doing a boleo or an embellishment. I have been always cautious myself and I usually don’t invite a woman to dance if I’m not confident I can navigate the floor safely with her.

3. Leader, face the outside wall.

This rule comes from my own dancing experience and a careful observation of the milongueros. If you pay attention, you’ll notice that they dance, most of the time, facing the outside wall, slightly angled to their left side. From this position and they initiate most of their moves. As illustrated on the drawing below, in a milonga where the rules are respected, a safe, if limited, zone gets created that I call the “free zone” (in yellow). From the “free zone”, the leader can initiate most of his rotation and them come back to it. It is exceptional to see a milonguero dancing facing forward in the direction of the line of dance.

4. Use the “free zone” and the width of the line of dance.

Initiate ocho cortado, right hand turns or left hand turns from the “free zone”. Use the width of the line of dance to complete your rotation . Then come back to your initial position after an even number of half rotation. Also, note that you can take a back step when you face the outside wall, it will make you travel further inside the floor and not against the line of dance. As long as you can keep your back step inside the width of the line of dance you should be safe from bumping into someone.

5. Lead the follower to step into you and walk into her to exchange space.

Considering the couple as one entity, it is important to know how to dance just exchanging space between partners. Make the follower dance into your space and dance into her space. You will save space and be able to dance in a reduced space.

6. Make your turns on the spot.

If you can visit Buenos Aires, admire how milongueros (I think in particular of one milonguero called Abel) can make a full right turn inside the width of their shoulders in a smooth, musical and clean manner. A tip to make it smaller, initiate the turns with upward energy more then circular energy and step outside of your partner foot and not inside.

7. “Rotacion y despues traslacion” (Turn then move)

Cacho summed up the basic of the art of milonguear: you turn and rotate to wait for the couple in front to move. Once they cleared some space in front of you, you move to take that space. And you do it all over again. Easy!

8. Check the floor around you while you turn.

I feel sorry, if it is obvious to you but I still see so many leaders dancing without checking what’s going on around them. Japanese men seems prone to that kind of behavior. And I know what I’m talking about, I’ve been dancing in Tokyo 2 years… Some leaders even dance ignoring totally the crowd around them and are offended when they bumped into someone!

9. Take the space in front of you and don’t slow the traffic down.

We all know how it feels to dance behind a couple who doesn’t move: dancing becomes more difficult and we get impatient. So don’t do to other what you don’t want them to do to you. Don’t be the one slowing down the traffic. Take the space opened in front of you! That space is yours because the leader in front of you won’t step back!

10. Use floor corners, entrance or holes in the traffic to dance bigger.

It allows you and your partner to relax and give you an opportunity to do that move you love so much.

11. Don’t fight for limited space.

Do not push, hit or bump into other couples even when there is no space! The floor isn’t expandable.

12. Be patient and wait for the flow to move.

Unless the couple in front doesn’t respect rule 9)… In which case you need to find a way to make him understand that he can move on.

13. Limit your choreography to safe moves.

Too many dancers, on top of not caring for others around them, feel over-confident about their tango. When the floor is packed, some moves can’t be done in a safe way any more, strike them through from your list and play safe until the space clears.

14. Express the music with your chest…like a milonguero.

Many dancers (especially nuevo or salon dancers) complain that they can’t express the music anymore once the space is limited. This is because their tango is focused on expressing music through steps and/or the variety of steps. Milonguero style is all about dancing and expressing the music through your chest more than through the steps. The musical nuances that can be expressed are endless even with a limited number of steps.

As a conclusion, I invite you to read Cacho’s articles: “The tango and trapeze acts” and “Brief definition of a milonguero”. Because social tango dancing isn’t a fight for space and attention, but rather a musical hug you share with your partner and a good time you spend beside friends on the dance floor.

Most of the tips in this post apply primarily to leaders. It is fair since leaders are in charge of navigation & choreography. But it is equally important for women to know how to “milonguear bien”. And it’s a true pleasure to dance with a careful milonguera. Here in Buenos Aires, I enjoy dancing every week with Betty, a local milonguera. Her sens of “milonguear” is amazing. She can dance on crowded floors with musicality and dynamic without ever bumping into anyone. How to “milonguear bien” for women is definitely worth another post.

But What Does “Milonguear” Mean?

Isaac talked about navigating well & caring for others on the floor, preserving the social dancing experience. Royce in her previous post talked about dancing small. I agree with both of them but milonguear is much more than good navigation, caring & dancing small.

Let me tell you about Cachirulo first!

Cachirulo is the milonga I’m enjoying most in Buenos Aires. It takes place at Plaza Bohemia, calle Maipu 444, every Saturday from 6PM to 2AM. Hector & Norma, the organizers, pay a lot of attention to details in order to offer the best dancing experience to all.

Norma welcomes you and Hector sits you (more or less according to your dancing level or popularity). Two sides of the room are entirely dedicated to ladies and less than 2 sides to men. The seating is organized by Hector to allow for easy “mirada” and “cabeceo”. The floor is rather small about 72 m² (12 m x 6 m). But the place can accommodate around 160 people. Needless to say that between 9 PM & 1 AM, the floor is usually extremely crowded.

The most famous milongueros of Buenos Aires go there on Saturday because the level of social dancing and the navigation are among the best in town nowadays. Nino Bien, Salon Canning end even Club Sunderland have become “circus” over the past few years, making it unpleasant to dance.

I said Cachirulo had been “hijacked” by terrible dancers. What do I mean ? And who were the “hijackers”?

“Hijacked” means that for 3 hours, the floor turned into a “battle field” where it was simply impossible to dance a tanda without any bump. And I used “hijacked” because most of the milongueros who were there stopped dancing (and so did I) for few hours and we watched helplessly with anger and frustration the chaos of the dance floor.

The “hijackers” were of 2 kinds: few local dancers unfamiliar with the place (it was Easter weekend…) but, mainly, foreign dancers (maybe part of the CITA crowd). In both case they shared a singular ignorance of the codes of the milonga (los codigos de la milonga) and a total absence of consideration and care for others.

The floor was such a mess that Hector had to ask Carlos Rey, the DJ, to remind people about the “codigos of the milonga”, twice that evening.

For those unfamiliar with the “codigos” they are:

1. Do not step backward
2. Keep your line of dance
3. Keep your feet on the floor at any time

These are what I would call the “obvious” codes of the milonga. Obvious for some of us but ignored by more and more dancers. I will refresh your memories on these codes first, then in part 2, I will add others which I drew from my own dancing experience, careful observations of the dance floor and discussions with Cacho Dante and some dancing friends. Those codes, I will call the “hidden codes” of the milonga. Respecting both the obvious and hidden codes will help you, I hope, to “milonguear” better.

Los Obvios Codigos De La Milonga (the obvious codes of the milonga)

1) Do not step backward

For the comprehension, I would add “against the line of dance”. We will see in part 2 how you can step backward in a crowded milonga. This is the most important rule and yet many dancers can’t help but taking regularly a back step against the line of dance. Back stepping against the line of dance will inevitably have 3 negative effects:

• It will cause some bumpings
• It will disturb the navigation of the following couple because the dance of the front couple becomes unpredictable and cut into their available dancing space
• The turbulence created to the following couple will propagate to at least 1 or 2 other couples further back as their dancing becomes unpredictable too.

There is a simple way to avoid stepping back against the line of dance and I will discuss it in part 2 “the hidden codes”.

2) Keep your line of dance

Keeping your line of dance means “do not cross over to another line of dance”: to the inside line when you dance outside or to the outside line when you dance inside. Keep your dancing inside the line you chose and dance small. A simple image will help you picture the mess a change of lane can create: imagine yourself on the highway with a car in front of you permanently changing lanes or permanently overlapping on 2 lanes. How would it affect your own driving? In the same way, a dancer not keeping his line of dance is a social dancing nuisance.

3) Keep your feet on the floor

This rule applies to both men and women but has a special importance for ladies. Do not take your feet off the floor or fly your legs in order to avoid hurting people around you. High heels can cut and pierce easily into the foot of another dancer. Milongueras with experience know how to keep their embellishment low and compact when the floor is crowded. Also the leader should be careful not leading a boleo to the lady that could make her kick a table or harm someone.

These 3 codes are the guarantee of an enjoyable social dancing experience. However, if the codes tell you WHAT to do or what not to do, they don’t really tell you HOW you can dance in a small space and enjoy, with your partner and the other couples, the music and the dance. For the Hows see part 2 “the hidden codes”.

So to “milonguear”, how small we are talking about? Just to give you an idea. Last week I danced 2 valses with a milonguero. It was during the peak hour of the milonga, the floor was very packed. We finished 1 vals in 2 meters. So after 2 vals, we progressed only 4 meters on the dance floor. Like many dancers, he liked to use giros (turns) in his vals. Even in such a small space, he could still execute his giros, without bumping into anybody. For me, he was and definitely can “dance small”.

Of course, “milonguear” is not only about dancing small. But dancing small is definitely one of the most important techniques to “milonguear”. It is not only a technique; it’s also an art. Many dancers don’t like to dance small (even if they can do so); because they feel it limits their expression and possibilities (step-wise), and thus destroys or minimizes their pleasure of dancing. My point of view is, to be able to dance small with your partner, and be able to do pretty much everything you want to in a small space is a matter of technique; but to be able to ENJOY what you do and EXPRESS yourself in a compact and small manner is an art.

For me, dancing with milongueros is like taking tango music lesson. When I know the music very well, they give me inspiration and new approach to listen and to dance. For the music that I don’t like very much, they show me how to appreciate it. And when I don’t know the music, they make me discover new jewelry in tango. Many milongueros know by heart what they dance in the milonga, they can always give me the information when I ask.

Generally speaking, in terms of instrumental music, they like to dance on the rhythm and melody. Marking the phrases and highlighting particular instruments or climax in the music are important. And for vocal music, they dance on the melody and the singer’s voice. When the singer starts singing, they use their body to sing together with the singer. It doesn’t have much to do with the meaning of the lyrics, it is more about connecting to the emotion of the singer and the intensity of the voice. Usually when the DJ plays Angel Vargas with Angel D’Agostino or Orlando Medina with Ricardo Malerba, many of the milongueros and milongueras jump to the dance floor. Because they love these music very much, and they are always moved by the singer.

Jean-Michel