Natural Promenade Turn In Tango

Ballroom Blitz #108

Natural Promenade Turn In Tango - Apr 04, 2024

Transcript

Ian: Hey guys and girls from the inter-webs. My name's Ian,

Lindsey: and my name's Lindsey,

Ian & Lindsey: and welcome to Ballroom Blitz.

Lindsey: Hello lovely ballroom dancers, welcome back to another Ballroom Blitz. We are going to be looking at a Tango move today and it's a great one it is the Natural Promenade Turn.

We can glean a few things about this move just from the name, so because it's got "Natural" in the title we know that it's going to turn clockwise around each other, and it also has the word "Prominade", so we will be starting and, if we do it in the traditional way, ending as well in the Prominade Position. But, in true Tango form it's going to change around our position as it goes, so we'll go from Prominade to Closed and back to Prominade again.

[Demonstration with out music]

Lindsey: So there you go a demo of the natural prominade turn in the Tango. It's got a classic sort of sharpness that a Tango figure does, and it's a good whippy one to go around corners or otherwise make your way around the floor. So, let's have a look at the leaders steps first.

Ian: Leaders, when you first start this figure we should only be turning it about three quarters (3/4), your classic "turning a corner" type arrangement. Then, as Lindsey said, you can eek out a little bit more to get it going down a room if you choose later on. But, if we aim for three quarters (3/4) we're going to turn the corner the long way around, which is very Ballroom. We're going to be pointing along our old line of dance in prominade. We're going to have a slow, very Tango, drive forward in prominade to kick us off, Slow. I'm now going to take a faster step, but still low and still quite straight, I don't want to turn this too early just yet. I'm going to take a quick, and then I'm going to block the follow by turning around them in the clockwise direction, the natural direction, and I want to think of putting my back towards my old line of dance, Quick. And, I have now closed the position. We're no longer in prominade, we are in a closed position, and our old line of dance is that way that means our new line of dance is that way. And here's the trick, I'm going to imagine walking forward, on this foot, in that direction, like so. That's my final step, [it] looks a little bit strange without a partner, but don't think backwards, don't think sidewards. You have to walk forwards, through your partner, to get that rotation going. Once I'm here I have to return us to Prominade Position and in a very Tango fashion I'm going to bring my remaining leg, my left leg, around into that "Link" type position and we're good to go along a new line of dance. A Slow Quick-Quick Slow, but you can think of it as "Walk" or "Drive" step, close [position], and turn, so we have

[Demonstration of Leaders Steps]

Lindsey: Followers, we are ready in our Promade Position. At the start we have our weight on our left foot, ready to go forwards on our right, following the leaders lead as we go Slow down the floor in prominade, Quick step still in prominade, and then our next step is going to keep on traveling along that line, but because the leader is taking a step around us, sort of blocking us through, our frame will be quite different at the end of it. So, I'm still going to take another step down my old line of dance on my right foot, Quick, but at that point my partner has come around. So, I should be taking that step straight through their feet. This sets up a perfect position to be able to turn in a pivoty kind-of way around each other. I'll feel the leader realign, take a step, forwards for them, backwards for me, with my new line of dance, and then I should feel the frame bringing me back around to promenade position at the end. That doesn't have a weight change so my final weight change will be on my left foot, so if I count that out, here I am just like the leader a Slow Quick-Quick Slow, and I have a

[Demonstration of Followers Steps]

Lindsey: Now, these demos make a little bit more sense when we've got our partner here, you can see that we are in a Prominade Position and we're going to just walk in Prominade for the first two steps so we have a Slow and a Quick. Now, this next bit we've got two more steps to go and essentially I'm going to step at Ian and then he is going to step at me as we pivot around each other, so we have a Quick Slow, and he has got us around the corner, used his frame to bring us back to Prominade Position and now we're ready to go again, promenading down our new line of dance.

[Demonstration with Counts]

[Demonstration with Music]

Lindsey: And there you go the Natural Prominade Turn in the Tango. So, a nice whippy one, it's a nice dramatic one, playing around with both Prominade and Closed positions, which of course Tango loves. So, have some fun with this one, use it in the corners or have a play around to see if you can get a little bit more rotation in it to make it work anywhere on the floor that you need it to. So, we'll see you next time.

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