We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Alberto Ramos Cordero. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Alberto below.

Alberto, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

The most meaningful project I’ve worked on is building what I’d call a circular, community-based economy through our cultural programming. Our goal has been to create an ecosystem—not just a series of disconnected events. The deeper we dive into our practice, the more we find ourselves tying threads together in unexpected, powerful ways.

We teach dance, we train as musicians in our community orchestra, we host a jam series, we support local businesses, and we platform local artists. Each of these is a strand, but together they weave something stronger—a community network where value circulates between people rather than being extracted from them.

So many people talk about a fraying social fabric. We believe that by revisiting some of the traditional ways communities have gathered—learning together, celebrating together, creating together—we can restore some of that connection. These practices build soft skills, trust, and resilience.

Right now, the culmination of this work is La Tertulia Tango Salon—a monthly gathering that brings dancers, musicians, and neighbors together in the same space. It’s where all of these threads meet: people we’ve taught, musicians we’ve trained alongside, local artists we’ve supported, and community members we’ve invited in. It’s the living proof that investing in people creates something that lasts.

For us, people are the best store of value. Investing in our community isn’t just the right thing to do—it’s the smartest long-term strategy we have. And seeing that investment pay off in relationships, creativity, and shared growth has been incredibly meaningful.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Both of us—Micaela Colleen Barrett and Alberto Ramos Cordero—are transplants to Cleveland. We first met while training in New York City, where we ran our first Argentine Tango school for many years before eventually relocating to Ohio.

Today, our work blends teaching, performance, music, and community-building. We teach Argentine Tango every Tuesday and Thursday, train as musicians, curate spaces, and actively support local artists. Our goal is to repair the rift between audiences and creatives—restoring a sense of engagement, co-creation, and participation that has been eroded by a culture of passive consumption.

As dancers, our role is to interpret music. But increasingly, we’ve noticed musicians being left out of their own economy—replaced by recordings or pre-fabricated soundtracks. Tango gives us a way to bring those worlds back together. There’s a deep, time-honored connection between musicians playing together and dancers dancing together, and we want to revive that link while reconnecting artists with their communities.

Tango is more than memorized steps—it’s a language. It’s been called a “walking meditation” because it’s soft, mindful, and centered on connection rather than choreography. It doesn’t care about age or ability—it cares about intention and the quality of how two people move together. Through tango, people connect with their bodies, with others, and with the wider community. In doing so, they rebuild “soft skills” like listening, adaptability, and empathy—skills that strengthen social fabric and resilience.

Our current programming includes:

Group classes — Tuesdays at The Treelawn Music Hall (Waterloo) and Thursdays at The Brownhoist (St. Clair).

Community Orchestra — 2nd Wednesday of every month at The Treelawn Music Hall. All musicians welcome, with lead sheets and set lists provided in advance.

La Tertulia Tango Salón — 1st and 3rd Wednesdays at Riffs in Tremont and Forest City Brewery on Duck Island.

What’s a Tertulia?
A tertulia is a traditional Spanish-speaking cultural gathering—a mix of social salon, concert, and conversation. People come together to share ideas, art, and community. Our version centers on live tango music and dance. Every tertulia features three live music sets at 7:45 pm, 8:45 pm, and 9:30 pm, with open dancing and conversation in between.

We are most proud of building a circular, community-based economy around this work. Our classes feed into our performance spaces; our orchestras train with and showcase local musicians; our events bring audiences into direct contact with the creative process. It’s an ecosystem where value flows in circles—artists support audiences, audiences support artists, and everyone builds something together.

At the heart of it, we believe people are the best store of value. We invest in our community because it’s the most resilient and rewarding work we can do.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

I don’t really think of the internet as a “real place.” I prefer to be out in the community—present, visible, and engaged. Online spaces can make it too easy to glaze over and disconnect, while in-person interactions let you build genuine relationships.

For me, social media works best as a reflection of the work we’re already doing on the ground. If the internet is largely about consumption, then I like to see it as a place where people signal how they want to be supported. But the real magic happens when you show up—supporting others, attending their events, and becoming part of the community’s fabric.

Rather than chasing engagement, I focus on embodying the kind of person I’d like to see in my own neighborhood. That means organizing, creating platforms, and directing energy toward others rather than constantly requesting it for myself. In that way, our community becomes an ecosystem—something to tend and nurture—rather than a shopping mall or a string of commercial transactions.

My advice? Don’t just post—participate. Engage with others first, and let your online presence grow as an authentic extension of your real-world contributions.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

COVID deeply disrupted our touring schedule and our entire business model. For a community built on close embrace, it was a seismic challenge. But rather than trying to replicate our work online, my partner and I chose to see it as an opportunity to rethink everything.

We pivoted toward learning to play the music—a decision that’s now transformed our whole model. At the same time, we stripped our dance practice down to its bare essentials and rebuilt it from the ground up. Tango is relational at its core—it famously takes two—so we focused on bridging the gap between self and other, challenging assumptions, and learning how to hold space in a truly collaborative way.

That choice—to reduce our world to each other, our practice, and deep skill-building—left our business, our personal lives, and our community more enriched, not less. While many moved their work online, we invested in tools and relationships that now continue to strengthen our ecosystem.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.clevelandtango.com
• Instagram: @clevelandtangoschool
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/clevelandtangoschool

Image Credits

Steven Thull