I’ve watched this one so many times that I’m not sure if I can still be objective about it—so I asked Alej to comment first. Here’s what she said:

“They dance very slowly, and he takes a lot of care of her. If anyone gets close he waits and waits. He’s protecting her all the time. The milongueras love to dance with someone like El Chino (or with Pocho, or Miguelito). You feel totally safe with them." [ We've shown both Alej and Noemí dancing in a very different way with Gerard on the last two pages, but both of them also dance regularly with El Chino ]. Alej continues: “When he has room, he moves. You can see they both know this music so well because it’s inside of them. They dance the way some of the old people from the neighborhoods speak—they take a lot of time, and they speak very clearly and carefully, without hurrying.”

In tango, you often see different things at different times, so a couple of weeks later I asked her to look at the video again. This time, after a few seconds she said, “Wow... mira como esta saboreando la musica!”—“Look how he 'savors' the music!”

As far as technique, I think El Chino takes about four or five steps that are as nice as any I've ever seen. There's also one very nice giro in the middle, and another one right at the end that's a small masterpiece. Look how smooth and balanced he is. Alej and I both know him, and he's a very nice man. I think people reveal a lot about themselves when they dance tango, and he dances with a mix of humility and confidence that is who he is. I don't know how to explain it, but I just feel like there's a lot to learn from him. I've watched this video so much that El Chino and Ophelia have become inextricably tied to the music. In my mind, Como se Muere is their tango, and as I watched them over and over, my dancing began to change.

Epiphany Three: Dancing Tango is More Than Just Moving

I don't want to get too far out into touchy-feely land with this. After all, tango is really nothing more than just moving around a dance floor in response to music. But even a novice dancer should be able to sense that some music calls for more "moving around" than other music. Let's listen to the first part of Viejo Porton:

 

 

Very fast Biaggi valses like this one and Lejos de Ti are two of our favorites—and I think it's fair to say that they are almost totally about movement. Listen to how the energy builds and builds, until Biaggi's orchestra almost works itself into a frenzy. Ten years ago I would have laughed if anyone told me that dancing tango could be as exciting as fast skiing or windsurfing... but it is. Flying around the floor to Viejo Porton, bending four and seven run corridas into fast giros is just as thrilling as a fast descent on skis. Sometimes Alej and I get going so fast that I can feel the tension in my arms as we hold on to keep the force of the turns from pulling us apart.

But tango has a lot of parts. The slower tangos at the other end of the spectrum require a very different kind of dancing, and as I began to absorb the way El Chino danced to them, I began to move to them in a much more contemplative way. But is it really correct to say that you can dance tango by not moving? Is it something someone else could actually see, or have I just watched this video so much that I'm imagining something that's not there?

One night we were in Salon Canning. It isn't our favorite place because it's usually crowded, and sometimes it has a lot of aggressive dancers—but we were there anyway, and when a De Angelis tanda with Como se Muere and Dejame Así came on, we decided to get up. There was almost no space, so we had to work our way along the edge of the floor. We were right up against the tables, and I was watching out for couples that sometimes drift out from the middle, and trying to block out the distractions. We weren’t really doing very much—but I thought we were moving well. I was trying to find El Chino's serenity, and his way of listening to the music. When we were boxed in it didn't bother me at all. I just enjoyed the music, and even when there was room to step I didn't do it until it seemed right—and the whole thing felt pretty good. We must have been one of the least conspicuous couples there, but as we left the floor, an older man who was sitting against the back wall caught my eye and motioned me over. When I got to his table he smiled and said, “Te llega bien esta musica, no?” When we sat down, Alej asked what he wanted. When I told her, she said, "What a nice way to put it!" The translation is: "This music arrives well to you, doesn't it? ”