S is for Syncopation

S is for Syncopation
Musically, syncopation is defined as a disturbance or interruption of the regular or expected rhythm, or the placement of accents where they wouldn’t normally occur.  I suppose that this definition would also be generally appropriate for dances that have basic patterns which include only the basic timing of quicks and slows in their basic patterns:  waltz, foxtrot, rumba, and country 2-step would all be examples.  But what about cha-cha and polka?  Their basic patterns include a triple step or 3 steps stuffed into 2 beats of music.  Hustle?  It includes 2 steps stuffed into 1 beat of music.  All are examples of syncopations in dance:  more steps than ‘normal’ danced in a beat or two beats of music.

But what is my favorite definition of syncopation?  The extra steps or fancy footwork that a more advanced dancer uses to correct (or cover up) a mistake!  What?  Who me?  Oh no…that wasn’t a mistake….that was a syncopation!  Why yes….I thought it was pretty interesting too.  Thank you! (smirk!) 

Dance of the Day:  Salsa

Mix together:

6 Roma Tomatoes, chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced
2 seeded and minced jalapenos
½ onion, chopped fine
1 TBS olive oil
Juice of 1 lime
Salt, pepper, chopped fresh scallions, chopped cilantro, chopped parsley, to taste

Serve with tortilla chips.

Consume on breaks between dances while dancing Mambo “on the 1” to really fast 4-count Latin music!

R is for Repetition, Repetition, Repetition!

R is for Repetition, Repetition, Repetition

I think that one the most frustrating thing about learning to dance was that I was so excited about it that I wanted to be really good at it NOW!  Everyone around me made it look so easy and I felt like such a klutz!  And it seemed to take forever for me to learn even the simplest movement.  I couldn’t even remember which foot went where let alone put them there fast enough to keep up with my partner.  Why was it taking sooooo long and why didn’t I just “get it”?

When I started taking classes and lessons, I always wondered why the pattern or technique that was being taught would seem reasonably comfortable by the end of the class, but be foggy by the next evening when I tried use it at a social dance and completely gone by the follow week when I went back to class.  Then slowly, the earlier basic movements and techniques that I learned became second nature and they were replaced by more complex and difficult movements that continued to torture my self confidence and belief that I could learn to dance!  The trouble is that at the time I didn’t realize that I had accomplished anything so I continued to beat myself up on my inability to learn and really, looking back, spoiled the joy of the journey of learning.  (I really think this is why kids learn things faster than adults…they look at the process as playtime!)  

Dang…how could I be such a slow learner?  Of course, the answer is that I wasn’t necessarily a slow learner, I just hadn’t done enough repetitions to get the movement into my muscle memory so that I could execute it without thinking and go on to think about new challenges.

So…how many repetitions does it take to get a movement into muscle memory?  (And, while we are at it, how many licks DOES it take to get to the center of a Tootsi Pop?)

According to a 1991 book called Motor Learning by Drs. Schmidt and Wrisberg, it takes 300 to 500 repetitions to burn a new movement into muscle memory!  (Muscle memory is the body’s ability to execute a movement without consciously thinking about how to do it.)  That is just one movement…not a complex dance pattern or technique which might include several different movements!  To put those numbers into perspective let’s consider my favorite dance:  Country 2-step.  A slow country 2-step that would normally be danced at a country bar has a tempo of about 150 beats per minute.  Assume that a dance lasts 3 minutes.  That would be 450 beats/dance.  If a dance couple only danced the 2-step basic (2 quicks and 2 slows, down line of dance in close dance position, leader going forward and follower going backward) that would be 6 beats/basic pattern or 75 basic patterns per dance.  If the only movements they were trying to master was 1) the “2 slow steps”, and 2) the “2 quick steps” (and thus ignoring all the fine muscle control to hold dance position), than it would take at least 600-1000 repetitions of the basic pattern to burn the required movements into muscle memory.  At 75 repetitions of the basic pattern/song the couple would have to dance 8-14 songs, doing nothing other than a correct basic pattern to put the 2-step basic into muscle memory!!  Add in variations like turns or syncopations, each with several movement components and well….do the math…we just aren’t going to learn to dance in a couple of hours!

Oh…and a bit of bad news….the number of repetitions required to erase a bad habit and replace it with the correct movement?  3000-5000!!!  (Note to self…learn it correctly the first time!)

The good news….dancing is an amazing life long journey and social hobby!  Getting those movements into muscle memory isn’t painful at all!

Dance of the Day:  Rumba

Rumba is the slowest of the International Latin dances that are danced competitively.  It is danced to 4-count music and has a basic pattern timing of slow-quick-quick.  It is a beautiful, sensual dance of Cuban origin that was introduced to Europe and the United States in the early 1950s. 

K is for KISS!

K is for Kiss

KISS….Keep It Simple Silly…or alternately…what can happen when you drift to the right out of proper dance frame and find yourself toes to toes, knees to knees and …lips to lips with your dance partner! 

So since the second option is pretty obvious (although the mechanism of how we got there sometimes isn’t), let’s contemplate the first option! 

 I’ll admit that I am not a step junkie.  If fact, quite the opposite and much to the irritation of several coaches and a couple of dance partners, I really don’t find much joy in learning to dance the steps or patterns by myself backwards and in high heals!  And when I am dancing, I am much more impressed by a leader that has great timing and musicality than one with a bunch of badly led steps! 

I am inspired by learning to be a really good follower and being able to follow any of those patterns.  But actually learning to dance each one of them on my own seems overwhelming if not impossible, backwards and not that much fun.  So, whenever it was really necessary, I would learn short sequences of difficult or highly choreographed (un-lead-able) choreography for my various competition routines and know that if my leader blew out of the routine that I had just learned then I would have to follow whatever he led that had no resemblance to the original routine anyway so what was the point?…sigh. 

And then somehow, I found myself starting to teach.  And, in my opinion, if you can’t dance it you shouldn’t be teaching it…so that left me in a bit of a bind because I really needed to learn to lead quick and that meant, drats, learning patterns.  Oh dear, what now? 

Fortunately for me…and anyone who wants to learn to dance but is overwhelmed by the thought of learning all those different patterns for each different dance…at least at the social level, nearly every pattern that can be danced in one dance can be danced in more than one dance and sometimes in many dances…so there aren’t that many to learn after all!  And that is where the simplicity comes in…learn to execute a pattern proficiently, study the timing of the dance that pattern comes from, choose another dance, usually from the same family of dances although not always, study the new dance timing, adjust the timing of the pattern to the new dance and POOF! a new pattern in two dances!  Now we are getting somewhere….if I learn 5 patterns and how to blend them together, then apply the to the different timing of 3 different various dances, I suddenly have plenty of material to lead in each of 3 different dances…I think that even I can get my pattern-phobic head around that concept!

 Don’t believe me?  Try it...Mambo and cha-cha are the same dance but that the “slow” in Mambo is replaced with a “triple step” in cha-cha.  Therefore, anything that can be led in Mambo can be led in cha-cha!  It works because both a “slow” and a “triple-step” take up 2 beats of music and the other action in each of the dances is a rock-step.  That’s just one example but the principle works over and over again….just keep it simple…don’t try to learn bunches of patterns for every dance…just learn good basic dance technique, understand the principles of structure and timing in each dance you want to learn and learn to execute a few patterns really well….then change the timing of each pattern to fit the timing of each dance that you want to dance suddenly dancing isn’t so overwhelming after all…even for us pattern-phoebes!

J is for "Just DO IT"

J is for…. Just Do It

 Hmmmm….guess that “Just Do It” would apply to my getting this blog written on time, too!  Actually, doesn’t it apply to anything that is out of our comfort zone or not something that we don’t actually love to do and do easily?  Really….when was that last time someone had to tell me to ‘get off my butt and Just DO IT’ when it came to eating an ice cream cone?????

 It’s hard enough to get committed to do something that is unfamiliar, seems that it will be difficult or overwhelming, or maybe even embarrassing or painful (as in my favorite excuse for not going back to the gym….it has been months or maybe a year since I have been and I know I am going to be too sore to move after I have been so…why go!) but more often than not, the thought process that we go through to try to justify not doing something unfamiliar is much worse than the actual activity turns out to be (that acknowledgement probably will not get me to the gym tonight because I have several other well worn excuses)!

 Dancing can be a really tough activity to start, especially if we believe that we are clumsy or uncoordinated or have 2 Left Feet!  I mean…if I go to dance class and can’t dance, I might look bad…right?  Umm….isn’t not being able to dance the point of taking dance class and isn’t it really likely that everyone else in class is equally unsure of themselves and their ability to grasp the new techniques that they are being taught?  So…wouldn’t taking a class be a great way to get started?  And, if a class still seems overwhelming, there are always private lessons….one-on-one attention from an instructor with no concern about the rest of the class watching, pointing and thinking…wow….(s)he does that way better than I do…I wonder what (s)he is doing in this class?

 So…be brave…try something new….JUST DO IT….learn to dance!

Dance of the Day:  Jitterbug 

(Could be Jive…but I think that describing those darned kick/flicks is way too much work….just dancing them!)

Jitterbug is a member of the swing dance family that gained popularity in the mid-1930’s.  Danced to moderate or faster swing music, it can be very energetic, aerobic and acrobatic.  Although a number of different versions of swing have been called “Jitterbug” over the years, what we commonly dance now is ‘rock-step, step-step’ pattern to quick-quick-slow-slow timing.  It’s just that those slows can be pretty darned quick sometimes!  The dance is rotational in nature and mostly stationary although it can “drift” somewhat randomly depending on the patterns danced. 

Interestingly, the term “Jitterbug”  is used to describe the dancer as well as the dance.  It has also been coined as a somewhat derogatory reference to the jerky, uncontrolled movements of a drunk person.  The term has appeared in many songs, including Cab Calloway’s “Call of the Jitterbug” and “Minnie the Moocher”.  And, although it was cut from the final film, a song called “The Jitterbug” was written for a scene in the 1939 film “The Wizard of Oz” where the Wicked Witch of the West sent a bug to sidetrack the traveling heroes by causing them to dance the “Jitterbug”!  Ah….and dancing is still a great distraction today!

A is for ASK Me to Dance - PLEASE!

Ask me to dance….PLEASE!

Here I sit, swaying to the music, trying to look casual and smiley & happy to be sitting at the edge, tapping out the rhythm and watching all the real dancers fly around the floor.  Looking hopefully into the face of every man walking my direction and hoping he will ask me.  Pick me.  Ask ME!  Oh PLEASE ASK ME TO DANCE! 

There he goes off to ask a good dancer. And here I sit, careful to follow him only with my eyes not my head, ‘cause that would look too desperate….too close to the truth. 

Oh oh….here comes another one.  Maybe he’ll ask me.  Maybe I’ll be his charity dance tonight.  Who cares, it’s still a dance.  w…w…WHAT? Why, YES, oh YES!  I would love to dance with you.  Thank you for asking.  Um, yes, I am still learning and thank you for putting up with me.  I’m taking classes and trying to learn as fast as I can but it would be easier if more people would dance with beginners like me.  Thank you for being so kind.  Thanks again, for putting up with me.  It was a fun dance (for me at least) and you are a great leader and I hope you will dance with me again sometime….

Oh good…a chair…I love to dance, I LOVE to dance, I love to DANCE…and looking back it is so amazing that I dance nearly every dance now but every now and then it feels so good to sit out a song.  Um…what?  Oh….yes, of course I’ll dance with you!  No, I don’t mind at all if you are a beginner.  We all started as beginners.  I still (painfully) remember being a beginner…I had to BEG for dances.  Of course I’m happy to dance with you, and you and you…and you....  

Ah, now….where was that chair.  Oh dear, someone is sitting in it.  Well…there are other chairs.  But wait.  The guy sitting in that chair looks like he’s new here….like he’s new to dancing….like he wants so desperately to dance but is terrified to scan the crowd for a willing partner to his stuttering timing and unsure leads.  Oh well, so much for chairs…excuse me…yes, hi….are you new here?  Awesome…I’m so glad you are learning to dance!  May I have this dance?  Yes…I know you are a beginner….that’s fine, we all started somewhere and I would really like to dance this dance…with you.

Dance of the Day:  Argentine Tango.

A mythically difficult dance that is often said to be all about musical interpretation and believed to have no basic structure.  It was originally danced in the 1880’s in the bars, gambling houses and brothels around the periphery of Buenos Aires as a tool in negotiating the services of ladies of the night.  Tango found its way to Paris in the early 1900s.  Ironically, the scandalous Argentine dance immediately became the Parisian craze.  Then, after being (close) embraced by all of Europe and New York, tango returned to Buenos Aires where it was welcomed as a long lost favorite son and is now one of the country’s top cash crops.  Ah…what’s old is new again!  And it does have a basic structure…really.