Database specialist acquaints Madison with tango

Steve Fosdal, right, an information technology specialist for DoIT, leads a tango class sponsored by the Madison Tango Society. Photos: Michael Forster Rothbart

If tango to you means Pepé Le Pew, you must have a word with Steve Fosdal.

By day, Fosdal works as a computer programmer in the Division of Information Technology, specializing in public health information data sharing.

By night — some nights, anyway — Fosdal, a latter-day Valentino, embodies Argentine tango.

The adjective is critical to a proper understanding of the form, Fosdal says.

“The kind of tango you usually see in North America is highly choreographed ballroom dancing,” he explains. On the other hand, in Buenos Aires, Colon or Mendoza, tango is a way of life, part of the after-work itinerary on Fridays.

“American tango is very structured. There are very strict rules,” he says. The competitions so prevalent in North American tango circles no doubt contribute to the number of rules and their strictness, Fosdal says. “They annoy me because I can’t remember them.”

However, it was his initial interest in ballroom dance that led Fosdal to tango, and to his regular partner Krista Bultman, a physical therapist at Meriter Hospital. Almost six years ago, Fosdal went to a concert of Argentine composer Astor Piazzolla’s tango works, and became so enthralled that he began once-a-week lessons at Tango Nada Mas in Chicago.

Fosdal and Bultman established the Madison Tango Society in 1998 as an offshoot of their practice sessions. The group holds milongas — dances — the first Saturday of every month. Practice sessions are on Tuesdays, usually from 7-8:30 p.m., at Union South.

Fosdal and the Madison Tango Society have performed at the Art Fair on the Square (although not this past year), farmers’ markets and other venues. However, he emphasizes that performing is not the primary lure of tango for him.

“I wanted something completely different from what I do at work, which is sit at a desk and stare at a screen,” he says.

Although Fosdal says that his vocation and his hobby share virtually nothing, he has been able to extrapolate a few things about teaching from taking and teaching tango lessons, he says.

“To teach effectively, you have to give people just enough information and then give them the opportunity to play with it,” he says. “You can’t overwhelm them.”

This is always a temptation in the teaching of tango. With its roots on the seamier side of Buenos Aires during the end of the 19th century, tango swept Europe and the United States in 1913. Its rhythmic genealogy from Africa, France, Germany and Italy usually employs six-eight time.

In addition to regular tango, there are three other styles.

“The ‘vals’ style is in three-quarter time, like a waltz, so that all the steps are smaller and faster, but, like the waltz, you don’t have to step on every beat. The ‘milonga’ style — same name as the tango dance, just to make it confusing — also uses small, quick steps, but you do have to step on every beat. There’s also a heavily choreographed show-style tango, similar to what’s done here,” Fosdal says, adding that, to further complicate matters, each style has a number of subsets, depending on what an individual dancer wants to achieve.

“If you’re a follower, you actually can use tango to disengage, to turn your brain off and concentrate on what the leader is doing,” he says. “On the other hand, some people tango for the opposite reason. It makes them focus on the immediate moment. I like tango because it’s a vehicle in which I can express myself.”

At the moment, he is trying to interest a local club or two in sponsoring a regular tango night. Meanwhile, Fosdal, Bultman and the rest of the Madison Tango Society will be in action next at a “milonga” on Saturday, Sept. 4, at 8 p.m., 306 W. Dayton St., behind the White Horse Inn.

“They have a great dance floor,” he promises. The dance is open to all at a cost of $10 per person, payable at the door. For more information about the Madison Tango Society, visit the Web site: http://www.madisontango.org.