Slotted or Circular???

[Chef]

Teaching is done to slotted dancing so everyone learns in the same basic mechanics of the move regardless of who they are dancing with and also to avoid potention collision with neighbouring partners.

The need to teach slotted to aviod collisions is something that I have heard a number of times but I don't understand why this is no longer desireable when freestyle starts. You can bend moves so that collisions are avoided but this is a concious decision to do so because you need to rather than just a lead a follower somewhere and move because she has gone somewhere else.

But this is just teaching the bare mechanics of the moves. If we were to dance EVERY MOVE EXACTLY AS INSTRUCTED where would the flare and style be? Moves are individually interpretated by the lead. They lead the move as they wish. As long as the basic mechanics of the move are sound, minimal varients of style added to the lead of that move is up to individual leader.

Adding flair and style should be a concious thing and done because you want to. There is nothing stylish about spinning out of control and hitting other dancers, or as I saw last week falling over chairs and people seated at them. Style and flair are things that are ADDED to a move rather than instead of the move. In order for the style and flair to look good the move that underlys it must also look good. To look good it must be good.

I saw MJ being danced on GMTV a while back and the moves were danced as they were taught and as a result it looked good on camera. MJ as she is danced socially with the random orientations looks pants even if it feels great to those people dancing. Style and flair is about what looks good rather than what feels good so if the move that you are putting your style onto looks pants then it is likely that they effort you put into the style and flair would be largely wasted.

[Steven666]

The need to teach slotted to aviod collisions is something that I have heard a number of times but I don't understand why this is no longer desireable when freestyle starts. You can bend moves so that collisions are avoided but this is a concious decision to do so because you need to rather than just a lead a follower somewhere and move because she has gone somewhere else.

But is it the leads fault that the follower has wandered. More often than not I feel it isn't the leads fault and mostly due to the way the follower returns. Not always though.

There is nothing stylish about spinning out of control and hitting other dancers, or as I saw last week falling over chairs and people seated at them.

Was it wrong to rofl at reading that?

I shouldn't as I hit the floor last week after losing balance.

[Chef]

But is it the leads fault that the follower has wandered. More often than not I feel it isn't the leads fault and mostly due to the way the follower returns. Not always though.

Trying to aportion blame or fault is not really helpful. It is something that if followers go places that you don't lead then those follower teach leaders that leading is not going to be listened to and therefore not to worry about it too much. If leaders don't lead well then followers stop paying much attention to the lead and go off where they like. The importance of the detail is often overlooked because it gets in the way of fun but the detail is what opens the way to a large area of more fun.

I have found that in dance everyone thinks they are doing it right and the other person is doing it wrong and almost always it turns out that both dancers are doing something wrong and any fault is a shared one. Dancing couples can get into the most frightful tiffs in this way and really need an expert referee to make changes to both of their actions to get the correct result.