Why I don't dance with you more

An acquaintance of mine would like me to dance with her more.  Her tactic is complaining to me that she never gets asked to dance.  She bugs me about not asking her more in a kidding/not kidding kind of way.  She also says things like "I don't know why I come out no one ever asks me to dance" and "I only danced two tandas, that's $5 per tanda " (milonga cover charge was $10).  She complains a lot - about the music, and the men, and the venue, and even her health.

I always dance one tanda with her since she's been friendly to me and was kind enough to help get me out of my introverted shell a bit, so I feel like I owe her one tanda.  But only one.

There's a lot of things that I can't say charitably, so I keep my mouth shut.  But here's what I'm thinking, more or less from worst to best:

The fact is that you drink a bit, and even when sober you lean on your partner a lot.  Now if you were an older woman who is just physically unable to maintain your axis, that would be one thing, but I don't believe that to be the case.  I don't know if you're unaware that you're not on your axis (I wasn't, for a frightfully long time), but the result is that your partner is going to be severely limited in what he can attempt, and he's going to be physically taxed by holding you up more or less continuously for 10 minutes.  Dancing with you is more work than joy, and men's choices of partner will reflect that.

You complained that the very, very good dancer at the milonga didn't hold you like he was holding his current partner (at the time you were complaining).  First of all, if I were a woman, I'd be flattered and happy just to dance with the man in question, because he's creative and moves wonderfully and even though he's very, very good (can you tell I'm a fan?) he dances with everybody.  But never mind that.  First of all, his current partner is a slender woman who is completely on her axis and is in control of her body at all times, and is a very, very good dancer in her own right.  He holds her accordingly.  If you want him to hold you like he's holding her, then lose some weight and get on your axis, and practice.

We spent about 10 minutes dancing, and you spent at least 15 minutes before and 15 minutes after complaining about your lot.  I'm seeking to minimize my interactions with you.

I'm an open embrace dancer, because I'm shy and It's what I'm used to.  You'll dance open embrace grudgingly (and complainingly), but you obviously prefer close embrace.  I don't have anything against close embrace, it's just not what I prefer to do.  Perhaps as I become more skilled and experienced (and less shy) I will be able to do either, but I have a very difficult time leading in close embrace and so in that regard we're just not the best match for each other.

This is America, and women are alleged to be empowered here, we have equality, etc etc.  Ask someone to dance.  I know it's daunting - I'm shy and I find asking strangers and even acquaintances uncomfortable.  Even if they accept (which they mostly do).  But that's one way you can get more dances.

There are a lot of women who want to dance at the milonga, and usually more women than men.  This means that you are going to have to play nice and share, and it also means that you have to compete to be the most pleasant option compared to your peers.  I may have mentioned some ways you can improve your odds above.  But even then, you're not going to dance every song.

I watched two particular women you were competing with that same night.  One is a young (mid twenties) enthusiastic intermediate dancer and improving rapidly (because she works at it).  She's in control of her axis most of the time, and she's also trim and pretty and she laughs a lot and is always having and sharing a good time.

The other is a woman in her late forties, who's an incredibly skilled and amazing dancer (because she has dedicated decades to practice), and she is trim and fit and beautiful and makes a point to do more than her fair share of what it takes to make a beautiful dance.

The younger woman danced about five or six tandas.  She probably could have danced more but she was spending a lot of time being a social butterfly.  I've interacted with her when she was doing so, and I can tell you she's charming and happy and pleasant to be around.

The older, more skilled woman only danced three or four tandas.  She wasn't asked.  I personally didn't ask her because she intimidates me (it's not her, it's me).  I don't know why others don't ask her more, but the fact is that no one dances every song.

You seem to think that paying your admission to the milonga guarantees you lots of dances.  The nerds would say that's "necessary but not sufficient".  You must do much much more than that (and frankly, less of what you're doing now).

Good luck.

Why I keep coming back to Tango

There are no mistakes in tango.  This has meaning on so many levels.  The simplest is that without set figures and steps, nothing is off the table - you can

attempt anything, and hopefully you can make it beautiful (some movements make this easier than others of course).

Tango is sexy and passionate and intimate and filled with longing and strife and anger and tenderness and beauty.

It's uniquely challenging and difficult.  I like difficult things, it turns out.

It demands a level of balance and awareness and body control that I didn't experience in other dances.  Not that other dances lack that, I just think that it comes later in the learning sequence.  With Tango it begins on day 1.  I danced ballroom styles for over a year and didn't realize that I was essentially falling onto every step the whole time.  Once I started tango, I figured it out in about a week, and started correcting it in the first month.  And this vastly improved all my other dancing.

The music is beautiful.  And various.  You can dance tango to nearly anything, because it's so improvisational and flexible.  You can tango to classic tangos (Bahia Blanca is a favorite of mine, along with "Por una Cabeza" (Scent of a Woman" and "True Lies"), or modern tangos ("Whatever Lola Wants", "Roxanne") or waltzes ("valz" in spanish), to pop music.  I've tangoed to Adele "Make you Feel my Love", to Elvis Costello "Watching the Detectives", to Lorde "Royals" and Amy Winehouse " I'm no good" - a wonderful fit for tango.

The Gallantry and old school chivalry of dancing in general holds very much in tango, and that appeals to me as well.  The man leads, and the woman follows, but the goal is to provide a pleasant and fulfilling experience for the woman.  She should be intrigued, happy, and feel like she is dancing beautifully and that all are looking on her with amazement and envy.

I'm most familiar with the leader's role and responsibilities, but the woman's is no less daunting.  I've tried to follow, and being on your axis and prepared to move in any direction requires an alertness and a kind of a zen mind that I found supremely challenging.  Another factor (shared with other dances) is the fact that when something is led, the woman must aggressively pursue and execute the step or move.  A combination of stillness and motion, of waiting peacefully, and moving confidently, and a willingness to essentially trade the lead with the man as the music inspires is required.

The man must quickly learn and dance to his partner's level of experience and vocuabulary, and his lead must be authoritative and unmistakeable while still being gentle and considerate of however long her response may take.  If any signals get crossed (either through a vague lead or difficulty following), the man must seamlessly accommodate whatever has actually happened, ideally without ever letting on to his partner or observers that anything unexpected has occurred.  The woman should always feel that she knows what is being asked of her, and should never feel like she performed anything less than perfectly.  The man must be able and willing to give her time to dance as the music inspires her, and there will be times when she is inspired to change her pace or include embellishments or even perform something that was not explicitly led.  A leader must always have a plan, but when the lady requests time or even takes the lead, he must smoothly and elegantly accommodate that.  At all times the man must dance with confidence.  There are no mistakes in tango, and the man must ensure that.

Two Leaders - Argentine Tango

I've been spending a lot of time dancing Argentine Tango lately, and at a recent milonga, I witnessed a vision of two leaders.

The first was dancing with what I suspect was his girlfriend, she danced with him several times, though not every dance.  She also danced with other men but he didn't dance with other women.  She was definitely the better dancer, I suspect that she was introducing him to Tango.

He wasn't a total beginner, he knew salida and a few other moves.  But what  drove me crazy (and I suspect, his dance partner as well) was his tentativeness.  He didn't keep a rhythm, he was hesitant when he moved, and when he wasn't moving he was nervous and twitchy.  I kept seeing what looked like false starts and indecision. His partner seemed nervous and hyper-alert, she realized she had no idea what was coming next, and neither did he, and it could happen at any instant, without warning.  It looked as though he was second guessing himself until he figured out the right thing - he'd have been better off doing the wrong thing calmly, definitively and rhythmically.

The second was  a young man, but obviously experienced.  He was calm and rhythmic and deliberate.  His dancing was simple and unadorned, but very clear and patient.  I saw him dance with a woman I know who's had about six months of ballroom dancing and basically an hour or so of Argentine Tango, and he made her look beautiful and graceful and elegant.  When she did something different than he led, he just handled it without lifting an eyebrow.  When things got tricky, he just slowed everything down - he would just be still for a few beats, and then he would start moving again in half time.  And when he was still, he was so beautifully still.  He wasn't just static and frozen either, he'd move or sway or change his embrace but he was able to do it in a way that told his partner "we're just being still right now".  When he moved she knew it just enough in advance.  Everything he did looked (and I imagine felt) inevitable.

I so badly want to be guy number 2.

So here's my plan.

Work on frame and lead and clarity first.  Figures and moves come later.

Be willing to just be still.  Learn what movements say "we're staying here" vs "we're moving now".  Learn to eliminate anything that's twitchy or indeterminate.  Decide to be still, and communicate that.

Let go of the beat and don't try too hard to follow the music.  Remember that it's easy to dance too fast (for your partner, or your skill level, or your ability to lead), but it's nearly impossible to dance too slowly.

Dance Simply.

Definitive Leading

I've been thinking about leading on a couple of moves and how that's reflected in life.

As a leader it's difficult for me to be as definitive as I'd like.  Some of it is bad habits - I tend to drop my right elbow, my frame isn't as stable and reliable as I'd like, and when I get to thinking I've had several partners tell me they can feel me "go away" in my body.  Well, yes, that's because I'm up in my head.  This is particularly problematic when I'm having challenges with traffic and floorcraft, or when I'm not planning ahead on figures I want to lead.  A lot of the time, I'm late with my lead, or I just can't remember how a particular figure starts.

All this is just stuff that will more or less get fixed by lots of practice and by getting dancing out of my head and into my body.

But there are things about my lead that I have to fix in my head, and that's interesting.

I was working with Mighty Mini-Teach on Foxtrot the other day and we happened to be working on both Grapevine and Senior walks.  They both start the same way, with my second step going outside partner, and I've had a few partners pick up on that and assume we were doing grapevine, when I meant to lead Senior walk.  Or at least I thought I did.  Tenatively.

Anyway, I asked MMT "How do I lead this so you know it's senior walk, not grapevine?".  She said "You have to cut me off".  I tried, tentatively, and she stressed "No, you have to REALLY cut me off".

A lot of the vagueness in my lead is due to my deference to my partner and my lack of confidence in my own moves.  I certainly don't want to be a pushy dancer, but I bet I could stand to make that mistake for a change as a learning exercise and be just fine.  I need to get over myself and be willing to cut off my partner when I need to, and to pay her the respect of just expecting her to follow that.


Definitive, explicit, confident leads.  It's something we both want.

Expert lesson - Tango and East Coast Swing

My studio had a travelling expert (Urs Geisenhainer from "Dancing with the Stars, 2009  as well as other credits) in town, and (along with an amazing demonstration tango he danced with the lady instructors), he held a workshop and private lessons; I participated in both.

The workshop focused on tango and was attended by students of all levels.  Herr Geisenhainer managed the challenge of teaching different levels of students well; He introduced new steps, worked on basics, and provided styling advice all in the workshop.  Despite the fact that as I write this, I'm not sure how he could have possibly done all that, it actually flowed very smoothly and didn't feel overwhelming.  Plus I mostly learned a variation of shadow rocks that I'm anxious to work on.

My (our) private lesson was East Coast Swing, and was shared with my East Coast Swing partner.  After watching him dance Tango and teach Tango, I was tempted to stick with Tango (which would probably have been fine with my partner, as she's the biggest pusher of Argentine Tango you ever met), but of course I didn't.  He helped us with several elements of our ECS, at first it was mostly styling, and let me tell you, this guy can swing.  I've been having trouble with my walkaround turns (typical guy - I'm OK unless I'm asked to spin...), and not only did he fix that (I still have to practice, of course), but he really helped me see how to make them appropriate for swing (his demonstration of swing vs cha cha styling in walkarounds was very vivid - the Cha Cha walkarounds were upright and snappy, but with the appropriate hip movement, where the ECS walkarounds had a completely different hip and body swing that I can't describe...  Big hip swings, rather than the comparatively subtle Cuban motion from Cha Cha...

But, man, it swung.

If you ever get a chance to watch, or better, learn from Urs Geisenhainer, take it.  He's an awesome dancer, an insightful and enthusiastic teacher, and a genuinely fun guy to learn from.

Here's a Viennese waltz (my favorite), which he performed with several other dancers.

Waltz - Promenade and Twinkle

So here's the data dump on my Waltz group class the other night.

It was a fairly full and almost perfectly balanced class, we were short one lady. We spent the first half of class working on promenade - most of us had some familiarity with the move, but we all could use work on it. The latter part of the class we spent on twinkle and left and right twinkle (or as we called the move, "George"...) I hadn't been exposed to twinkle and left and right twinkle, but I managed to pick up the basics and footwork fairly quickly. Just the last half of promenade, starting at the other end of the box, on the other foot. The nuggets I was most in need of were those having to do with my frame and lead.

The mantra "nose and toes" is something I'd heard before, and my interpretation is that the point is to signal definitively with your head and toes, without getting your hips too much out of square. I definitely have a tendency to not lead the promenade with my head, and one of my partners really helped me understand how important that is to her following, because she just had a much harder time following when I got sloppy with my head. The other thing I need to remind myself is that it also looks fabulous.

The Young Turk really helped us pay attention to what the leader's right arm was doing during the "nose and toes" setup phase of promenade/twinkle. I'd been elongating my frame somewhat, but TYT pointed out that the gentlemen should actually be executing a right turning action with his right arm, resulting in a lady that's slightly more behind in frame, and slightly pivoted open - set up perfectly for promenade. Plus she ends up cradled in your right arm which gives her the stable, supportive structure she needs to really cut loose on her develope'.

The other thing that seemed to help a lot is my focusing on maintaining a positive connection with my left hand. The right turning action and frame elongation often felt like I was taking away the strong connection we had, and a positive left hand connection made that feel much more secure and definitive. This also made it feel like I was shifting slightly inside a strong, stable frame rather than it feeling sloppy.

Social dancing and group classes

So I haven't been blogging for a long time much at all. I keep wanting to make these deep, thoughtful, insightful posts, and there's not a lot of that going on in my dancing. Maybe there never was. Lately, I've been dancing a lot (which is better than blogging about it, I think you'll agree), but I'm trying to keep all the action in my body rather than being all up in my head. Or at least, these are my excuses for not blogging. I've got drafts of nine "deep" posts, I swear.  But then, I've had them all for months, so...

I've decided just to blog everything and quit holding out for significance. So here are some random notes from recent group classes.

Lately, I'm trying to participate on all the group classes that cover what I think of as socially useful dances: Salsa, Rumba, Country, and (to a lesser extent) Swing and Foxtrot. How is this different than just going to ALL the group classes, you ask?

Well, first of all, I'm not going when the dance is totally new to me, which happens with what strikes me as surprising frequency. There's a bunch of dances in the world, and they offer most of them. Cha Cha, Samba, Quickstep, Paso Doble, Jive, Hustle, Argentine Tango, Viennese Waltz and Bolero are all stuff I've recently skipped. I probably should add Cha Cha at some point relatively soon, as there's a lot of Cha Cha-able music out there - lots of pop and rock, which surprised me.

Secondly, Before the "Socially useful" dance push, I was spending most of my time on Waltz and Tango, just because I love them so much. And down that same path I could see Viennese Waltz, Argentine Tango, and Bolero looming. Since my one of my main goals is explicitly social, it was clear I needed to emphasize the social dances more than I had been. Tango is definitely a "dancer's dance", and though waltz is fairly social, I need more venue options than Italian weddings. I think I have a lot more to say about the social vs beloved dichotomy, but if I let this post go to long, I'll trap myself in a rewriting/editing cycle, so set that aside for now.

Two Step: It was a small class, I was happy to know about two figures that my partner didn't (not bragging - the score was about four figures for me versus her two). I tried them on her anyway during warm-up, on the theory that if I timed them right, and led them definitively enough, it would all work out fine. That was interesting and instructive if not totally successful.

We did basic underarm turn right, and underarm sweetheart turn (which was new to me). We also did Promenade (new to me, very fox-trotty, unsurprisingly) and a couple of un-sweetheart turns (hey, it's my blog, I get to invent terms for things that have official names if I want to. Especially if I don't remember them). Anyway, I pretty much know one easy, basic way to half turn my partner out of sweetheart, and I've been briefly exposed to a much flashier, turn and a half version, but I know I couldn't do it without at least referring to my notes and maybe not even then.

Rumba class:  This was a pretty full class, and everybody there was pretty experienced, for a basics class. There was one person who was even less experienced than me, but he was game and so Dance-Sama took that as permission to pile on a bunch of stuff. We are working over several weeks toward an extended series, that starts with Basic, Cross Body Lead, Open Breaks, Underarm Turn / 5th Position Break, Swivel Promenade. Yes, she covered all that in one class.

This was a lot for me to take in, but it's starting to make sense, I'm starting to have some body intuition regarding dancing. I've done cross body lead in Salsa and Rumba, and it's starting to make sense that in Rumba I need the forward step that precedes the Salsa version in order to get the forward and back motion that Salsa gives you for free. Doesn't mean my body will remember to do it, but it's a start.

I'd seen most of the other figures before, so nothing earth shattering, and I certainly could use all the practice I can get. The Swivel Promenade was new, and we barely got to that in the time we had. I stayed after and practiced a little, with a partner initially, then alone.

The other insight was Dance-Sama made me feel the correct posture (or at least a better posture) for Rumba (and probably for life - I tend to have the typical nerd's horrible posture). Shoulders back, everything else in and up and slightly forward. I'm working on making that habitual.

Waltz class tonight. Social and beloved. A two-fer!

Waltz, Rumba and Salsa lesson notes

Tonight I had a private lesson, we worked on Rumba, Waltz and Salsa. Some of this was review, but a little new stuff. This post is mostly just my lesson notes - Converting this stuff into words helps me remember it, but probably keeps me too much up in my head. So if lesson notes sounds like an uninteresting post, you'll want to click ahead.

Waltz:
We worked on Promenade. I've done Promenade in Tango, where it is similar, and, frankly, trickier. I need to remember to elongate my frame, and I think I'm opening my hips too much in promenade. The hesitation during promenade felt very natural, but then I'm a slave to the beat.

We also did an open break - underarm turn combination. Aaaarg, the critical details are already fading!! Let's see, 1st half of a normal box then sidestep? is that right? Then back rock step Left, and lead the turn, back rock step Right, (turning...) then another hesitation before we're off to the waltzes again. I'm starting to love the hesitations in the waltz, they're subtly dramatic and they're what makes it human and to me they add so much to the flow of the dance. Without the hesitations, it could be done by clockwork dancers (which I probably resemble, but not for long....)

Salsa:
We reviewed cross body lead, and I needed the review, I wanted to start it on 3 (back step), but it needs to be set up on 2, otherwise my partner can't feel it coming. We also did a double face loop, I tend to hang on too long, in which case I tend to turn my body out, but that's not the end of the world, it's a decent set up for a cross body lead. I think getting into the Right-over-Left handshake hold to start this all is probably my biggest problem right now.

We also reviewed coaster action, which I was fine with, but I had a surprisingly hard time knowing what to do with my right foot after my left foot comes up. I need a thousand reps, as usual.

Rumba:
We also did an open break, underarm turn combo, Teach is obviously building on the Waltz lesson. I need practice rolling my left hand from the closed grip to the low open grip. And I think I am often too high with my Right arm - Teach very insightfully helped me understand that if our arms aren't nice and straight, I can't provide a strong lead. I'm starting to get my lead together on the "close the door" finale to this combination (the same motion also completes the cross body lead), and I love the way that feels when I'm leading it confidently.


The DanceEvangelista has drafted me into a little dance competition on Saturday. I'm the token noob on her team, and we're going to do a Jitterbug. I'm pushing my comfort level here, Though I'm decent at Jitterbug for all my noobness, if I do say so myself. But I'm nervous about the spotlight. Making mistakes in the middle of a crowd of other people who are all working through their own dance issues is one thing. All eyes on me and no other distractions is intimidating.

Following and perception

I'm shopping around for different studios for dance instruction. Not that I'm unhappy with my original outfit, just because I'm a dilettante.

I had my second session with a new instructor recently. Our first session was only half an hour, and in the process of trying to understand something about my hips and center, I related it to Aikido (that NEVER happens....) and mentioned I'd had class just before my dance lesson.

So I show up for our second session a week later. Five minutes into our dance lesson, she interrupted herself and observed "Why didn't you have your martial arts tonight?"

Woah. How did you know?

"You're moving differently".

At this point I've only spent about 35 or 40 minutes with this woman TOTAL.

I guess that's what years of following on the dance floor will do for you.

I'm still gobsmacked.

The Frame, Again

Quickies from a recent lesson:

Your frame - Resilience vs stiffness:
Your frame is all about the relationship between your elbows and spine. Your elbows need to move together, constant distance between your elbows is desirable, having them flapping about is bad, MMmmmkay?. Feeling the relationship between your elbows is how your partner gets signals about rotation. I don't remember if my instructor said this or if this is just my Aikido perspective, but rotation comes from your core, through your hips, back, and then frame. I do remember my instructor made a big deal about the phrase Counter Body Rotation (I may have remembered that phrase wrong - when you google it, you get lots of skiing and snowboarding references...)

Supporting your frame
Your frame should be supported by your lats and traps in your back, supported from below (as much as possible. At least, it should feel that way). I think of it as being like a couple of rubber bumpers in your back that your shoulder blades rest on. My mistake has been to "hang" my frame off my shoulders and collarbones and upper chest. This puts tension in your shoulders, chest, and upper body that you don't need. Apparently this one of the classic blunders men make. Supported from below via your back is the way to go. Rotating your shoulders back is a huge part of this. Start with your arms straight overhead, lower them (still straight) until they are pointing directly ahead of you, roll your shoulders back, then open your elbows out to establish your frame. This helped me feel what I should be doing. A decent frame is also going to demand better posture than I typically have.


There's a difference between getting this mentally and being able to DO it, but at least I have a mental model to start from. Now to get it into my body.

The Frame

Analogy I picked up at dance lesson last night:

Your frame is your steering wheel.

Imagine a limp, floppy steering wheel in your car. Imagine trying to drive that through traffic.


Don't have a limp steering wheel.

Leading

It's important to me to be a strong lead. I'm starting to get the importance of a strong frame - that structure's how you communicate. I think I tend to be a little limp on my right arm, I think my shoulder is letting my elbow droop. I've been told that the structure comes primarily from my back, not from my shoulders. I'm still thinking about that - which is of course not the point, the point is to do it for a few hundred hours and not think, but I think about everything. I'll probably Google "dancing strong lead" after I post this and geek out.

It's also interesting that leading is boiling down to communicating what you're doing with your core - your center. Of course, the center is also a big deal in Aikido. I guess I shouldn't be surprised - both of these are arts that are all about moving a human figure (or two, I suppose) around on the planet, in gravity, staying balanced while in motion, moving with a purpose. Both of them have that tension between structure and flexibility - you're not stiff, but you've got structure. You need structure to make something happen. But you need flexibility, controlled flexibility to create the motion.

I'm starting to feel how to communicate to my partner, but there's a lot involved. My posture. My poise. My back and elbows. My footwork. I seriously need to get over my tendency to try to dodge around my partner's feet. Not only is that wrong, it's weak leading, but it muddies the signals she needs.

In Aikido I sometimes have a bad habit of moving around or sort of glancing off my partner's center, when I should be moving my center through theirs. On the dance floor I'm not as definitive and decisive as I'd (and my partner'd) like me to be. Part of that is I don't know what I'm doing yet, in fact I often don't know what my options even are. It's hard to be definitive when my brain runs off the little island of what I know - like Wiley Coyote ten feet beyond the cliff edge, holding up a little sign reading "Now What?". But part of it is just that attitude I need of "Now, I am doing THIS". Decide and act. Unapologetically, decisively, unambiguously. Maybe dance will help my Aikido. I'm sure Aikido will help my dance.

I'm also not spending enough time just dancing between lessons. Lessons tend to pile on as much new information as I can take, or a little bit more, which is fine and wonderful and good value and responsible teaching. That's all good. But because I think about everything, and because I ultimately need to stop thinking I need hours of dancing just for practice. I think I'm going to try to find another student to just drill with - do the new thing I learned about 20 times in a row till my body starts feeling it. Or maybe I'll discuss this with my teachers and figure out how to get some drill time. As it is now, I get back on the dance floor and am trying to think what to do, instead of being in a place where I'm just moving.

Having fun.