Archive for category Tango
Tango Marketing and Twitter
Tango teachers and organizers in different parts of the world and with different audiences have success with a variety of different marketing tools and strategies. In the social media world some dancers have found Facebook to be very effective and more are also starting to use Twitter.
Great Dance has a Twitter “how to” for dancers. Check out the comments for some examples of individuals who have found Twitter useful to market themselves or their organization. Dance.com has a piece about dance teachers and organizers who are using Twitter.
Kristie Wyler, artistic director of Metro Dance in Plymouth, MI, is an avid tweeter. With nearly 800 followers and over 1,000 tweets, Wyler is one of the most popular teachers on the site. She uses Twitter not only to spread awareness about general dance related issues, but also to stay connected with her students and students’ parents. For Wyler, who goes under the handle MetroDance (http://www.twitter.com/MetroDance), Twitter is a great way to keep her studio connected to the broader dance community. It’s also a way for the dance community to feel connected to her.
Do you use Twitter? Have you found it useful for connecting with other tango dancers? If you are using Twitter, don’t forget to follow us, @KnowTango.
Seeding a new tango community
What does it take to seed a tango community?
I almost started this post with “what does it take to start a tango community” but think that seeding is probably more accurate. Starting something often implies it has an end, or that the initiator will manage it on an on-going basis, but seeding something implies that the community will grow and develop in it’s own rite. Later I’ll write about growing a small-stage tango community, but this post is all seeding a brand new community (I will arbitrarily define a “brand new” community as community with 1 or fewer teachers and 1 or fewer events per month).
I first thought about this topic when I saw Anil, a well-traveled tanguero, post about starting a tango community from scratch. He had some very interesting qualifications for the community he chooses:
has to be kinda NEAR (but not inside) a city with a medium-large tango community
has to have a medium-large university/college nearby
has to have some semblance of culture/art
has to have some semblance of nature/parks
has to have an average temperature of at least 30-40 degrees in winter
Some of these are certainly personal, but I think the point about proximity to a more establish community, a college, and having a good art scene are very important qualifications. We often talk about what are the biggest / most developed tango communities today, but we rarely discuss how those communities grew and what was integral to their development.
If you imagined your ideal tango community, what would it look like? Working backwards, what would one or a couple of pioneering teachers and community builders have to do to work towards your ideal?
Tango in the recession
Tango as an industry has had a very interesting response to the recession. (Note: the content of this post is based on subjective and anecdotal evidence from talking to organizers, teachers, and DJs across the US and some from abroad. My sample size was low and there may not be any statistical significance, but this is what I observed.)
In the second half of 2008 and the first half of 2009 as the recession was first ramping up, it seemed as though people were steadily increasing dancing relative to the past. Classes seemed to be more full, milongas more packed than they’ve ever been, and everyone was commenting on how great the recession has been for tango. No one really understood why this was the case, but the most common explanation that I heard had to do with the fact that people seemed to need human connection more than ever and tango was a great (and relatively cheap) way of accomplishing just that. Another reason I heard, and the most compelling to me, is that milongas and practicas provide great “bang for your buck” in terms of hours of fun per dollars spent (relative, say, to a movie or going to a bar). Of course this does not explain the increase in classes and festival attendance which, arguably, have a much lower “fun return on investment”.
In the second half of 2009, it seemed like people were moving further away from classes and festivals and more towards just the milongas/practicas. Attendance levels at all tango events were still higher than in early 2008, but classes started to fall off and festivals definitely noticed a slightly lower attendance than they were expecting based on the previous year’s numbers. If this observation is correct, than the second reasoning offered above may have been growing in prevalence in people’s minds.
In the last month or two of 2009 and the beginning of 2010, people I spoke to said tango overall is shrinking. Organizers report fewer entrants, teachers report fewer students (especially beginners), and every tango professional reports that their income is taking a hit. I find it interesting that the tango industry cycle is offset by the global economy by about 1.5 years.
What have you noticed in your work or travels? If you are a dancer, do you find that there are more or less people at the events you attend regularly? If you are a professional, are you finding that there are more or less dancers or students at your event?
Learning about tango events
The way we learn about tango events is changing dramatically, and there is extreme variability around the world.
About ten years ago, the only way to learn about a tango event was to pick up a flier (at another tango event, or on some bulletin board), grab a local newsletter/magazine, or to subscribe to one of the many email list servers that sent out notifications in your area. These methods of acquiring tango information still exist, but the increasing ease of putting together a website and the growth of Facebook have really changed how people learn about new events.
In the United States, most people learn about their local tango events through their regional website or via Facebook, or some combination of the two. In fact, our fans on the KnowTango Facebook Page (selection bias aside) said that they use Facebook as a tool to double check regional listings or, more importantly, to see which event will have the most dancers. The scope and scale of the social element — knowing where your friends are going dancing — is totally unprecedented in the tango world and I think we are going to see that continue to expand in the future.
That said, use of Facebook for tango tends to be very regional. In the US, for example, it’s high, but in countries such as France, Germany, and Argentina, it’s significantly lower. So what do dancers in those countries use to publicize their events? And how do people know about new events? For now, at least, I think we are still tethered to the world of paper fliers and newsletters.
Excellence pt. 2: Venues for tango milongas, tango classes, and tango festivals
Posted by Henry in Excellence series, Tango on July 13th, 2009
In continuing our excellence series, we turn next to the question: What makes an excellent venue?
There are arguably three types of important venues, which may or may not overlap. One is for milongas, classes, and festivals.
Simba had a great series of thoughts in his post on how to organize a milonga.
What do you think? What makes an excellent venue?
Excellence: Tango classes and tango technique
Posted by Henry in Excellence series, Tango on June 9th, 2009
Clay from Portland, famous for organizing the single largest tango festival in the US, has some informative surveys on his site.
Survey #1 deals specifically with teaching to beginners, and the most improtant qualities (in order of importance) identified for beginners teachers are:
- Understood mechanics of tango.
- Good communication skills.
- Encouraging.
- Patience.
- Good dancer.
- Empathetic.
- Methodical and organized.
- Non-judgemental.
- Flexible and creative in classroom.
- Danced with you during the class.
- Explained the “culture” of tango.
- Funny and entertaining.
- Knew your name.
Are there different qualities that are important for teachers working with intermediate or advanced dancers? What other skills become relevant at higher levels? Can an excellent teacher for beginners be a mediocre teacher for other levels? If so, are there any teachers that are good for any and every level, and always have something to offer?
If there exists a teacher or teaching couple that always has something constructive to offer at every level for every type of learner, then I would venture forth that they are truly excellent. Then again, do these types of teachers even exist …?
Excellence, pt. 1: Argentine tango classes and teachers
Posted by Henry in Excellence series, Tango on June 8th, 2009
What makes dancing fun? What makes dancing tango fun?
A good community will have, at least in part, good dancers taught by good teachers.
We start our excellence series by asking a very simple question: what makes a teacher excellent? Put another way, what distinguishes excellent teachers from mediocre or even good teachers? Here is a distillation of some early responses:
- Passion & enthusiasm
- Knowledge of tango music, Argentine culture, and Spanish
- Vast experience, careful preparation, and good communication
- Humility, sense of humor, and respect for your students
From my personal perspective (disclaimer: distinct from that of the company), good teachers know a lot about the music and the dance, have a wealth of experience, and an undying passion that they convey to their students. But building on the last point, truly excellent teachers connect with and inspire their students by capturing their imagination.
So how to connect and inspire? That’s for your comments and maybe the subject of another Excellence Series post … 
What do you think? What is missing from this list or if nothing’s missing, what’s the most important? Think back to your favorite two or three teachers — what made them so incredible and so unique? What qualities makes a teacher excellent?
Happy dancing,
-Henry
New look, new features. Check out the list!
Posted by Henry in New Features, News, Tango on April 22nd, 2009
After a few months of your great feedback, here is what we fixed or changed in our most recent version:
- Fixed toggling events/day to change results on the map and in the headers
- Fixed monthly repeats function to be more intuitive
- Fixed date on headers to show soonest upcoming event date
- Fixed headers to be sortable within each category
- Changed event toggles and counters to hide-able map overlays
- Changed search results to display only the events visible on the map (up to 50)
- Added day toggle (works kind of like a map-based calendar)
- Added the event types Workshops and Shows
- Added a notification when you save a broken address
- Added a “Request delete” button
- Added option to upload a flier for an event (PDF, JPEG, GIF, or PNG)
- Added Orchestra field to Festival
Keep the suggestions coming! How else could we make our site better?
Hello people!!
A little about me: my dance life started with ballroom dance during college and after that I moved to Boston, found salsa, and enjoyed the fun and energy of the salsa clubs for a few years. About a year ago I got bitten by the tango bug BAD and there was no going back…all other forms of dance ceased to have meaning, and I am continually amazed at the joy and peace I find in tango. Tango has enriched my life and through it I’ve met so many truly wonderful and inspiring people. Hopefully our tool will empower dancers around the world to do the same.
- Sarah
Off to a great start
Hi everyone! We’re really excited by the positive response we’ve gotten so far to the site.
I’m Laurel and I’m really excited to be working on KnowTango.com because of its potential to bring together tango dancers and communities from around the world. It’s exciting to be experiencing this time of growth for tango — especially the unique opportunities now available to travel and meet tangueros from all over.
I’ve loved tango since I first went to Argentina. I love the dancing of course - but also the music, the poetry of the lyrics and the way they express Argentinidad. Currently I’m working on memorizing lyrics to some commonly played songs so I can do more than mumble a couple words of the refrain.
Please come back to KnowTango often to add more events and find out about all we have planned. Hasta la proxima!
