In the long, lonely hours between planning lessons, preparing music and making cups of tea for my beloved, I often receive an email or Facebook link: “have you seen these dancers on You Tube; can they teach at your lessons?”
There will be a poor quality clip of a tango couple dancing a show dance at an event, with lots of flamboyant movements, travelling at 100 mph around an empty dance floor followed by rapturous applause. YouTube has thousands of such clips of tango dances. The dancers are often brilliant, and far better than I am *sigh*. BUT why-o-why is a show dance clip on You Tube meant to be an indication of how good a teacher is? Listen carefully: I shall say this only once:
A good show dancer is not necessarily a good tango teacher.
The two skills are totally different. Yes, teaching requires some dance ability, but it also takes communication skills, interpersonal skills, time management, etc etc … oh, and intelligence, wit, & charm… 😉
If I want to be taught by you, I want to know what you are like as a teacher, not a show dancer. Tango teachers promoting themselves with show dances is irrelevant, like tinned peaches (yuk!). So, it would make more sense to promote a tango teacher by using a clip of them actually teaching tango.
