Originally Posted by Rocky
The other problem with WCS is that many experienced followers hate dancing it if they have come from a MJ background. I'm not a follow myself so I'm basing this on what a lot of experienced and very talented followers have told me. The problem is that unless you are at the high level it's just not musical - the vast majority of WCS leads lead the same structure of figures over and over again regardless of what the music is doing and that just gets tedious (apparently). (end quote)
Of course, it really depends on which circles you move in. At West Coast events, I'll hear experienced jive followers - including the odd teacher or competition champion - moan that they can't bear jive anymore as most leads aren't musical and several will yank the followers' arms off.
It would also be interesting to know how much swing the followers you're talking about have done. To use the common analogy that dance is like a conversation, if they haven't done a lot of West Coast it would be like someone who has learned to speak French fluently complaining that after a couple of lessons they can't have a decent chat with someone in Spanish.
It can sometimes be a struggle to lead anything with experienced jive followers who haven't done much swing as what constitutes style in jive can effectively be sabotage in West Coast.
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