backwards and in high heels
Also joy.
Posts tagged men following
It Don’t Mean a Thing if it Ain’t Got That Swing!
74 notes (via bristolswing & legitimate-diversion)
Javier Guiraldi, Juan Francisco Seguí, Juan Pablo Ramirez & Helen La Vikinga give the performance “Danza Maligna” at the milonga La Marshall at El Beso, Buenos Aires, Argentina april 2012.
Mariano Garcés y Alejandro Figliolo dance a queer tango (“la cachila”) at Festival Anormales representing the Queer Tango Marathon.
Todaro & Pepito Avanelli, old milongueros dancing tango between men - and in the very end there’s some women couples as well. The link goes to a public video on Facebook that’s sadly impossible to embed.
Being Amibdancetrous
am·bi·dance·trous
adjective
1. Having the ability in dancing to perform both roles of lead and follow competently.
It’s interesting being someone who is known to dance both roles of lead and follow, when I made semi-finals as a follow and finals as a lead in a competition this weekend I got some varied reactions.
I feel like some people almost view me as a curiosity. At the Saturday night dance I had a few leads ask me to dance. I had one of the judges of the weekend tell me in a joking/sarcastic manner that I make an ugly girl (I found it funny, didn’t take it too seriously). Many of the follows said they liked my white hair flower I borrowed from a friend for the competitions.
Though the thing that surprised me the most is a woman who identified herself as a lesbian approached me and complimented/thanked mefor being out there and defying traditional gender roles. To be candid I don’t really compete with that as my main reason, but I have no problem if that is a side effect of myself entering competitions as a male follow. Frankly I don’t give a damn what gender what my follows or leads are, just if they can dance.[Emphasis mine.]
And that’s how I want people to think about me, too, an ambidancetrous female. :) I learned to lead as a technical pursuit for an aide in teaching, and also because we didn’t have any men hanging out with us. But I just kept on leading because it was fun! And the more I led, the more confidence I got, and the better I got.
And hey - now it’s getting lucrative. I’m attending Hawkeye Swing Fest classes for free this year because I’m going to lead. Score!
Big up the leads!
Not big up the female leads, just big up the leads and follows of whatever gender they choose to identify themselves as!
Innit!
18 notes (via bristolswing & apachedanse)
Au fin fond du 18ème arrondissement de Paris est né le tango queer : une danse qui refuse les normes de genre. Ici, ce ne sont pas comme toujours les hommes qui guident, les femmes qui suivent, et les couples peuvent être composés de personnes de même sexe.
Le tango se danse aussi sans…
My favourite male followers have an elfin quality: lithe, playful and mischievous. I watch their long, slender legs flicking and curling and tracing arabesques on the shiny wood and in the cold air-conditioned air with delicate gestures which look feminine because of their tango context, but are free of campery or exaggeration. The legs are just the tiniest bit stumpier than women’s legs: ending not in shiny, strappy sandals, but in feet raised on demi-pointe in black split-sole trainers or soft, two-tone, grey-and-blue flat shoes of suede and mesh. These dancers possess an ethereal quality, a lightness, a swiftness, a softness of tread which seems somehow more striking for being expressed through the more massive medium of the male body and highlighted by the relative rarity, for me, of the occasions I which observe men dancing the follower’s role at this level of skill.
Read more about the gay milonga La Marshall in this delightful tango blog.
