Recuerdo can rely on a very long history of teaching and dancing tango since 1990.
Lieve and Gerdy were lucky to attend courses by some of the old maestros that by now passed away, but whose dance oeuvre they still cherish and honour.
method
Initially, the teaching method of Recuerdo was based on the pedagogy of Antonio Todaro and Pepito Avellaneda, Lalo Diaz and Mirta Campos.
Recuerdo thinks that tango de salon should stay a popular dance and not an exclusivity for trained dancers. In movies about tango you constantly see the best tango dancers appear. However, in the popular and traditional tango salons from Buenos Aires, you see grannies and grandfathers next to a young crowd, good dancers, clumsy dancers: all of them dancing harmoniously together. Here it has never been about being the best: on the dance floor all are equal to one another.
Our classes are accessible for anyone, no matter ones age, physical skills or knowledge. Every individual and every dance couple is different and are therefore being instructed individually by the two teachers who both master the role of the male and female dancer. Everyone can therefore join in.
For that reason, only 10 couples can participate per class in order for the teachers to dedicate sufficient time and attention to all students.
Even complete beginners can already from the start join in during the tango salons that we host ourselves.
This means that nothing should hold you back to participate, as everyone started from scratch at some point.
Dancing tango is not about theory, about performing super good or reaching certain levels. The most important thing is that you dance together on the music and share something with your dance partner. It’s the student who chooses the level: he or she can decide to retake a series of classes or to continue to a higher level. Also when you quitted dancing tango for a while, it should be easy for you to start dancing again.
The codes of the tango salon are however crucial: courtesy, patience, respect for your own dance partner and the other couples on the dance floor. This is something we teach from day 1.
Just like an Assimil course we progressively help you increase your level class by class and focus a lot on repetition.
Starting from a very basic structure, the couple learns how to “walk” together and improvise very short sequences.
Moreover, we also focus on combinations and more traditional tango figures.
Gradually one learns to focus on the tone color of the different orchestras and to interpret these by a basic structure.
At Recuerdo you dance in general with your own dance partner. Sometimes we do make an exception to this for pedagogic or technical reasons: it can be very useful and interesting to every now and then change partners during a class for the benefit of the learning process.
In most of the European salons it’s a custom to frequently change partners, but this contradicts our vision of growing as a tango couple and finding a meaningful, emotional connection.
Moreover, we also focus in every group on milonga and tango waltz, the two other tango rhythms that you will hear in a tango salon.
*waltz starting from level 2