One of the things I like the most about watching solo Charleston dancers and by extension solo Charleston competitions, is the amazing amount of musicality and expression that can happen when they dance. The two clips below show some evidence of this.
What I find inspiring about both these clips is besides featuring amazing dancers in terms of technical skill, each dancer is performing and giving away ‘who they are’ to the crowd.
Below I have two more modern examples that I think this is present:
One thing that bothered me slightly lately as a trend in recent solo Charleston competitions, is it seems acrobatics is being awarded over being musical and really layin’ it out on the floor.
Now take my words with a grain of salt, I do not claim to be an amazing solo Charleston dancer or experienced judge of solo Charleston myself. However I am expressing the sentiment of a conversation that I have had with many dancers on the East Coast, and that even some others have expressed online.
Don’t get me wrong, acrobatics are amazing. Done musically and appropriately they can bring the room to a tumultuous crash of energy. However like aerials in partnered dancing, just done for the sake of looking impressive leaves me with a kind of ‘meh’ feeling.
I’ll leave you with a quote from Rik’s Blog that I linked to, The Click Heard Around the World in which he wrote about Jana Grulichova dancing in ILHC 2010’s solo Charleston comp,
“What she brought, that no one else really had, was 300% commitment to what she was doing, plus a beaming joy to be doing this dance. It reminded me of the first time I saw Hurley Francois at the first ILHC in 2008. Jana didn’t need to do any of the acrobatics or flashy tricks that the boys were pulling out in their solos. She delivered very classic charleston and jazz vocabulary, but amped up to a whole new level. So incredible”
Most people when starting to learn swing dance can remember a certain pattern they were taught in their introductory class, usually the “Rock-Step, Triple-Step, Triple-Step” pattern.Often there is this solid framework because an issue that John White writes about in his blog post Dreyfus Model of Skill Acquisition.
In the post he comments how many novice level dances will often look for hard and fast rules for swing dancing. However as many people learn quickly (especially follows) if you try to dance within only patterns, you are only getting a small subset of the dance known as the Lindy Hop.
Positives and Pitfalls of Patterns
Don’t get me wrong though, I am not saying that patterns are rubbish and should not be utilized in instruction or on the social dance floor. They are great at providing a simple model of dance where dancers can work on fundamental technique and isolate external variables that they would normally have to deal with and could crowd out their understanding of the issue.
However the important thing to convey is in fact that patterns are simple models that are not completely representative of the actual social dance floor. Groovy Movie actually lampoons the idea that you can completely learn swing dance through step patterns here at 3:00:
As a follow if all you try to do anticipate the patterns in class, if you dance with anyone outside of that class it can easily become a difficult dance as many new follows quickly learn. For leads if you just lead patterns you learned in a class, often one can technically be on time but still be completely ignoring the music.
The difficult thing for me as an instructor in beginner classes is still providing newer dancers patterns that provide them an isolated environment for them to get down steps to at least survive one social dance, yet still attempting to provide them with instruction technique and give them perspective of where to use these steps. It is a difficult compromise that I am always attempting to fine-tune each lesson.
The struggle for an dancer who moves on beyond the novice stage is often breaking free from this framework. I remember out in California one of my biggest struggles the first summer I was out there was not defaulting to the six-count footwork from open. I had to have several nights where I completely forbid it from my repertoire and forced myself to do other things.
I could ramble on about this topic for awhile, but I’m curious to hear the rest of your thoughts. But before that I will leave you with this quote.
“All fixed set patterns are incapable of adaptability or pliability. The truth is outside of all fixed patterns.” – Bruce Lee [1]
[1] Mainly known for his prowess in the Martial Arts world, it is actually a not as well known fact that Bruce Lee was an excellent dancer as well and won the Crown Colony Cha-Cha Championship in China at the age of 18.
If you haven’t heard over facebook, yehoodi, or word of mouth recently, Dax Hock and Sarah Breck were on national television representing Lindy Hop in Paula Abdul’s show, “Live To Dance“.
The song they perform to is “We No Speak Americano” by Yolanda Be Cool. Which, while not traditional swing dance music I can understand the choice because they are trying to appeal to the general public.
Dax and Sarah... and a Plane
What I do admire though, is Dax rising to the occasion in spite of his injury. They both put on a performance to be proud of.
In my opinion they have earned the “Spirit of Lindy” title they have listed on their website.
It’s been talked to death on Yehoodi, local discussion boards, and countless organizer meetings around the world – PokeAlex on Yehoodi
The “Newbie Problem” as shown in the quote above is something that is often brought up in the community. For those of you unfamiliar with the term, I’ll explain it below.
The “Newbie Problem“
A newbie shows up at a dance venue excited to dance and mingle with people.
Said newbie sees all the good dancers or “cool people” are hanging out amongst themselves (often in one part of a room such as a corner or near the DJ booth) and feels excluded.
Newbie reacts to their inferred situation by possibly; having self-deprecating thoughts on their own personality and/or dancing, negatively have feel and express opinions that assumed “cool people” are elitist, or a combination of both.
Organizer Struggle
As an organizer though, when you put on your organizer hat it changes. It is expected (if it is a smaller weekly venue dance and not a huge event) you to make an effort to be welcoming to newer people and to be present socially. The amusing thing is even though I attempt to make myself appear as friendly & welcoming as possible for my college club, according to a friend of mine many newbies see me as intimidating regardless of my efforts . Rachel writes about the frustration of dealing with this situation in her blog,
“We tried dancing with more people. We tried offering more beginning classes that would be accessible to those dancing at Heights. We even tried to not dance in front of the stage, but nothing seemed to completely clear the air.” –Rachel Green
So as a non-newbie dancer, if you are seen dancing with or in the areas of a venue the experienced dancers hang out, you already have to fight a predisposition that you are intentionally distant and have this negative disposition toward newer dancers.
Reality Sets In..
The main issue that exists is many newbies establish this false premise that, “Because I am new to this, people should have to go out of their way to make me feel comfortable and accepted.” Rebecca in her blog post has a very good quote that addresses this issue,
“Because of that attitude, I stopped myself from taking advantage of countless opportunities.” –Rebecca Brightly
In her post she also goes over four reasons why these people have not initiated conversation or social contact with a newbie.
They don’t have anything to say.
They were awkward/shy/unsociable before they became dancers, and they are STILL awkward/shy/unsociable.
You don’t have anything in common.
You haven’t been around long enough.
I’d like to throw out a few as well,
They have a previous injury that makes them have to be careful who they dance with: I have a friend back home in California who has back problems, in result she only dances with leads she knows and trusts.
They stay in the area around other “cool people” or advanced dancers, because it is where their friends are: In your every day life how often have you thought, “Hey all my friends are here, I am going to go over and talk to these complete stranglers.” Now I am a crazy extrovert, so that is entirely in the realm of possibility for me. However not everyone falls in that category.
They are an instructor who has just taught 1-3 classes and is taking it easy: If you haven’t taught a class before while fun, it can be tiring. Especially if it was a big class that you were having to project your voice. Often after this one just wants to relax, converse with friends, and possibly grab a dance.
However what it comes down to it. Something I have heard others say and that I say myself these days I think sums up the situation.
“When you pay your cover charge into a venue, all you are doing is paying to get into a room and for nothing else. “
Volunteering is usually a great way to save money and make a workshop more affordable for yourself. However with the benefits come the responsibility of being a good volunteer. I’m kind of ashamed to admit this, but this weekend I was a sub-par volunteer at LabLove.
Due to having a lack of transportation, in addition to being unfamiliar with the Philadelphia metro I missed my first volunteer shift and had to switch with the person doing the second one instead. I woke up the volunteer coordinator in the morning, calling her in an attempt to inform her that I was running late and lacking a ride. Lastly, I had to miss my last volunteer shift, because my ride which I previously thought was going to stay for the last dance was understandably fatigued and wanted to head home early.
One big happy volunteering family.
So in an attempt to help volunteer coordinators and volunteers everywhere and slightly make up for myself failing, here is my basic guide on how to be a good volunteer.
Volunteering 101
Read the information the volunteer coordinator provides you and keep a hard-copy on yourself: Especially for bigger events, often the event coordinator is trying to juggle multiple volunteers and tasks to complete at the same time.The less you have to interrupt them to get clarification on things, the more time they have to get things done.
Be honest about when you are available to volunteer: If you are a late-night owl who has trouble waking up, the morning shift is not for you. Likewise if you are someone who loses track of time on the dance floor, a mid-dance shift is probably not good for you as well. If you have any doubts of being available at a certain time, play it safe and put yourself as unavailable instead of making the volunteer coordinator try to find a last minute replacement for you.
Have transportation to your volunteer shifts: If you have a car, then it is as simple as making sure you leave early so you arrive to your shifts on time. However if you are without a car, then that means securing a way to get to the venue on time for your shift. If you can’t guarantee that, it is better to just list you are unavailable.
Be friendly, helpful and courteous: This one is for the workshop attendees just as much as the volunteer coordinator. When you are volunteering, you are doing a job in exchange for payment for a service. This is common sense, if you were working at the front desk of business you wouldn’t be caught talking to your friends while ignoring a customer would you?
Respect
What it comes down to is respect, the workshop organizers are kind enough to give an opportunity for people who may not be able to normally attend a workshop to show up. You can pay that back by giving them less things to worry about and being effective at the role they are providing you in exchange for a discount at their event.
After my blunder of a volunteering experience, I emailed the LabLove coordinator apologizing for being a sub-par volunteer and offered to pay via PayPal for the time I missed. I would advise people to do the same and make amends if while volunteering you mess up, irregardless if it is ones own personal irresponsibility or a misunderstanding. It is the nice thing to do and most people will understand you are just human. (This also applies to most aspects of dancing/life as well)
Expressions you can commonly hear in the swing dance world are, “I’m trying to become an advanced dancer.” or “Oh I am a beginner go easy on me.”
The weird thing about this is I have had followers who claim they are beginners to a dance clearly outshine people who say they are intermediate or “know” a dance.
What it comes down to often is subjectivity. I know small community colleges that consider knowing a swingout as a sign of an advanced dancer. Put that in juxposition with the Orange County/Los Angeles swing dance scene, where if you claim the title advanced dancer you better be able to bust a move in the middle of a competition or jam circle.
Not having similarly calibrated tools of measurement leads to trouble sometimes.
What Is Intermediate?
As a fun little exercise I am going to take the descriptions of the requirements for an intermediate level track at different events in the Lindy Hop community to see if there is any parallels among them. To have an even mix I have selected nationally recognized events, smaller college workshops, and regular venues from across the United States.
SparX (College Swing Dance Workshop in Ohio): Intermediate: You’ve already conquered swingouts, lindy circles, texas tommy, tuck turns, other basic 8 count material, as well as common 6 count turns and side passes. And I mean you’ve conquered them– you execute them while throwing in variations so that people say “Woah, that was just a tuck turn??” (but in a good way). You also can easily mix the 6 and 8 count moves and have begun creating steps of your own. You understand musicality and now want to learn those subtle techniques that will take your dancing to the next level.
Lindy Focus (Ashville, North Carolina): “This track is for dancers who are already quite comfortable social dancing Lindy Hop on a regular basis. You have a strong understanding of the core repertoire including swingouts, lindy circle, texas tommy, tuck turns, other basic 8 count, as well as common 6 count turns and passes. You easily mix the two. You are strong with your technique, can move easily at a wide variety of tempos (dancing a little faster all the time), you’ve worked on frame, balance, and posture”
Camp Jitterbug (Seattle, Washington): You have a few Lindy Hop classes and/or workshops under your belt. The basics are comfortable, but you realize that continuing to fine-tune them will only make you better. While you can execute basics during classes, social dancing is a challenge still and you want to learn how to become more comfortable on the social floor. Higher tempos are a bit challenging still since you are still trying to think of the move the comes next if you are a lead or how to keep your frame so you can follow. Requirement for this track is to know the basics of Lindy Hop.
Tuesday Night Swing at the Verdi Club (San Francisco, California): For the Intermediate Level Lindy Hop Class, you must already be confident with 8-count basics, including the Lindy Hop Swingout and related turns, and basic Charleston steps. We will expect that you are committed to practicing your Lindy Hop regularly outside of class. New steps and concepts are introduced each month in the Intermediate Lindy Hop class. The Intermediate Lindy Hop class is meant to be taken continuously over several months or years
Flyin’ Footwork Productions (Orlando, Florida): You must be familiar with the 8-count Lindy Hop basic and the Lindy Circle to take this class. If you have taken our Lindy Hop Series, then you are ready for this class
Heartland Swing Festival (Collegiate level competition/workshop weekend in Des Moines, Iowa): Dancer should have at least a few months experience and be comfortable with the basics at medium tempos (up to 185bpm). Tuck turns, sugar pushes, basic charleston, footwork variations, and swingouts should all be familiar to you while you learn to integrate 6 and 8 count patterns. The trust relationship between partner’s connection is dawning on you.
Breakdown
So from this small sampling of six events from all over the United States here some things to notice:
Five events explicitly list that you are comfortable with or have “conquered” the swingout.
Three of the events list that you know how to do a Lindy Circle.
Two of the events list that you should know how to do; a Texas Tommy, tuck turns, other basic 8 count, as well as common 6 count turns and passes
Two of the events list that you know basic Charleston.
Three of the events mention you should have a decent amount of class/social dance experience under your belt.
Two of the events mention being able to handle medium level tempos.
The interesting thing for me is when putting this together I assumed the more nationally recognized events (Lindy Focus & Camp Jitterbug) would have stiffer requirements then the more regional lessons/college events. Surprisingly there was a lot of overlap though.
Camp Jitterbug as well does not get into specifics such as moves. Instead they choose to base their requirements on more situational requirements such as how a dancer feels about certain situations such as social dance, classes, and different tempos.
Also interesting to note that ILHC and Lonestar Championships do not have descriptions for requirements for the levels in their tracks.
My View
Personally my (generic and non specific) view of an intermediate level Lindy Hopper is someone who can comfortably and confidently dance Lindy Hop on the social dance floor. However they lack the quality of movement and ability to handle extremes in tempos that separates them from being an advanced dancer. But they aren’t struggling to make it through a dance like perhaps a beginner may.
Some people think levels are meaningless and just exist to serve peoples egos. However to play the devils advocate one of my biggest pet peeves about last year’s Camp Hollywood was people in the intermediate Collegiate Shag class who were unable to dance a double shag basic (6 count footwork: with two slows followed by two quicks) in open.
If you have any thoughts on the subject, I’d love to hear it.
A question I receive often in my local scene, hear “dance nerding” it out with other people, and read online is often, “How do I get better at x?”. Variable x can be anything from dancing in general, to a particular type of dance, competition, and et cetera.
Goal setting is an effective tool to address these issues. This way instead of feeling like you are stumbling around in a general direction, you have a specific route you are taking to make progress.
Goals: How to effectively set them
Now you could have a generic goal of being “The best Lindy Hopper evah!”, however it is more realistic and effective to have a goal such as: I plan to become an amazing Lindy Hopper by attending three nationally recognized events in the United States and go social dancing at least three times a week this year.
A useful mnemonic featured at mindtools.com is SMART.
Specific
Measurable
Attainable
Relevant
Time-bound
Also quoted from mindtools are these useful tips,
State each goal as a positive statement: Express your goals positively – ‘Execute this technique well’ is a much better goal than ‘Don’t make this stupid mistake.’
Be precise: Set a precise goal, putting in dates, times and amounts so that you can measure achievement. If you do this, you will know exactly when you have achieved the goal, and can take complete satisfaction from having achieved it.
Set priorities: When you have several goals, give each a priority. This helps you to avoid feeling overwhelmed by having too many goals, and helps to direct your attention to the most important ones.
Write goals down: This crystallizes them and gives them more force.
Keep operational goals small: Keep the low-level goals you are working towards small and achievable. If a goal is too large, then it can seem that you are not making progress towards it. Keeping goals small and incremental gives more opportunities for reward.
Set performance goals, not outcome goals: You should take care to set goals over which you have as much control as possible. It can be quite dispiriting to fail to achieve a personal goal for reasons beyond your control! In business, these could be bad business environments or unexpected effects of government policy. In sport, these reasons could include poor judging, bad weather, injury, or just plain bad luck. If you base your goals on personal performance, then you can keep control over the achievement of your goals and draw satisfaction from them.
Set realistic goals: It is important to set goals that you can achieve. All sorts of people (employers, parents, media, society) can set unrealistic goals for you. They will often do this in ignorance of your own desires and ambitions. Alternatively you may set goals that are too high, because you may not appreciate either the obstacles in the way or understand quite how much skill you need to develop to achieve a particular level of performance.
We have a new year coming up, so for your New Year’s resolutions why not tack on some swing dance related goals?
P.S.: My goal for this year was to learn the Big Apple, the California Routine, and the Tranky Doo. Just have to clean up the second half of the Big Apple and clean up my Tranky Doo
If you didn’ t catch it in my last post, solo Jazz & Charleston is awesome in my book. Here is the video I linked in the previous post as one of the examples why:
If you still aren’t convinced, here is some benefits of learning to dance solo.
Your quality of movement increases, which allows for your partnered dancing to improve.
When people do routines like the Big Apple/Tranky Doo/Shim Sham you can join in. If you don’t know them, it will be easier to learn them with some training in solo dancing.
If you don’t have a partner to dance with, problem solved.
Lastly, if solo Charleston circles open up you can join in.
How To Learn Solo Jazz & Charleston
This short guide is written assuming you are at least a beginner/intermediate dancer who has taken at least one partnered Charleston class.
1. Turn On Some Music & Dance
The number one way to improve at dance in general is practice. It may be awkward at first, but you can trust me the best way is to get better is going through the motions until they start to feel natural. When you are out in public and see someone dancing solo, join them. However, do not make the novice mistake of taking up a ton of room and running into people.
Pro-Tip: Do this in front of a mirror or video tape yourself to see what works and what doesn’t.
2. Build Up An Inventory of Jazz Steps & Moves
While being able to improvise on the fly is important, it is also nice to have a variety of steps/moves to fall back on as well. There too many to list fully here, however below are some for you to try:
Pro-Tip: When practicing these try to figure out where these fit in with the music instead of doing them at random.
3. Learn Some Swing Dance Routines That Incorporate Solo Movement
Examples are the Big Apple/Tranky Doo/Shim Sham as listed above. The material you learn in these routines can be incorporated into both your solo and partnered dancing.
Pro-Tip: When you have any routine down where you can do the absolute basic version in your sleep, attempt to make it your own.
4. Attend A Solo Jazz/Charleston Focused Workshop
It’s hard to find them, but if you do take one. It makes you do step number one in this guide consistently during a weekend. In addition you will have amazing dancers to throw ideas at you, learn from, and possibly give you feedback. You’ll see a considerable improvement in your solo dancing.
Usually intermediate leads/follows are more guilty of this, often when dancing with a partner they ‘think’ is on a lower skill level, a term I refer to as dancturbating.
Definition:
Dancturbating : The act of dancing, often to draw attention, while completely ignoring your dance partner.
The best part about this dance is when you completely ignore me.
One of the best parts of dancing for me is attempting to connect with a person through the medium of dance. Often I use conversation as an analogy for dancing and ignoring your partner is effectively the same as having a one sided conversation.
Now I am not bashing on solo jazz/Charleston, in matter of fact I think it can be quite badass. But when you are dancing with another person its a nice courtesy to at least acknowledge their presence. I am also not saying if you are dancing with someone you feel is newer to the dance, only dance vanilla white basics.
If you have some decent social dance experience, then within a few seconds of dancing with someone you can usually figure out as an experienced lead/follow what boundaries a person has a dancer. Listen to your partner and use that knowledge to create a great dance experience for both of you.
Interesting thing I have encountered with my travels across the United States is what kind and what tempos of music are played as it gets into the late night hours.
What kind of music do the late night owl's prefer?
In Pennsylvania a lot of people insist that once it gets into the late hours it is only appropriate to play blues music. But if you go to Rochester, New York you might be dancing to some soul music at 3 A.M. in the morning. To get even more baffling, at Jammin’ on the James a few months back I distinctly remember a jam circle featuring the song Swingtime in the Rockies during the 1-2 AM hours.
The funny thing is, the arguments have not changed in seven years. Read this yehoodi topic to see for yourself.
My personal view on the issue is pretty much in line with the two quotes Mike Faltesek wrote on the same topic linked above:
Quote one in response to the post, “Tempo should decrease as it gets later.”
i disagree
tempos, to me, are meaningless. i like my music hot and full of energy almost all the time, but especially the later it gets. I need music that is screaming at me to wake up and swingout. Not music thats telling me to drink or to hump the cute girl thats hitting on me.
Quote two
rant [bleep!] having different rooms
lets just have different exchanges. it would be nice to finally have a lindy exchange other than the Binge that stays true to its name. There is nothing more frustrating than going to an exchange thinking that you are going to be able to dance your favorite dance and then have to sit or try to “expand your boundries”. [bleep!] i just want to dance lindy hop! /rant
If you have any views on the topic, I would love to hear them folks.
It's The Way That You Do It 