Has marriage passed you by?  Do the wedding bells ring ding dong, ding dong for someone else, but not for you?

We have been recently dancing Argentine Tango to a Spanish song where the singer hears church bells in the distance and wonders why he doesn’t hear his own wedding bells. Since I don’t know Spanish, I’m not sure what conclusion the singer comes to and don’t even know the name of the song, but I can feel the singer’s pain.

The singer’s voice is so hauntingly clear and beautiful, so somehow he seems to accept the fact that he doesn’t have any prospects for marriage. Maybe a voice so angelic can only come from a complete and whole person in the inside that maybe doesn’t look so great on the outside. Women might not have been so attracted to him physically and he being a gentle soul never completely revealed himself.

Let the goodness in you be known to others, not in a showy way, but in a natural, unassuming way. Let your inner attractiveness come out so a potential mate can find it. We will all grow old and tired, but only your inner beauty will last. When you grow old with a marriage partner, you’ll want to look into their eyes and see the beauty within.

Tango dancers often think that the great divide in tango dancing is in the styles, but it may be in the musicality. Good musicality connects the dancers and even connects dancers to the onlookers. No matter your tango taste, whether open embrace, closed embrace, tango nuevo or other styles, good musicality is important.  Regardless of the style, dancers become connected by interpreting and enjoying the tango music in that moment.

Many tango teachers and dancers think that musicality and connectivity can not really be separated.  Followers often gravitate to dancing with partners who have good musicality regardless of their level of knowledge of steps and movements.  They enjoy the tanda more when the partner appreciates and keeps time with the music.

Some teachers emphasize musicality in their teaching.  Other tango teachers ignore the musicality, but teach the basic patterns or movements.  Those students who seek musicality will eventually gravitate to the teachers who teach this as a fundamental. 

Teachers who have good musicality often encourage improvisation and natural musicality in their students.  Musicality adds enjoyment to the dance and helps tango students to feel their tango dancing is developing quickly.

Some beginning tango students have more of a talent for musicality than for connection.  Connection comes in different forms. There is the physical connection like the embrace and the emotional connection. The latter is not really possible to teach, but it is related to musicality.

No matter how good the embrace, if the musicality is poor many think there is not real emotional connectivity.  Some teachers emphasize musicality very early on in their teaching. Many tango students like this approach if they have considerable dance experience before starting Argentine Tango and have well developed musicality.

For leaders, learning musicality helps them to get over the awkwardness of leading.  It becomes so much easier to communicate through steps and movements when the partners are connected by their musicality.

Good leaders give the followers a chance to express themselves. They give the follower a chance to play, but not every follower is comfortable expressing herself and does not take the opportunity.  Both partners should be free to express themselves and their unique musicality.

When a leader has a good appreciation of the music then it is a pleasure for the follower to dance with them regardless the degree of complexity in their steps.  For many followers, musicality is the key to connectivity.  For a follower, apprehension turns to enthusiasm after accepting to dance a tanda with a new leader and then discovering his good musicality.

At Saturday night’s milonga, I danced with a follower who is a regular in my tango group class.  We broke all the rules about Argentine Tango being serious business and just silently expressing yourself and the music through the dance.  No, we had a three minute conversation  about peanut butter banana sandwiches while we danced.

For snacks at the molonga, in addition to the regular wine, cheese, crackers, fruit and such, someone brought ice cream sandwiches, ice cream cups, and frozen chocolate covered bananas.  The chocolate bananas were especially good and my dance partner had just finished hers before the tanda started.

Before we even embraced, I inquired if she had a peanut butter banana sandwich.  She had not and was very interested in how to make one, so I gave her all the details.  Being originally from Europe, this was all foreign to her as they mostly just have butter with bread.  We finished the dancing the song and ended the conversation talking about how these sandwiches were Elvis Presley’s favorite and then figured out that’s why he died so young.

For those of you that do not dance Argentine Tango, the parada or sandwich is when the follower leans back with her foot out and the leader sandwiches the foot between his two feet.  It is a stop or pause for the follower, and then the leader crosses over her foot and pauses while the follower takes a step.

Also at the milonga, I had good conversations with two other leaders in our group during breaks in dancing.  Normally, when I go to a milonga, I am usually quiet, have my game face on, and just enjoy the music and dancing.  My changed attitude I believe came from all my writing about Argentine Tango, so being at a milonga was very familiar and relaxing.     

Being that this web site is about relationships and Argentine tango, I want to inquire if you are taking paradas with people to build relationships as you go about your daily life.  I’m a single guy who is comfortable being by himself, so I can go about my daily routine without having a conversation and be perfectly happy.  I need to change my ways and engage people more.

It takes effort to stop and have a conversation with someone and build a relationship.  The thing about an Argentine Tango parada is it can be quick or slow, but it is still a stop.  For example, by taking short bits of time using snippets of text on Twitter, one is able to communicate with people around the world and slowly build relationships (my Twitter name: tangoleader).  Twitter is a fun and unique way to communicate over distances, but are we building relationships with the people we see regularly in our immediate vicinity?    

Micro-blogging and blogging has me thinking more about my relationships with people I meet regularly in my daily activities.  We all lead busy lives, but are we taking a moment when opportunities arise to build our relationships with others where we live, work, and relax?  We need to do more paradas in our daily lives.                                   

You can dance Argentine Tango in closed or open embrace, the difference being the distance between you and your partner. My preference is open embrace for most partners as I am not always comfortable dancing chest to breast with a woman I don’t know very well.  Since I am almost 6’2”, I always dance open embrace with petite ladies because the physical size difference can make dancing uncomfortable for both of us.

Dancing closed embrace has advantages such being more precise in movements because you are physically closer together. Ladies are able follow easier because they can feel the leader’s movements and instantly react. Close embrace is more romantic, sensual, and emotional dancing that is often referred to as having a good connection. You can see the pleasure on the ladies faces as they dance and a good connection is highly desired by many ladies.

The advantages of open embrace are more energy and momentum created from expanding and contracting the distance between partners. Dancing open embrace usually has a livelier and more fun attitude, but it can be danced slow and sensual. It is easier for the dancers to see the foot and leg movements between the partners, but harder to execute some movements because of the distance between partners.

The embrace, whether open or closed, is a way to connect with another human being for a finite period of time. It’s like a hug, in a world where we are not hugged enough.  The embrace can transmit comfort, reassurance, affirmation or celebration. In close embrace, when you hold someone tightly and they embrace back in acceptance of you, it is a joyous feeling. No matter what is happening in your life, for those moments everything is O.K. because you have found acceptance from another human being.

Today, July 7, 2009 marks the 4th anniversary of terrorist bombings in London where 52 commuters died and 700 were injured during the morning rush hour.  In remembrance, hundreds of tango enthusiasts will gather to dance Argentine Tango at seven train stations and seven London bridges from 6 – 7 p.m. for commuters.  Equipped with headphones, partners will silently dance the tango.  TangoCommute is not a celebration, but a gift to the people of London to bring some joy while remembering the 2005 suicide bomb attacks.

At 8:50 a.m. on this day four years ago, three separate bombs on three separate London underground trains exploded with fifty seconds of each other.  One hour later, there was another explosion on a double-decker bus.  The bombings brought disruption, confusion, terror, and grief to the city.  Though tango, TangoCommute seeks to ease some of the emotional pain for the commuters during the remembrance.   

TangoCommutes’ motto is dancing with compassion and connection.