#tango improvisation

A la parrilla The steam from my cortado fogs the window, blurring the hurried figures on Avenida Corrientes. Here, inside the cafe, time moves differently. It follows the rhythm of a distant bandoneon, a rhythm that speaks of stories, of encounters, of a dance born from the soul. A young dancer asked me the other day about the “real” tango, the one not found in polished shows. I smiled and began…

Figura Definition In the lexicon of tango, a Figura is a complete sentence. It is a sequence of steps, a choreographic phrase with a distinct beginning, a developing middle, and a clear resolution. While a step is a single word and a combination is a fragment, a figura is a full-fledged statement made on the dance floor. It is not merely a pattern to be memorized, but a structure—like a stanza in…

Improvisación Definition To define improvisación in tango is like trying to describe the taste of a Malbec from a single grape. On the surface, it is the art of creating the dance in the moment, without a pre-set choreography. But this is a clinical, cold definition. In truth, improvisación is the very soul of social tango. It is a silent, spontaneous conversation between two people, a shared…

Romper Definition In the language of tango, romper means “to break.” On the surface, it is a simple, technical instruction: the leader breaks the forward momentum of the caminata, the tango walk. It is the action of stopping the linear progression to initiate a change of direction, a pause, or a figure. This is not a shove or a block, but a subtle cessation of forward energy, a grounding of the…