Improvers Course, Week 3

19th October 2009

(Week 1 Notes | Week 2 Notes Week 3 Notes | Week 4 Notes )

I played two tracks, one traditional, one modern, and we danced to those tracks, with the concept of listening to the music, and attempting to dance to the music.

Musicality

I briefly showed an example of dancing to a traditional track, then dancing to a neo-track - as mentioned in Week 2, the music dictates how you dance - the embrace, the steps, and the musicality.

We then danced to both those tracks, attempting to get a feel and dance to the different musical styles.

More details

More about Musicality.

Interpretation

Interpretation and musicality do affect the flow of the dance - in fact, that's their purpose.

Leader - tempo

Playing a traditional track, we demonstrated some tempo changes possible - quick-quick slow, that sort of thing. We then worked on this as an exercise.

Follower - elongated ochos

We did a demonstration for follower-interpretation - slowing down an ocho step to music - then worked on this as an exercise.

Leaders: wait for the follower to pivot before leading the step.

Both - giro

We examined the different tempo possibilities for a giro step - taking the non-pivoting parts of the full giro sequence at double-time.

Using Adornments

Adornments (or "Embellishments" or "decorations" - all the same thing) are general actions which make the dancing look and feel better - they're the icing on the cake.

By contrast to musicality, a key point about decorations is exactly that - they're icing, they're not the cake. So these should not ever interfere with the connection or the basic step. If you're not comfortable doing the basic step, then don't do decorations.

We examined several possible adornments - for the follower and for the leader.

Side "mini-step"

Leaders, lead the first motion of a side-step; such that the follower starts to move her feet.

Stop at that point, and lead her to swing her foot back to the collection point.

Repeat until you can isolate this element. You can then use this as a "pulse" element.

Follower - hook step

For any forward or back step, followers can "hook" their feet into a back or forward cross position.

We worked on this with:

  • Forwards steps
  • Back steps
  • Forwards ochos
  • Back ochos

(Gives 8 possible variations)

Leader - giro enrosque

"Enrosques" are nice ways for the leader to adorn a giro.

We worked on enrosques for anti-clockwise giros (right leg) and clockwise giros (left leg).

The "enrosque" is simply a spiral. You turn on one foot and leave the other foot in place, allowing you to twist one leg around, then untwist it to allow effect.

Here is Osvaldo Zotto and Mora Godoy's version

Notes

Again, remember that decorations should not change the dance tempo, they should simply add to it.

Another little trick - feet placement "twisted" in advance of a giro.

Related articles

- David Bailey, 19th October 2009