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Tango Carpa—What It Is, What It Does


Copyright ©2018 Karlos Bermann


Look, Ma, no hands! Here, on Argentine TV, tango master Carlos 
Gavito and his partner Marcela Durán assume an extreme carpa
position to demonstrate shared balance.
In Spanish the word “carpa” means “tent.” In tango, “carpa” refers to the posture of the dance partners in relation to each other. This posture can be described as an inverted “V.” In English, the image of an “A-frame” is perhaps more evocative than that of a “tent.” In any event, in carpa, each partner maintains a straight posture, much like the yoga “plank” position, while inclining or leaning toward each other.  In practice, the lean is often more evident in a female follower with a male leader, given that the man usually has greater body mass. To offset the greater mass of the man and equalize the pressure/counter-pressure, therefore, the woman inclines more of her weight toward her partner. 
           Whether the dancers are in close embrace or a more open embrace, the “lean” of the carpa posture creates a degree of pressure between them. This enables the dancers to maintain a firm, stable connection, to have a shared balance and, when necessary, a shared axis. So long as they maintain the posture, carpa bonds them together, so they become nearly one. 

                             
            It is this connection that Gabriela Condrea describes in her lyrical book about tango, “When 1 + 1 = 1.” In the book Condrea includes a poem she calls “el abrazo,” the embrace, in which she writes,  “I press my hand/ against the line/ of his back/ pulling him closer/ yet pushing him away/ keeping him at a distance/ creating the tension/ the connection/ defining the parameters/ between two/ who walk as one.”  The carpa posture gives the dancers the necessary connection while the “tension”—the “pulling” and simul- taneous “pushing,” or compression, enable the dancers to maintain the connection and the shared balance without collapsing or falling into each other. In addition, the inverted “V,” open at the bottom, allows their feet and legs to have a freedom of movement they would not otherwise have. “Creating a connection takes two people,” Condrea writes, “[and] since you are so close to one another and leaning—albeit slightly—toward each other, sharing an axis, you depend on each other to make it work. You lean with the faith that your partner will meet you halfway.  And you can’t hold back . . . He can’t meet you halfway if you don’t lean, too.” (p. 20)


             More than trust is involved in learning to dance in carpa. The muscular control required to hold the posture, to avoid swaying or bending backward, which can throw the couple off balance, takes practice. The posture must come to feel natural so it can be maintained without conscious effort on the part of the dancers. Only then can they have the combination of control and relaxation that is the foundation of tango connection. Only then can they truly give themselves over to the moment, becoming one with each other and the music. 👠

















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