Fizz Beyond the Basics STYLE CLASS - Week 3 Summary

Here's the recap email that I just sent to our students, after the three week class on STYLE that I taught with Ana Christian at Fizz:

Hey Student,

Our three week Beyond the Basics series on STYLE is over. You owe homework to no one but yourself! We hope you have gotten something useful from the class and that you continue to explore and grow. There’s a recap of the class below, in case there’s anything you missed or would like to remember.

Here’s the recap of the three week STYLE series:

WEEK ONE: Essential Lindy Hop TECHNIQUE

We focused on sound Lindy Hop mechanics - fundamental leading and following technique, though possibly different from what you’ve learned elsewhere. 

The leading skills - placement of weight, clarity of connection from core to core, body leading.

The following skills - continuance of motion (keep moving until the end of the line), clarity of connection from core to core, killing anticipation (being okay NOT walking forward and just dancing in place)

Everyone was exposed to the fundamentals of leading and following, both sides. We hope that getting a feel for both roles helps with whichever you prefer to focus on. We didn’t present much in terms of style. However the foundation of style starts with sound technique.

HW playlist: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLqLKBNesVXgh-zPTnNolgoLk081YT11x6

WEEK TWO: Dancers get to SHINE!

This week we looked at the idea of a SHINE STEP, which is a move designed to show one’s self off! We asked at the beginning what STYLE means in the context of dance.

We did a quick exercise about keeping one’s face up. We split into halves and each half did as much shim sham as they could muster. The other group observed. The performing group was prompted at first to perform staring at the ground, and then with their faces above eye-level. The observers uniformly remarked that KEEPING YOUR FACE UP makes a huge difference in whether or not they people can see you.

Then we learned two shine steps - First a FREE SPIN for the leads, working from weight placement and core connection and adding an element of balance. We demonstrated a SHOULDER TWIST for the leads which led to an over-rotation for the follows, and that evolved into showing a variety of SWITCHES to follow. 

Our discussion included questions of what to do while your partner is having a shine moment. A suggestion - be their hype-person and cheer them on, help your partner shine even brighter!

We closed by returning to the question of STYLE. We fielded a lot of great answers. Neil summarized: Style can be the expression of your personality through the dance.

HW playlist: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLqLKBNesVXggnZbAfJ0Uuxp-D4mYXQ2g5

WEEK THREE: Self-assessment, making CHOICES and a few variations

On week three, we asked folks to bring cameras. We broke up into pods to shoot each other dancing. Everyone got about a video of about four swingouts, focusing on them. Then we spent time watching the videos and offering a quick self-assessment. First - what’s something you LIKE about your dancing. Second - what’s something you would like to adjust. 

(Neil adds - being able to find something positive to say about yourself can be hard. When you find something, HOLD ON TO IT!)

Then we shifted the pods and tried a new exercise, still with the cameras:

Four swingouts, but before dancing, the follow’s camera-person whispered a body part to the follow and the follow would find some way to accent or stylize with that body part, that they could repeat four times. On swingouts three and four, the leads would pick up and try to mimic the follow’s choice. 

We then talked about how creativity sometimes comes from somewhere else. You can be inspired in the moment by what you see, and especially by your partner!

Finally we split up to learn some swingout variations. Ana taught a few simple variations, kick-ball-changes, follow swivels, bootie bumps. Neil taught a harder footwork variation which involved tap steps (or kicks if the tap was too much), and really messing with which foot is doing the standing.

Finally, we came back to field thoughts on what everyone got, and everyone chose things they’d like to continue working on! Neil also established an idea: if you see someone doing something cool, CHEER for them!

HW: watch videos of yourself, self-assess (remember to find things that you like and that you’d like to adjust) and keep playing with it! 

You’re more than welcome to reach out to either of us, feel free to ask us for dances.

In closing, it has been an honor to teach you all, for as long as you were able to be with us. We hope you’ll continue to explore and find inspiration in each other and yourself. Have fun and never forget to GO FOR IT!

Sincerely,

Ana and Neil

***

Thanks to Ana for teaching with me and rolling with the punches. Thanks to all of the students who came in and found some inspiration! 

Swing Out and Bear Down!

We got home from Tucson, Arizona last night. It was an incredibly lovely weekend. Fancy and I must offer thanks to everyone who made sure this was such a wonderful trip: Aelynn Heinrichs and Rain Bidleman for handling all of the location, promotion, travel and housing; Kadie Pangburn for putting both of us up in her lovely home (she's also an amazing photographer!); Gayl and Howard Zhao for lending us dance space in their home (Gayl also owns the Dance Loft) and all the students and other folks who were so warm and welcoming.

We taught four classes on Saturday:

Beginner level Lindy Hop - We broke down our basic and then threw out some work on freespins and tuck turns. In-the-moment Leading and Following were secret objectives in this class.
Charleston Chews - We were tacitly teaching Newton's laws of motion until the point when I went and mentioned one of them vocally: "an object in motion stays in motion."
Adventures in the Groove - this is the class on lindy hop improvisation that I wrote a long time ago. I don't get to pull it out at LindyGroove too often since we have so many new folks and it takes an amount of teacher/student trust to teach this class. I'm not going to describe the class here. If you weren't there you'll just have to be there the next time we teach it.
Putting it Together: Style - Eyes up! We taught a couple of stylish examples and then discussed what makes dancers more interesting to watch. Also, if you can't sing, sing loud!

After talking with students there are a few general topics of discussion that I'll leave with. Here are some questions to consider:

relax - with a lower-case r. So many students bring their nerves with them onto the floor. What's the best way to deal with dance anxiety?
Leading and Following - Is it important to use less effort? How does one find the easiest way make this dance happen? What does your partner bring to the equation and waht are some good ways to honor that?
Dogma - what's the point of learning different ways to do things? Why should or shouldn't we experiment with different paradigms?
LOVE - we snuck the word agape into the class at some point. It's a good thing to have. That's not a question.

For those in Tucson, I'll have to recommend the amazing Yoga Oasis studio! Darren Rhoades is a yoga rock star and he's in your town. Classes are dirt cheap. There's so much to learn there. Check it out!

Also, I suggested watching a few videos on The YouTube. Here's one that I'm sure the students didn't write down:


ASSSSCAT! - Here's one take on improvisation. This ain't a dance clip, but it shows the power of Yes And!

Thinking ain't Dancing

I have often said this to my students: "Thinking ain't Dancing."

It has been noted by many other thoughtful dancers that a partner dance is a conversation. I'd like to consider this in a little more detail and to draw out the analogy a bit more. When these dancers refer to a "conversation," to which part of the interaction do they refer? What IS a conversation?

My own personal take on this is that all interactions involve a flow of information. This seems to make sense in the context of a conversation between two people: one person has a message that they would like to share with the other. They might use words and gestures or they might use notes and emails. One difference between a face-to-face conversation and a lengthy long-distance exchange is that when you can see someone their face and body often communicate more powerfully than their words. This seems to be closer to the kind of conversation that we're discussing.

Then there's the physical impulses. While we are dancing, there are a bunch of purely physical sensations. These vary from "ooh, my back hurts" to "I'm hungover," but perhaps the most pertinent in this discussion are the sensations that tell that "I'm touching another human being and they are right here with me."

In class I often refer to "mechanics." In specific, I often am referring to what I believe to be the essential mechanical tools of basic leading and following: a sense of connection from one partner to the other; a sense of balance not only with the partner but with one's self; engagements of a set of muscle groups in one dancer to a corresponding set of muscle groups in their partner; an understanding and application of the core muscles; the support mechanisms of the body from the ground through to the top of the skull. There are an awful lot to discuss, so in class it is more expedient to use the expression mechanics.

In my own personal estimation, these are the most visceral exchanges of information. They don't require a thought process. In fact, it is much slower to process a thought than it is to use our senses. In my beginning classes I sometimes have yelled "stop staring at me and start doing something!" I'll get back to that in a bit, but in short the flow of information goes from my physical image, through eyes into the frontal lobe somewhere, gets processed as information down the spine and usually into the feet. As far as I'm concerned the visual method, while perhaps vital, is also a very inefficient way to learn the dance.

In the improvisation class that I take with Bill Chott, he mentioned an idea called the "rate of acceptance." This is the rate at which after one performer has made a statement that the second performer says yes and then builds upon that foundation. This is in line with what I'm discussing here. One must be able to accept the information in order to use it with their partner.

The thing I mentioned earlier about "stop staring." If I catch a student looking at my feet while doing a step or looking at their partner's feet, I often ask them to take their eyes up and find a new eyeline. While our eyes are useful for communication in the interpersonal sense, they are often impediments to the visceral mechanics that we need to use as Lindy Hoppers.

More about this later. This seems to be plenty for now.

The first point

I was working with some students after class yesterday (by the way, the class went wonderfully. One student said it changed the way that it made him think about dancing!) and I returned to a point that I remember so clearly and which has influenced the way I have taught leading and following for my entire career.

The scenario: he had some basic lindy instruction and she didn't. I asked them to dance and he tried to do the swingout, with her completely befuddled and wondering what she'd have to do the whole time.

I don't buy into the mishegos that every mistake made in dancing is the lead's fault. However, in the case that the lead isn't noticing how much his partner is struggling, this is certainly the case.

My response: F*** your training. If your partner isn't with you then you've got to find them first. Practically, it's better to just do steps in place than to do swingouts if your partner isn't ready.

Then I taught them how to make a swingout work. Of course, the first impulse was to find each other first and the second is to do something together.

Then I set them on the dance floor and as always I asked them to find some dancers they didn't know and ask them to dance too. I miss having students that need to be taught how to find dances. I think that homework is probably the most important assignment of a beginner's dancing life.

The Joy of Paradigm Shifting

Here's a thought that occurred to me while I was in New York last weekend for Frankie95. It puts me in mind of a conversation I had with Eugene (who was within a month of learning his first Lindy Hop steps) a couple of weeks back during which he complained about follows who didn't completely give in to his lead. A little bit of prefacing may be necessary.

About a decade back, I had visited Manhattan for a week or so. I remember attending what might have been the last night of the Louisiana Bar and Grille, which was one of the popular venues of the time. I remember getting kicked a lot on the dance floor and believing that it was more than I would have been kicked on a similarly crowded dance floor at home in Los Angeles. I theorized that Manhattanites, due to living in such crowded conditions, were very unlikely to put a premium on personal space. Residents of the Big Apple regularly spend their time in very tight spaces - subway cars, elevators, even sometimes the outdoors seems crowded to me. As this is apparently the case, it makes a lot of sense that the Lindy Hoppers of New York deal with their dance space in exactly the same way.

Now for a person like me, who gets kind of itchy when I'm around big crowds, this can be a big issue. I've always put a premium on good floorcraft, the notion that dancers should be aware enough about their surroundings that they don't bump into other dancers. It was something that seemed important to me from very early in my career. I consider myself more than adept at the basic skills of floorcraft. At the very least, I apologize to a dancer if I kick or step on them. I help them if I have injured them in some way. More often than not, unless I'm really off, I'm pretty good at avoiding collision. It's important to me on a primal level.

The two paragraphs above appear to be examples of two opposing paradigms. Paradigms are ways of viewing the world. In the first view, dancers take up their space and pay little to no attention to the dancers around them, expecting the same from those around them. In the second, dancers are responsible for their own safety and the comfort of those around them.

What happened at the Frankie event, was that I spent Friday night incredibly tense. Gritting my teeth and squeezing through the crowd was about all I could manage. I got kicked a lot, and I heard at least a few other visiting dancers complaining of the same. As it stood on Friday, I was getting dances, but on my part they leaned to the side of paranoia. It happens a bit with me when I'm in very crowded spaces. Even just walking through the ballroom was difficult and it made those initial exchanges, the asking strangers to dance bits, harder to do.

Mind of course that there were many dancers at the event that were not from Manhattan, so please take the blanket statements with several grains of salt.

On Saturday, it was even more crowded. How was I going to get any dancing done in that mass?

I'm not really sure how it happened, but at some point I accepted that the rules were different in this place. People would bump into me from time to time and I'd just have to deal with it. There were more important things to focus on, for instance my partners and their fun and safety. When I made that switch, I smiled a lot more and found it easier to ask people to dance and to make slightly better first impressions than on my tension-filled Friday night. I had an incredible night, even after one of my shoes finally gave in to months of abuse.

Which brings me back to my conversation with Eugene. He had complained of follows who just wouldn't follow the way he had intended. My response to him was that no one can expect that the person they're dancing with has the same rules and technique that he has. Part of the joy of Lindy Hop is bridging the gap between those varying points of view.

Sometimes you just have to go outside of your comfort zone to learn how to be comfortable.

Omnibus

During a private lesson the other day, I quipped "Lindy Hop is the dance of Freedom!" It was funny if you were there. It's also true.

When dancers are just beginning Lindy Hop, it's easiest to think that the Lead is the boss and that the Follow is the subject. Stated another way, the leader has control over the follow. While this may be true in a rudimentary way, it seems to me to lack a certain dynamic.

Here's a thought that occurred to me the other day, mostly unedited:

"I've always rejected the notion of control in dance, especially with leading and following. It is often suggested that the Lead is in charge of the dance. While there are good reasons to suggest this (to beginners for instance - ed) I prefer to consider that the partners are cooperating, collaborating, synthesizing."

Why don't I like the word 'control'? It has too many nasty connotations. Also, there are better words in almost every case. If someone uses the word controlled with regard to their own movement, there are words like precise, balanced, dextrous and a host of others.

I often have used the phrase "leads, you're driving the bus." While it is a bit more romantic to suggest a carriage, the reason I go with the bus image is that there's something very physical in that image for me. I imagine a bus driver really using their body in a way that a carriage driver wouldn't. Maybe it's a tour bus driver, since they're also in charge of showing their passengers a good time.

This is also a really over-simplified view. I think later it becomes more like a bicycle for two, where one person is responsible for steering and both need to be engaged or fall.

I think both of these metaphors fall short of the potential of the dance. After you get past the driving metaphors, then it might be time to consider the dance as a conversation. That, however, is a much longer discussion which will be taken up elsewhere.

Exercise this!

I recently saw a demonstration of Honda's Asimo robot at Disneyland and was reminded of some powerful exercises. If you haven't heard of Asimo, it is a project to create a humanoid robot, like Rosie the Robot from The Jetsons, but on two legs. Here's a commercial:



While Asimo is certainly an achievement in engineering , in terms of balance he's got nothing on the potential of the human body. Still, if you've seen Asimo's ability to balance, I'd ask you to consider challenging yourself.

Balance exercise #1

1. Standing with both feet shoulder-width apart and arms outstretched, slowly and easily raise one leg forward, then lower without letting it touch the ground and then raise to extend the same leg backwards. Bring that leg back to standing and repeat with other leg.
2. Close eyes and repeat the process, which for most students is much more difficult.

Questions to ask: Why might closing my eyes make the balancing more difficult? What are the tools which can be used to make this balancing easier?

Thanks to Marcus Koch and Baerbl Kaufer for this exercise.

Balance exercise #2

1. Standing with legs shoulder-width apart and arms outstretched, raise right foot to meet left knee, balancing on the left foot.
   
2. Lift gaze to ceiling, or look upward.
3. Point fingers and bring them easily to the tip of your nose.

Questions to ask: Why would moving my hands to my face change your balance? What skills can be learned to improve my balance?

Thanks to Emily Falcon for this exercise.

Lead/Follow exercise #1

1. With a partner, join hands facing one another.
2. Let the lead choose to walk either forward or backward, letting the follow find their ease in following. The lead may choose to switch directions, forward or backward only, with the follow working to become more sensitive to the physical sensations necessary to follow.
   
3. As the follow becomes more comfortable, the lead may adjust their movement by shifting forward or backward and ending mid-step, with a foot in the air, challenging the follow to adjust to unexpected weight changes. While it is also difficult to make the follow move sideways, it is NOT a priority. Leads should work on getting a sense of how comfortable the follow is with the shifts in backwards/forwards movement.
4. Repeat the exercise, with the follow closing their eyes.
5. Repeat the exercise, but now with the lead closing their eyes.

Questions to ask: Which senses will I need to engage in order to be a better lead or follow? Why does closing my eyes make a difference in using these senses? How can I turn on my receptors?

Lead/Follow exercise #2

1. With a partner, dance a few measures of Lindy Hop.
2. Let the follow close their eyes, continuing the dance.
3. Switch roles, letting the lead close their eyes while the follow re-opens theirs.

Questions to ask: Did I anticipate my partner or was I successful in connecting with them? How do I engage the senses that activated when I close my eyes? What is the default state that will engage the essential lead and follow connection?

Thanks to Simon Selmon and Rusty Frank for the above two exercises.

Lead/Follow Exercise #3

Two partners bound at the wrists with a held cord or rope. Dance socially, but instead of using fingers and hands to lead, use only the cord and the lead's right arm/follow's back connection for leading.

Questions to ask: What modifications do I have to make in order to lead or follow under these circumstances? Which impulses are essential for leading and following and how can I access them?

Counterbalance/Compression exercise

1. Face a partner in a two-handed closed position
   
2. Choosing a partner to lead, slowly bend the knees as though sitting, noting the musculature that connects from one partner to the other. When a comfortable sit has been created, note the counterbalance used to keep both partners aloft. Viewed from the side, this would be called a V-shape.
   
3. Let the lead pull the couple together, both coming to standing.
4. Repeat and switch roles.
   
5. Stand as in step 1, but place both palms against each other as though each partner were performing a push-up against a wall.
6. Each partner should lean in toward the other, noting the work from their hands, arms and shoulders through to their cores. Viewed from the side, this would be described as an A-shape.
7. Work the transition from the A-shape (compression) slowly and easily through to the V-shape (counterbalance), and back again, noting the work in the corresponding musculature.

Questions to ask: What is the most efficient way to use my musculature when transitioning from A to V and back? Which of my muscles felt strain during this exercise? Where does my partner feel strain and how can I tell before asking? What can I do to ease this strain?

Thanks to Melinda Comeau for this exercise.

Breathing Exercise #1
The breathing exercise can be very dangerous to describe in text, as it it often misunderstood by students. The most important consideration when working on the breathing is to release any unnecessary tension. The image of a full breath might be one of a four-sided box, being your chest and belly, your sides and your back, open at the top and the bottom. In a full breath, each of these sides should feel relaxed and easy.

This exercise works well with a partner leading the way, but once it has become familiar it can be done solo.

1. Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, imagining a golden thread from your scalp into the sky, lengthening you to your tallest, easiest height.
2. Cut the thread, rolling the chin to the chest and continuing the roll down the spine to a relaxed fold at the waist as low as you can go without straining.
3. The standing partner places their palms pressed lightly at the nape of the folded partner's neck, right at the top of their spine, requesting a breath; "take a deep breath into here... and then out." The standing partner should note when the folded partner has released tension in that area, adjusting their touch responsively to their partner's breath.
4. When the musculature has opened up and released tension, the standing partner brings their hands somewhat lower and repeats the request.
5. Repeat step 4 until the folded partner's breath has opened up at the near the lower lumbar region of the spine. Take a few breaths in and out here and then hold in, roll up the spine to standing, remember the golden thread, and then release.

Questions to ask: It seems better to me not to suggest getting extremely self-conscious about breathing. However I would suggest doing a bit of research on the subject if you are interested. Perform a Google search on deep breathing. I can't suggest any of these links specifically, but it might be time for an adventure, though I believe that my approach to body awareness was informed by my teachers' suggestions of Feldenkrais Method and Alexander Technique, though I don't consider myself deeply educated in either. Buyer beware.

It looks like I have some research ahead!

Thanks to my college movement and voice teachers for this exercise. I wish I could remember your names.