hardships of the beginner

hey everyone,

had a really good class last night, learnt three moves and still enjoying it all. music was a little too fast for me (still working on getting my timing right) - but it's all good !

quite funny last night, there was a girl who was in my beginner class who, when asked if she had been to absolute beginners, said 'oh no, i don't need to - i've been to beginners classes now for a while'. So the instructor raised his eyebrow and continued.

I thought back to all the posts i've been reading about people starting salsa and progressing too quickly.

Anyhow, during my dances with this one particular lady things just weren't clicking and we were always finishing in the wrong positions. Now, i've always been a patient guy so i listen carefully to the instructor and basically pay attention. So i was sure that it wasn't me making the mistake (particularly when it was just this girl i was having problems with).

So, in the middle of the class she just stops and calls the instructor over...saying 'can you sort this please, he's getting it all wrong !)...haha, this didn't bother me - hey, i'm a learner and we all make mistakes.

best bit was though, when he watched us through the move and complimented me on my positioning and stance....then corrected her what she was doing wrong 8)

and we danced fine after that...

not sure why i'm telling you all this, guess it's my own way of releasing this excitement inside me

Hi dan_gines! I've been there & done that, been the one to flub & have been flubbed on. My intructor was always quick to spot who was flubbing where & soon corrected us! Do you do much partner rotation, or do you stick with the same partner the whole lesson? It' s good to dance with a lot of different types, so hopefully you have a chance to rotate. Sounds like that woman was a tad overly-confident to begin with(sometimes people don't want to admit they know less than you. It's a loss of face, in some situations.)

Anyhow, glad things are running smoothly now!

I know exactly where you are coming from

Dan,

I have been there... I remember when I was first learning how to lead a Coca-Cola in class (left-pivot turn).... :idea:

One of the girls in my class kept telling me "that doesn't feel right"... and I was leading it the way I had been shown a long time before that (a very good friend of mine is an instructor, and he had taught me some things from time to time). She kept insisting that I was doing it wrong even though every other girl in the class when they rotated to me was actually complimenting my lead on it (which always makes you feel good in class).

Finally, the girl told the instructor (another friend of mine) "can you help him... I think he is having trouble".... and the instructor led her through it and practically had to force her to move on the correct beat. After a few times, she was telling him "it just doesn't feel right" and he explained that she was not following correctly. Apparantly, an old boyfriend had 'taught' her the wrong the way months before she started taking classes.

Anyway, we are really good friends now and dance in the clubs together, and eventually she even apologized for assuming it was me.

(I mean, sometimes IT IS me, and I'm the first to always ASSUME it is me before the girl - since I am, the lead and there is ALWAYS something more a leader can do to get the intented move out of the follower - ... which, I happen to believe is the gentlemanly thing to do in classes.... just say "can you help ME, I might be doing this wrong")

I think of dancing as communication. Leading is the sent message and woman accepts the message and responds. But if the two of us are not speaking the same language, the communication is not going to be effective.

So if I send a message and I don't get the expected response, is it really anyone's fault? If both dance effectively is that to the credit of one or the other? Since if both dance well, they both get credit? Just some rhetorical questions thrown out do demonstrate a point.

So without ever assessing blame, bad dancing is like bad communcation. Just because I speak English and you speak French, if we can't communicate, it is neither's fault for not knowing the other language. But if two work together with an open mind and patience, the communication can begin to happen. We must move past blame altogether, because that accomplishes nothing.

Early lessons should teach ettiquitte as part of dance technique and blame should be shot down right away. Blame is just a way to deal with frustration, but dance is a team activity between two people, both have to work together.

Something you see all the time - I think beginners seem to fall into two categories - those that think they know everything and can't possibly be wrong, and those that think that everything that goes wrong is their fault. Think when I started dancing I fell into the latter category - I remember dancing with a couple of guys that I thought were great when I started and not being able to follow them. Obviously blamed myself. Now when I dance with them I realise that actually the reason I couldn't follow them was because they dance completely off time. Still they are still nice guys, I've just learnt to do a shuffly type step that compensates for them when we dance now! Anyway, nice to see you have a healthy, could be my fault, could be hers, not really the end of the world either way attitude!

Anyway, I'm in London too and tend to go out 5/6 nights a week dancing so if you ever want advice on the London scene, or to know what certain clubs are like - send me a message.

templeria said:

Anyway, I'm in London too and tend to go out 5/6 nights a week dancing so if you ever want advice on the London scene, or to know what certain clubs are like - send me a message.

Click to expand...

...or post it here so that there's actually a record for any of us who may eventually end up over there!

Something that drives me a little nuts....

When learning a new pattern in salsa class a couple of weeks ago, I began with my hands in the wrong position, so ended up leading an inside turn rather than an outside turn--which otherwise didn't affect the pattern at all. I just hadn't been watching closely enough and was concentrating on footwork.

No biggie. But the girl I was dancing with goes ahead and does an outside turn even though I'm trying to lead (and with my left hand over my right positioned to lead) an inside turn. With the result that we're getting tangled up in a simple turn.

Now I'll admit I should have been watching to see what the pattern really was--but wouldn't the protocol for most followers in that situation be to do what was actually led, and then just say, "Um, I think we're supposed to be doing an outside turn"? Rather than to turn against the direction of the actual lead?

It's made me even more conscious of people in other classes who try to anticipate the lead or just head off into the steps that they've learned without actually following anything. The other night in a WCS class, one of the followers was just heading off into her prescribed steps without waiting to see if I was leading anything. And that put her dancing ahead of the beat, so I've got to fight her just to hold her back. Sheesh.

End of complaint. :x

Been there, too - blamers are one of my biggest pet peeves when it comes to taking classes. It's odd how I could get along perfectly well with some of these ladies outside of class.

About all I can say is: hang in there! It'll get better as you progress.

As they say, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing - and a little knowledge reinforced by a few years of habit can be a real show stopper.

One thing I've found usefull long term is to try to at least conceptually learn both leader's and follower's parts to everything. That really helps give a better understanding of how the figure works, providing a base upon which to analyze new or conflicting ideas about it. Having a picture in your mind of what each body is doing at each stage isn't quite the same as dancing through it with someone who knows the figure well, but it can sometimes expose problems in your concept of the figure - or in what someone else is trying to convince you about it.

But what to do with the information... that depends on the setting. Sometimes you just try to avoid certain people in class rotations.

Chris Stratton said:

One thing I've found usefull long term is to try to at least conceptually learn both leader's and follower's parts to everything. That really helps give a better understanding of how the figure works, providing a base upon which to analyze new or conflicting ideas about it. Having a picture in your mind of what each body is doing at each stage isn't quite the same as dancing through it with someone who knows the figure well, but it can sometimes expose problems in your concept of the figure - or in what someone else is trying to convince you about it.

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Oh, absolutely. I'm lucky to have a really good male friend whom I go to the salsa club with. And we frequently trade at being lead and follow. If I ever have a question about a lead, I generally ask my teacher, whether in ballroom, salsa, swing, or whatever, to lead me in the pattern. Always learn a lot by following. (Not the least of which is I would make a terrible girl--but I'm getting better!).

Knowing both parts can be useful...

Whenever I cannot quite figure out what my students do wrong, I do the pattern with them... this way I know if the leader makes a mistake or if it's the follower's fault... and it's easier to correct...

And it can be fun... I love leading :twisted: