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Follower's checklist for balance

posted Apr 15, 2014, 9:28 PM by Sophia de Lautour   [ updated Sep 18, 2017, 11:13 PM ]
balance checklist tango
...el equilibrio
That's Spanish for 'balance'.

Maintaining one's balance is an essential part of good tango technique. When practicing solo it's always good to work on balance exercises, wearing your normal dancing shoes, and sans partner or wall to lean against.

Here's a balance checklist for followers1:
  1. Can you stand stably on one foot, without wobbles, with level shoulders, moving your free foot freely on and off the floor? 
  2. Can you turn on your support leg without using the free leg, without falling off axis, staying stable and centred? 
  3. Can you overturn your Ochos so that the front ones travel backwards and the backward ones go forward, whilst retaining your balance? 
  4. Can you pause after each Ocho, as you arrive at your axis, to ensure that  you are not falling into the next Ocho?
sydney tango lessons

1 Inspired by (and some paraphrasing from) Terpsichoral Tangoaddict's post on this subject.
image: sourced from Alfredo Melendez's Dance Blog
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