It's The Way That You Do It

This past Feburary I had a crazy idea.

Many swing dancers go through this period of desperately wanting to improve, in result many suggestions get thrown their way. One of the more painful suggestions is to videotape and review ones own dancing. At least for myself, even in competitions I have won, watching video of myself is one of the most grating things to do because I am the ultimate “negative nancy” and only see my flaws.

Regardless of the mental anguish watching my own dancing on film caused, I considered it a necessary evil to improving my own dancing abilities. In result, I started filming myself dancing;  afterwards I would review those notes and use it as a tool to decide what in my dancing I needed to practice my focus time on. However I realized some serious drawbacks; I was limited to my own experience of judging visually the quality of a dance and I was limited in my ability to provide suggestions to correct/improve upon problems discovered.

Based on those perceived problems my next idea was to add more people to the process. What resulted was using crowdsourcing to obtain constructive feedback for my dancing. An assortment of opinions from varied members of the swing dance community was more likely to yield effective material to work on then just myself. Just like many other questions I have had related for the swing dance community, I took it to the swing dance messageboard/website Yehoodi in a topic labeled, “Dance Education Through Social Feedback Experiment”

The Experiment

Framework for the experiment was simple. I would post a video of myself social dancing with a partner; after the video was posted I would open the floor for commentary/suggestions to be posted about that week’s dancing. After the allotted time had passed, I would post goals based on what people had posted and then after a period of time post another video of myself social dancing to show the progress I had made. After that the cycle would begin anew.

Unfortunately due to some circumstances I only got to run the experiment for four weeks. However, I think I had amazing results in the small amount of time it ran for. After the experiment I felt much more confident in my dancing and managed to make finals and be in the top five of the intermediate J&J at Boston Tea Party.

While I did gain a lot from this experiment, there were some difficulties.

• The first was being able to determine which suggestions/constructive criticism had a solid basis. The beauty and difficulty of dealing with Yehoodi is anyone can post on there. This means the individuals offering me this advice could be anyone from an international instructor to joe-schmo who only dances East Coast Swing to rockabilly music. My method of dealing with was keeping an open mind and using what I knew about each poster to determine how trustworthy of a source they were.
• Second was simply recording myself at a social dance on a near weekly basis. Having another person available to dance with at a certain day every week, remembering the camera, getting someone to give up social dance time to film, and said camera having batteries that were not dead. Having that all add up perfectly was surprisingly difficult at times.
• Lastly was getting comfortable with the idea of posting my dancing on an internet forum for people to judge. I consider myself to be quite like a honey badger and I have had videos of myself in competitions posted on youtube in the past. However, the idea of only myself on video that people I knew and strangers were going to pick apart still took a bit to warm up to.

Observations

If a reader of this article was wondering if an experiment like this would be beneficial to them, I think it would produce great returns given that they have a thick skin and they have been dancing a decent amount of time.  If a person doesn’t take criticism well or is very sensitive about their dancing a private lesson or feedback from trusted friends would probably be a more appropriate avenue to take. Newer dancers are likely to lack the context to determine if advice is well founded or completely off the wall.

The one way this experiment could be  improved is by limiting the individuals who give feedback to dancers who are respected “experts” in the field. Which in my opinion is currently being done by Dax & Sarah’s Swing 90x program. From what I have read on the blog posts required for the program and from talking to someone who is in it, they are getting at minimum quadruple results of my little experiment.

Acknowledgements

I’d like to thank:

• Yehoodi posters; Capt Morgan, Glen, NoNameJive, Toon Town Dave, Brooksie, Hounddog, Zenin, alexcloutier, Random, bryn for providing feedback on the Yehoodi thread.
• The Yehoodi Talk Show for mentioning the topic and giving some great advice.
• The follow who wishes to be unnamed that let me dance with her on film.

I have a bit of a confession to make. The last six months I have barely danced in what is considered my “local” scene compared to my dancing weekends on the road. I may pop in and teach a lesson, but most of the social dance portion I end up practicing things in front of a mirror or chatting with friends.

Part of it is I fall into the trap of comparing my scene to other scenes, I can even provide a small list of thoughts that sometimes go through my head:

 I wish (my local scene)…

• is competitive like Southern California.
• is crazy and fun-loving like Baltimore.
• encouraged solo dancing (and is conveniently located next to an amazing BBQ restaurant) like Rochester, New York.

What Changed?

Three things I came across online challenged my dance lifestyle and way I viewed things:

1. Michael Seguin’s post on the Mobtown Blog titled, “Competitions, Events, The Cult of the Amateur, and a Coda on the Slow Dance Smackdown“.

The quote that relates the most of the topic at hand is,

The best and most committed dancers in a particular scene sometimes aspire to national rather than local glory. Instead of building their own community, recruiting students, and making the sexiest dance scene possible, they join the ranks of the regular event-hoppers. There is nothing wrong with this in principle, but the trend isn’t sustainable. Events feed off of the legions of dancers who cut their teeth in small scenes and are looking for a special experience. If no one is developing and maintaining local and regional dancing, events have no pool of dancers from which to draw. – Michael Seguin

2. Hamfats.ca video interview titled “Words for Lindy Hoppers” featuring Kelly Porter

3. Jamin Jackson’s blog post titled “Scene Drama: “Un”Divide and Conquer” which goes over improving the relationships between local scene leadership and traveling dancers.

Common Theme

While there were small similarities in each of the three things brought up, the one unifying theme is while traveling is important it is also equally if not more important to foster growth in ones’ local scene.

Personally I have resolved to try to help out my local scene/area and foster growth. However it isn’t as easy as pie, there are definitely days where I get bogged down by what Jamin refers to as “event blues”. But have gotten better at handling it by having the rationalization that carrying the attitude of comparing my weekly dances to what happened the previous weekend is a determent to my local scene and myself because it creates a negative atmosphere for individuals who interact with me and for myself.

One thing that has helped carry out this “fostering local community growth” attitude is like with my personal development with dancing I set concrete goals for myself. It can be a little thing such as having a goal of giving one sincere compliment to someone I have not danced with before to as big as agreeing to help judge a local competition or set up for a dance.

I invite you to share any thoughts or comments you have about this topic. I have had friends from all over the United States talk about it, but it is always in online or private conversations that are out of the eyes of their respective local organizers.

Otherwise I leave you with this insightful quote from Jamin,

Recognize that many people you do not know played a critical part in leading you throughout all the various scenarios and odds into the swing dance community.  If there is ever a point where you are angry at someone in your scene, know that the feeling of anger is not necessarily bad.  In fact it is an opportunity if mixed with love to create powerful solutions that can benefit your scene.  However, when you do something bad with that feeling, it hurts everyone.  Instead of taking a brick and throwing it through a window, use it to build something that will last. – Jamin Jackson

Recently there have been some notable posts that cover the main motivations why people swing dance.

• The Hidden Reason Why We Become Swing Dancers on Dance World Takeover started it off using challenge as the main motivation for why people swing dance.
• the hidden reason we become lindy hoppers: a response on move(me)nt responded by listing community as the primary factor.
• A Shared Challenge on Dancing Past the Godzilla Threshold responds with his main motivation is sharing a moment on the dance floor with someone else.

Reasons For Moi: The Spark and Challenge

For myself I have a primary reason why I dance and a secondary reason that helps to allow the primary to happen.  I think a lot of individuals are in the same boat of myself that while there may be a primary reason, there are a variety of secondary reasons as well. An example of this is why I like dancing in Montreal. My primary reason is because they have a great dance scene that is fun to visit. However my secondary reasons are because I like the opportunity to practice my French and they have delicious food.

“The Spark” is my nickname for those moments in dance that just blow your mind and are indescribable. At the risk of coming off completely insane, it is this feeling that you can’t tell who or what is in control but one is almost possessed and have this feeling of invulnerability that causes you to just own whatever you are doing or click with another person on this almost ethereal level. When Greek mythology spoke of the concept of a genius, this is the closest I can think of what they were talking about.  “Owning it”, “Killin it”, “Being on Fire”, and the other names for what people refer to this as… this is the primary reason why I dance. Those moments are rare, but I am constantly seeking them out.

Challenge is my secondary reason because they make the possibility of “The Spark” happening. Having clean basics allows me have a clear line of communication with the lead or follow I am dancing with. Constantly tackling new material or refining what I have allows me to have more tools in my toolbox to match whatever the music and my partner is giving me in a dance. I have days when I don’t feel like practicing my triple steps and would rather instead watch television or eat ice cream, but my primary motivation to dance works to feed my secondary one.

Tapestry

I’m glad that discussion is arising from these blog posts about the motivations behind why people Lindy Hop. The comment sections of these posts are also filled with opinions that provide insight behind reasons why people travel miles to dance with strangers or even just go out to their local venue every week. The most relevant comment to myself was one Cari posted herself in her move(me)nt post,

Actually, if you’re going to say that Community is not very hidden, I don’t think you can say that the Challenge is very hidden either: while I was writing this post, I was discussing it with a friend; she disagreed with me in that she started dancing because of the challenge it posed, and only found the Community later. Now, I would say she probably loves both aspects of the dance – but the Challenge was still one of her first motivating factors. – Cari from move(me)ent

I first joined Lindy Hop because at a house party I saw people swinging out and I wanted to learn that. As a natural extrovert,  meeting people and making new friends has never been that difficult of a thing for me. I started traveling because I realized to get better I had to visit areas with opportunity to learn from experts. Only after awhile in the travel circuit did I make bonds with some folks and community became an influence in why I danced. I have always felt odd that I didn’t start because of a friendly gesture or a pretty girl like many other leads.

If I have learned anything from all these posts it is two things.

1. Why individuals dance Lindy Hop is not a simple thing that can be defined by one reason, it is a tapestry that encompasses multiple motivations which vary from person to person.
2. No person is an island. While many of us have different motivations, you can almost certainly find someone with similar ones to your own.

Expectations
Contracts, an essential article that organizers and instructors have to deal with alike before a swing dance event. In the ideal world all expectations are explicitly stated and agreed to in these documents before an event. However as shown in Bobby White’s article Implied in the Contract over at Swungover this is proven to frequently not be the case. Usually though this only results in possible annoyance of the instructors and/or organizers.

However in the worst case scenarios this can end up being disastrous and costing individuals thousands of dollars.  This doesn’t even go into the opportunity costs for instructors or organizers. Instructors who lose money on an event could have been at another event which would have paid them or perhaps at a competition that they could have placed and received prizes and possible credibility to earn future teaching jobs.

Below are two links for situations that are arguably worst case scenarios, I won’t go into detail about them here but let you make your own judgments.

• http://www.kansascityswingcorps.com/oscar
• http://ifsgscrewedus.wordpress.com/

Advice for Organizers

1. My first piece of advice is if you haven’t read Bobby’s article on Swungover, do so.
2. Second piece of advice is from a video titled, “F$#% you Pay Me”.

At the 8:45 minute mark is great advice is given for anyone dealing with any type of contract.

Clear definitions.
Clear expectations.

… all explicitly stated and agreed to by both parties in A CONTRACT.

Summary: Only expect instructors to do what is stated in the contracts. Showing up for dances, doing demos at the Friday night dance, judging contests, et cetera should all be agreed upon in that beforehand. Otherwise, don’t expect it.

Advice for Instructors/Performers

If you want something, put it in your conditions to work in the contract. Even if it is small details such as being provided water during classes or having the option of getting transportation to leave a dance early. As an organizer myself I want the instructors I hire to be as comfortable and happy as possible, because often they carry that attitude to the classes they teach. I know most good organizers hold this same view as well. If what to do to make that happen is conveniently provided in a list form it makes life easier on myself and the volunteers for my event. In addition it makes life for the instructors easier during that event.

For those of you who teach outside of your local area Richard Halpern’s advice in the comment section of one of the ifsgscrewedus.com posts is spot on,

Yes indeed, folks! You all should have been wise enough to get ALL your travel arrangements either made and paid for by the client, OR to have been completely reimbursed BEFORE you left, as well as receiving your TOTAL PAYMENT IN-FULL, at least 30 days PRIOR to the date of the engagement, if being paid by check, or 7 days prior, if being paid by wire-transfer (as is customary when dealing with gigs that are out of the USA.

[…] I do these kinds of gigs all the time, all year long, and because of my requirements, I don’t have these problems anymore. Some of the bottom-feeding “agents” in the lookalike and event planning industry have complained that I am being a “Diva” or am “Ego-maniacal” because I ask for these things, and they are the ones who always leave themselves open for this type of abuse from disreputable clients, and then expect the talent that they themselves contracted with, stand by them when they don’t get paid. What a crock. Good luck to all of you on this one.

Unnecessary Risks… Don’t Take Them

Contracts exist to protect both parties and remove any ambiguity from a business relationship.  In addition they ideally provide a plan of action if things go awry (instructor’s flight gets delayed/organizer has to cancel event after contracts are signed/et cetera).  In respect to contracts I want to to leave everybody with these finishing remarks:

1. Know what is necessary criteria for yourself as an organizer and/or instructor for contracts and do not back down on them.
2. If someone tries to get you to avoid contracts with promises of trust or great rewards, walk the hell away.
3. If possible/reasonable get a lawyer to draft an initial contract, they are professionals and anticipate things one would not even fathom.

Addendum

In the comment section below there have been some responses posted in relation to the situation in which the organizers are more then willing to pay/hire instructors, but getting contracting to happen is difficult due to the behalf of the instructors. A quote from Michael Gamble from Bobby’s Swungover post I think addresses these situations best,

“On another side (not necessarily “the” other side), I’d like to point out that not all instructors are comfortable, eager, or even ABLE to interact on this professional of a level. There are definitely some who prefer a less formal agreement, who chafe at spelling out their needs, and who, let’s face it, do not like to write emails. (That was not a euphemism for “they aren’t very timely in their responses” — some actually don’t like it and can get surly and/or increase their demands if pressured to respond to a request) This is perhaps doubly true of many musicians.
So with those things in mind, I often find myself trying to figure out “at what level” each staff member operates, and try to meet them there, for practical reasons.”

My advice for future organizers, especially college students is unless if you are dead set on a certain instructor/pair of instructors talk to experienced organizers before you attempt to hire anybody. Ask them in their experience which ones have been professional and easy to work with. Organizing a workshop is hard enough, the larger number of things you can limit as stress factors, the better.

am·bi·dance·trous

adjective

1. Having the ability in dancing to perform both roles of lead and follow competently.

Earlier this week I made a post in my new tumblr account about my experiences as competing in both roles as a lead and follow at the Boston Tea Party this past weekend. It got a decent amount of feedback so I figured I would expand a bit on the topic.

So You Are a Lead, Why Follow?

Isn’t It Awkward?

Competition?

Last but not Least