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Cornish Pixie
23rd-February-2005, 03:56 PM
The most important event in my dancing exeperience so far has been the arrival of a very experiencd dancer from up Lincolnshire way. She has taken me under her wing and is being my mentor, helping me with all aspects of my dancing. Shes got me a lil confused though. Shes says i need to learn how to flow with footwork.

Can anyone elaborate on this? :what:

I can dance on the beat and my feet are constantly moving and there is never a moment when i not moving. It all feels very flowy to me?!?!

How to find this elusive flow?

Gadget
23rd-February-2005, 04:25 PM
? Try sliding over a few beats, so you are not stepping on every beat?
? Alter the timing so the steps have little crescendo's of movement but still mark the beat?
? Instead of taking lots of little shuffles or steps, take a proper one in the right place?

Minnie M
23rd-February-2005, 04:27 PM
........ Shes says i need to learn how to flow with footwork. Can anyone elaborate on this? :what:

I can dance on the beat and my feet are constantly moving and there is never a moment when i not moving. It all feels very flowy to me?!?!

How to find this elusive flow?
Try and get a 'private' with DavidB - he is the master of this :drool:

philsmove
23rd-February-2005, 08:43 PM
Try and get a 'private' with DavidB - he is the master of this :drool:

And he is not too far away from you this Saturday

Andreas
23rd-February-2005, 09:04 PM
She may mean what I refer to as anckle compression. If there is a constant tension in your legs/feet then you will be very responsive because you NEVER SETTLE. Settling on the back foot is the doom of MJ dancers, particularly obvious in Australia, where they have a strong tendency to step way back and stick their bums out as if their life depended on it :D

So keep your steps small and tension up at all times. A simple rule that I keep telling people (boys and girls) is: by the time your heel touches the ground you will be moving in the other direction again. This can mean just as much being about to step forwards as it could be body-rolling your weight forwards. Just never keep your weight back, it makes your motion jerky and you overall slow :cheers:

SwingSwingSwing
23rd-February-2005, 09:33 PM
Perhaps she means flowing with music. Are stepping on each and every beat regardless of the feel of the music?
You could try dancing behind the beat when the music is softer and dancing ahead of the beat when the music is "driving".
As Gadget suggested, try not stepping on every beat. Stretch it out, play with it.

SwingSwingSwing

Gary
24th-February-2005, 12:11 AM
... Settling on the back foot is the doom of MJ dancers, particularly obvious in Australia, where they have a strong tendency to step way back and stick their bums out as if their life depended on it :D

I don't think it's that bad (although I'm working on reducing how much my weight settles back right now, ... :blush: )

If there is a problem along these lines, I suspect it's from over-emphasising that there must be some weight-transfer to the back foot when you step back. Beginners have a tendency to just tap the back foot and not put any weight on it, so they're hammered with the idea that they really need to put some weight on it. I guess it's similar to the problem that some approaches to teaching the beat can result in bouncy dancing.

MartinHarper
24th-February-2005, 01:00 AM
Beginners have a tendency to just tap the back foot and not put any weight on it, so they're hammered with the idea that they really need to put some weight on it.

Ok.

Why do we really need to put some weight on it?

Cornish Pixie
24th-February-2005, 11:13 AM
And he is not too far away from you this Saturday

Where is he exactly?

JamesGeary
24th-February-2005, 01:11 PM
She may mean what I refer to as anckle compression. If there is a constant tension in your legs/feet then you will be very responsive because you NEVER SETTLE. Settling on the back foot is the doom of MJ dancers, particularly obvious in Australia, where they have a strong tendency to step way back and stick their bums out as if their life depended on it :D

So keep your steps small and tension up at all times. A simple rule that I keep telling people (boys and girls) is: by the time your heel touches the ground you will be moving in the other direction again. This can mean just as much being about to step forwards as it could be body-rolling your weight forwards. Just never keep your weight back, it makes your motion jerky and you overall slow :cheers:

:yeah:

Listen to a good ice skater and they make no noise when they skate. By the time their blade touches the ice they have finished its downward motion. I am sure that relates somehow.

Cornish Pixie
24th-February-2005, 01:14 PM
?
? Alter the timing so the steps have little crescendo's of movement but still mark the beat?

:confused: :confused: not up on musical terminology, what are crescendos?

Andreas
24th-February-2005, 01:25 PM
:confused: :confused: not up on musical terminology, what are crescendos?

That is when it gets fast and really loud :D

Geordieed
24th-February-2005, 02:28 PM
I feel that there are two areas that you could possibly cover here. The first being that my ultimate goal is to dance so smoothly that you start off a move when the track of music begins and ends when the track comes to an end. This would include breaks etc etc as ultimately breaks should not bring you to a halt like a statue. Breaks should we worked. I know that within Lindy they say that the bounce should come from within.

The other area, which is related, is not allowing the feel of your footwork to be transferred into your handhold etc. Hand connection can be kept up regardless of whether you are weighted slighty forward or back and any backward movement does not interupt the flow of the dance.

Chef
24th-February-2005, 02:37 PM
Where is he exactly?

I see from another website that David and Lily Barker are teaching west coast swing (great in itself for teaching smoothness and flow) at Westbury-in-Trym this saturday. You might be able to get him to give you a private lesson either before or after that event if he has time and space.

I don't know how much it might cost but it will be worth it. You can contact him by sending him a private message through this forum to his username of DavidB.

Happy Dancing.

ElaineB
24th-February-2005, 02:44 PM
I see from another website that David and Lily Barker are teaching west coast swing (great in itself for teaching smoothness and flow) at Westbury-in-Trym this saturday. You might be able to get him to give you a private lesson either before or after that event if he has time and space.

I don't know how much it might cost but it will be worth it. You can contact him by sending him a private message through this forum to his username of DavidB.

Happy Dancing.

Westbury on Trym being in Bristol of course! You naughty boy Wurzel - you haven't been checking the Bristol Web site, have you! :wink:

Definitely try to get a private lesson with David, although he may already be booked this week-end. Otherwise, see if you can get up to London some time - I promise you that you will find the trip well worth it. One lesson getting it right is priceless!

Elaine

MartinHarper
24th-February-2005, 03:10 PM
:confused: :confused: not up on musical terminology, what are crescendos?

In music, crescendos are when the music rises in volume over a few beats or a few bars.
Knowing that, I'm still not entirely clear what Gadget meant... :)

alex
24th-February-2005, 03:28 PM
You can contact him by sending him a private message through this forum to his username of DavidB.
You will have to PM him. He rarely looks at the forum any more, so probably won't even see this.
I know he replies to PMs, because he just replied to mine.

Alexander

Gadget
24th-February-2005, 09:18 PM
:confused: :confused: not up on musical terminology, what are crescendos?
as I understand it, (and as I intended it's use) it's a gradual build-up to a climax - relating to footwork, I intended it to translate into the speed of movement: sssssttteep, although this actuall introduces more 'dynamics' into the dance rather than smoothing it. I suppose you could reverse the crescendo and go stteeeppppp, but again, it emphisises each step instead of smoothing it.

OK, ignore my ramblings on this point. :blush: