2014-04-09, 12:38 PM
I received the greatest piece of dancing advice ever last night from my Bachata follow.
"You have to tell me where to go. If you tell me to go nowhere, I will go nowhere. If you tell me you want to spin me, I will spin. I should be able to dance with you with my eyes closed and simply feel your frame and presence. If you cannot communicate your frame, then we can't dance. Stronger frame! Stronger lead! Go!" And then we danced.
That phrase "I should be able to dance with you with my eyes closed" was rather enlightening and totally changed the way I think about dancing.
Because if she's dancing with her eyes closed, that means I have the following responsibilities:
- MOVE HER
- Make sure she doesn't run into anyone
- Use my frame to clearly communicate what I want the next move to be. There are certain hand signals, bodyweight changes, and frame movements I can do to communicate what I want.
If there is an error in dancing, there's only a 10% chance that it's her fault (I gave the signal strongly, she just didn't do anything about it) and 90% that it's mine because I didn't tell her where to go.
As a lead, I can do whatever I want to do. That is very liberating and entirely scary at the same time. I have complete control over a woman in dance. She can shut her mind off and just listen.
"You have to tell me where to go. If you tell me to go nowhere, I will go nowhere. If you tell me you want to spin me, I will spin. I should be able to dance with you with my eyes closed and simply feel your frame and presence. If you cannot communicate your frame, then we can't dance. Stronger frame! Stronger lead! Go!" And then we danced.
That phrase "I should be able to dance with you with my eyes closed" was rather enlightening and totally changed the way I think about dancing.
Because if she's dancing with her eyes closed, that means I have the following responsibilities:
- MOVE HER
- Make sure she doesn't run into anyone
- Use my frame to clearly communicate what I want the next move to be. There are certain hand signals, bodyweight changes, and frame movements I can do to communicate what I want.
If there is an error in dancing, there's only a 10% chance that it's her fault (I gave the signal strongly, she just didn't do anything about it) and 90% that it's mine because I didn't tell her where to go.
As a lead, I can do whatever I want to do. That is very liberating and entirely scary at the same time. I have complete control over a woman in dance. She can shut her mind off and just listen.