BUDAPEST TANGO MEMO

Gábor Novák is a visionary tango organizer, teacher, and improvisational dancer from Budapest to founding Tango Factory and shaping Hungary’s tango scene as passionate as the dance itself. Let’s discover its own journey!

A few words about yourself?

I am 53 years old, tango dancer, organizer, teacher. My tango school name is Tango Factory. Living and working in Hungary. Divorced. I have a beautiful teenager daughter, a great supporting family. I love my life!

How was your life before tango and how did you start tango?

Before my tango life, I worked in my family’s business in the photo printing industry. I started at the lowest level, cutting paper and handling small tasks and step-by step I went higher on the ladder and became the CEO of the company. When digital technology revolutionized the industry, I took the lead in modernizing the company. It was a big challenge because no one had prior experience with these new processes. We were pioneers in Hungary. We had to combine the “old fashioned” chemistry-based photography with modern computer-based technology. Our company worked exclusively with artists, professional photographers, and exhibitors. I enjoyed this job, but when tango became more and more important in my life, I decided to sell the photo company and work full time in tango.

How did you start tango?

After my divorce in 2006, I was looking for a new free time activity. One day, while browsing a dance studio’s website in Budapest, I watched a video they embed there to show what tango is about. It was a demo dance of Chicho Frumboli & Eugenia Parrilla. I didn’t see anything like that before and it was very far from what I thought tango is. They danced on a modern song with a great musicality and super cool movements. It immediately captured my attention to tango and started to investigate where I could learn it. I discovered a milonga at a stunning location, in a cinema called URANIA. When I went there to look around, I saw lot of pretty ladies embracing some average looking guys, and I thought, this might be interesting activity for a me as well.

I started taking classes at a dance club near my home. I was lucky because after each class, there was a milonga where I could immediately practice. After three or four months, I was slowly started to dance on the milonga too. But then the summer break came, and the school was closed for two months. Back then, there was not so many options to dance tango in Budapest, like today, so I decided to organize my own milonga—even though I had no idea how to do it! I found a lovely summer venue (Mucsarnok Terrace), and to my surprise, people came to dance in a huge number. It was fun, and it gave me the motivation to search for more venues and organize events. Just like with my family business, I learned by doing.

How did your interest in tango grow?

As a child, I was always fascinated by dance, I loved to dance on every kind of music, but I never had the chance to learn any form of dance. The first time I learned dancing was at my high school graduation ball. Each class had to perform a dance. We picked Hungarian folk dance. I really enjoyed it and went very well, so the teacher invited me to join to his professional dance group permanently. I studied folk dance for a few months, but I had to quit when I went to university.

Almost 20 years later, when I saw tango, I immediately felt that this dance was meant for me. In Hungary, there weren’t many tango teachers at the time, and what I experienced here was far from I saw in the YouTube videos, so I traveled to Vienna to learn from different styles and methodologies.  As I met tango dancers from abroad, I started inviting them to Budapest. For example, I invited Katy & Tiha, who were living in Sweden at the time. I also bring to Hungary many other international tango teachers to give workshops. I began traveling across Europe, attending milongas and festivals, and gradually expanding my circle of tango friends.

Who are your favorite teachers?

The biggest influences on my tango journey have been Maria Filali and Gianpiero Galdi. I consider them as my “tango parents”. But of course, many other great maestros I really like to learn from. Like the already mentioned Chicho Frúmboli, or Jonathan Saavedra and Clarissa just to mention my favorites by name. At festivals in Europe and my travel to Buenos Aires, I met many fantastic teachers, well known and less famous as well, and I learned something important from almost all of them. 

How did you start teaching?

On my first trip to Buenos Aires, I met some great young teacher couples, and introduced them to one of the biggest tango schools in Hungary. One of these couple has been invited for long term to Budapest, to teach regularly here. Of course I was there on their classes every week. After a year, they decided to go back to Buenos Aires for a 2-month holiday and they asked me to replace them during this period. I was shocked about their proposal, as I loved dancing, but I never considered myself good enough for teaching it. But they insisted and helped me to prepare the classes and encouraged me to do it. So, I eventually accepted the offer, and to my surprise, I loved it! The students' positive feedback gave me confidence, and this experience led me to start teaching tango in Budapest. I realized that teaching not only brings me joy but also deepens my understanding of tango.

After this replacement teaching, I started to give privates and occasionally workshops, and later regular classes alone and in cooperation with Bela Barabas. When we found a great location to a tango school - in Mária utca - I decided to open a tango club called Tango Factory. The idea was to invite different tango teachers to teach in my club and create a great home of tango in Budapest. A few months later I met my formal dance partner Marina Hoffman, we had an exceptional connection from the very first time, so she moved to Budapest, and we started to teach in my club together. With her professional ballet and other dance background and the experience of our progression in classes, we created our way of teaching - we called it the Factory Method - which I use today as well in my teaching. In our experience it gives a strong base for people to an enjoyable and comfortable way of dancing tango.

A few years ago, I started to teach in Pécs, and Szeged - beautiful small cities in Hungary - and I so much like these cities that from January 2025 I moved to Szeged. So now, I give classes in 3 cities - Pécs, Szeged and Budapest.

Any advice for beginners?

Many teachers talk about connection and communication with a partner, but when you attend their classes, they mainly teach figures. I dislike focusing on figures. Our method prioritizes a slow but comfortable learning process, without overemphasizing figures. Figures are useful tools, but for me, tango is about moving together with my partner harmoniously in space. The figure is not the goal; it’s just one consequence of the movement.

For beginners, my advice is:

         •        Be patient.

         •        Listen to tango music.

         •        Practice anytime, anywhere: on the street, in your bathroom, in your kitchen.

         •        When you walk on the street, observe how your body moves and reacts in space.

         •        Integrate tango into your daily life.

         •        Most importantly, after your first class, go to a milonga!

What other projects are you working on?

Beside teaching I organize regular milongas as well. At summertime the Museum Milonga is one of the most popular outdoor milonga of Budapest, in the garden of the National Museum.

I also organize once or twice a year a marathon called Danube Tango. Budapest is an attractive destination for tourists and for tango travelers. Maybe for this reason Budapest is the city where the most tango events happen every year. This is the only city in the world, where almost in every 2-3 weeks there is an internationally advertised festival/marathon/encuentro/tango camp or other tango events.

I am proud of that Danube Tango events are one of the oldest and still running tango events. It’s always a very inclusive, friendly and relaxed atmosphere tango party with many nice dancers from all over the World.