learning the blues

[straycat]

PS Are we confusing Blues and Swing ? Oops!

Nope. (depending on who you mean by 'we'. In regard to the clip t0mt0m posted, definitely not. - the organisation may be called 'Swango', but the clip is called 'Blues Basics', and the dancing is pure traditional blues.

[t0mt0m]

Worth saying that the link is to the 1st episode of 12 or so, which first go through blues basics (pulse, weight transfer, fishtail, shake n bake etc) and then go on in further videos to look at how tango, swing and other moves can be brought into blues. So the 1st video shows traditional style, but they expand on that.

It's not a complete fusion, but it seems there's been some work into fusing the different styles - of the tango moves, in some ways there's overlap - the use of frame, leading from the chest, using weight transfer, using weight transfer to really help dictate movement as a couple, being a close dance etc - what does the music say to you? Some can be fast, some upbeat, some way down low.

I'm not sure what a complete fusion would look like - any ideas?
Each to their own - if your partner enjoys it, great - i'd imagine you can tone up or down the different styles depending on what your partner knows and likes. I've seen a fair bit of WCS, and tango and Jive all done on the same track, by different dance couples, all having a whale of a time.

I'm in the process of editing the youtube videos into a miniseries split by the movements, and the intro/description of each part, if anyone's interested. Will be interesting to compare with the blues DVDs out there also (Lucky, Rocky etc).

[philsmove]

.......Each to their own - if your partner enjoys it, great - i'd imagine you can tone up or down the different styles depending on what your partner knows and likes....).

This is what I absolutly love about blues. No strick rules, if feels right ,it is right

[David Bailey]

It's not a complete fusion, but it seems there's been some work into fusing the different styles - of the tango moves, in some ways there's overlap - the use of frame, leading from the chest, using weight transfer, using weight transfer to really help dictate movement as a couple, being a close dance etc - what does the music say to you? Some can be fast, some upbeat, some way down low.

Well, you can pretty much say that applies to all dances. Basically, that's "technique" for you.

I'm not sure what a complete fusion would look like - any ideas?

After much, much, much thought and quite a bit of work on this one, I reckon there's no such thing as a "fusion" - dances just don't work like that. The only real way to produce a true fusion is to be good at both base dances, and to work on creating your own style.

But generally I think that results in an "accent", which is effectively a stylistic variation of one of the core dances. So, you can have "Tango accented" Modern Jive, but it's still Modern Jive. At most, I think fusions become "a bit of Dance A, then a bit of Dance B, rinse and repeat".

Basically, the way to tell what the core dance is, is to see what the actual music is. Unless the music itself is a fusion, then you're dancing one or the other, but with a specific accent.