B is for Balance
Since dancing is just a controlled fall and getting really
good at it means learning to control one’s intended motion as it opposes
gravity so that the outcome looks fluid, in sync with one’s partner and the
music, and…balanced…then losing your balance isn’t really a bad thing at
all….it is a requirement! And the
perception of balance is simply an illusion!
If dance partners were in total balance with each other there would be
no dance– only statuesque stillness with beauty perhaps, but no musicality,
movement or emotion.
But wait, isn’t that just like life? Life’s balance isn’t really standing with
both feet planted firmly on the ground, going nowhere and doing nothing. It is finding harmony and equilibrium between
all the things we want and need to do. Balance
is finding a way to do what we want/need to do while making it look calm and
easy.
Calm and easy…flying apparently effortlessly across the
floor with a dance partner. Two bodies
moving separately yet as one with each other and the music, looking calm and
controlled, yet completely off balance and in a continuous love/hate battle
with gravity.
And to all my partners who have had hold up more than their fair share of our partnership in order to support me when I wobbled or leaned too hard, please forgive me…I was just learning how to lose my balance.
Today’s Dance: Bolero
A slow-tempo
Latin dance done to “bolero” music.
There are both Spanish and Cuban forms of the music. The Spanish being ¾ or waltz timing dating
from the late 1700’s, the Cuban being the 4/4 timing version dating from about
1930 that is commonly danced today.
Bolero is danced competitively as one of the American Rhythm dances. It is an unusual Latin dances in that it
requires both the typical Cuban motion but also incorporates rise and fall as
found in waltz (homage to it’s Spanish cousin, perhaps?) and contra body
movement. Note that the famous “Ravel’s
Bolero” is of the Spanish genre, in ¾ timing, and thus sadly, one can not dance
a modern bolero to Bolero!
