International Standard Waltz: CBM vs no CBM

[Arun Garg]

Exactly the opposite. If you turn the toe in on step one, you're asking for it to get run over.

Gotta wholeheartedly disagree here. Have had more than one professional champion standard coaches (on top of my other coaches) have me do exactly this as a follow, and had my follow do this in my leading. And you have to understand the turning the toe in does NOT mean turn the toe in and step directly back to block your partner. It’s a way to initiate the vacating of the left hip to give the forward stepping partner plenty of space.

 

[Arun Garg]

The issue is lack of clarity, including on the part of many instructors, regarding the relationship between CBM and rotation.

The first thing to keep in mind is that the definition of CBM is not in terms of rotation; in fact the definition doesn't refer to rotation at all. CBM is when the side of the body opposite the working foot moves faster than the side of the body on the side of the working foot. While this has implications with respect to rotations of body parts, it's better to ignore those when trying to execute the movement.

In the case of the Mirko video, which is wonderful, his wind up in the prep step causes him to enter step 1 of the natural turn with a right side lead. By the time he arrives on the right foot, his body has squared up, and as you note, by the time he's stepping off the right foot, the left side of his body is ahead of the right side of his body. This is CBM: the left side of his body, which is the opposite side from the working foot on step 1, which is the right foot, has moved from behind the right side of the body to ahead of the right side of the body, so it has obviously moved farther, and thus faster.

In Standard, turn is normally measured in the turn of the feet. Thus, "no turn on 1" means the right foot lands pointing directly forward - neither toe out nor toe in.

Now, if you are measuring the turn of the hips, independently of everything else, CBM necessarily involves hip turn. From a physics perspective, conservation of linear momentum implies conservation of angular momentum and vice versa; in CBM, that means when one side moves faster, and that hip moves faster, then there's a rotation of the pelvis toward the other side. However, there is no rotation of the feet, and thus no "turn".

This is a good clarification, thank you!

This is the error that people are trying to correct when they say "not to do this". Mirko does not make this error - although, in that 2015 British Open Professional Final video I linked to a few weeks back, now censored off of Youtube, some of the competitors do make that error, in my opinion, so there are some high level dancers that make the error and probably teach it.

So I think this is the crux of it. A difference in style and development. If a number of the top open pros in the world are vacating space back on 1 by toeing in, I don’t think you can call it an error. There’s always a book perfect ‘ideal’ and then there are any number of mechanically sound approaches to make that book ideal a practical reality.

 

[fiesta0618]

You and I live in different universes. Follower's toe turned in on step 1 of natural turn is a *requirement* in my universe. It took me years to get there, btw. Not a beginner thing at all.

Fair objection. I know what you're referring to, and I agree. My post was oversimplified for the sake of brevity. What I'd say about that is that there are dozens of wrong ways to execute that turn-in, so in conversations about basics it's easiest to abstract that detail away.

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You mention CBM in relation to the prep step, but not specifically for step 1. Do you have an option on that?

My opinion is that CBM continues on step 1, but it is far too late to initiate CBM on step 1.

As @Warren J. Dew mentions, Vasily does use CBM in those clips. Both he and Mirko "wind up" strongly beforehand, and the main difference is that Vasily arrives "square" on Step 1 instead of left-leading the way Mirko is. I think that seems perfectly fine, with the caveat that a square arrival probably requires greater partner offset in order to pass with a linear step. Not that I am qualified to cast judgment on the "correctness" of any of these dancers...

Anecdotally, I arrive "squarer" on Step 1 now than I did as an early Silver dancer. Part of that is due to a better windup and better-controlled swing, but another part of that is my partner position being further outward from our centers than it used to.

 

[fiesta0618]

My opinion is that CBM continues on step 1, but it is far too late to initiate CBM on step 1.

This is sloppy wording, in retrospect. What I mean is that the faster motion of left side relative to right continues. At and after 1, CBM would involve *leftward* rotation.

 

[ProgressNotPerfection]

As a bronze smooth student, this whole thread reads to me like a graduate school mathematics lecture, taught in an unfamiliar dialect.

 

[tyner]

Very helpful conversation. I think one source of confusion might be differences of view of what constitutes "step 1." When I'm thinking of step 1, I'm thinking of the time between when the left foot (prep step) arrives at its position and the right foot arrives at its position. So when I'm discussing CBM for step 1, this is the time period I'm referring to. I know other people think of step 1 as what happens between when steps 1 and 2 are arrived at. I suspect that you (fiesta0618) are thinking in this 2nd view. In that case, I'm in total agreement on CBM of step 1.

I also was thinking of CBM as an action where one side is distinctly leading at the end, but after this conversation, it occurs to me that CBM could also be used to simply go from one side leading (as in prep step) to a square position.

 

[Warren J. Dew]

Very helpful conversation. I think one source of confusion might be differences of view of what constitutes "step 1." When I'm thinking of step 1, I'm thinking of the time between when the left foot (prep step) arrives at its position and the right foot arrives at its position. So when I'm discussing CBM for step 1, this is the time period I'm referring to. I know other people think of step 1 as what happens between when steps 1 and 2 are arrived at. I suspect that you (fiesta0618) are thinking in this 2nd view. In that case, I'm in total agreement on CBM of step 1.

I would at least include the time after arrival on the right foot while the left foot is behind the body, moving to the collected position beside the right foot, in step 1. Surely it's not step 2 yet when one isn't even balanced over the end position of step 1 yet.

I also was thinking of CBM as an action where one side is distinctly leading at the end, but after this conversation, it occurs to me that CBM could also be used to simply go from one side leading (as in prep step) to a square position.

Yes. An additional source of confusion is confusion between CBM and CBMP, which is perhaps exacerbated by the standard answer to the examination question on CBMP being a bit simplistic.

 

[Warren J. Dew]

As @Warren J. Dew mentions, Vasily does use CBM in those clips.

I don't think I actually wrote that, but I did think it to myself, so you correctly read what I actually meant!

Both he and Mirko "wind up" strongly beforehand, and the main difference is that Vasily arrives "square" on Step 1 instead of left-leading the way Mirko is. I think that seems perfectly fine, with the caveat that a square arrival probably requires greater partner offset in order to pass with a linear step.

In going from a right hip ahead position to a left hip ahead position, Mirko necessarily has to pass through a square position. Whether it's exactly when he "arrives" is another question; maybe I need to watch the video a few more times to see. Mirko spends a lot of time on the collection between the right heel strike to center of mass over the right foot, and there's a lot of good stuff going on there.

 

[Warren J. Dew]

If a number of the top open pros in the world are vacating space back on 1 by toeing in, I don’t think you can call it an error.

As Peter Eggleton once told me, "Even the [then British and World Champions] aren't perfect; they're just better than anyone else right now."

I would call the things the other couples in the finals were doing that caused them not to win "errors". In fact, the implication of Eggleton's statement is that even the winning couple might be making errors.

 

[Warren J. Dew]

As a bronze smooth student, this whole thread reads to me like a graduate school mathematics lecture, taught in an unfamiliar dialect.

Hey, this whole thread is about a movement that, in Smooth, is bronze. Soon you'll have to deal with all this along with all the additional complexities that come into play in continuity style!

 

[Warren J. Dew]

You and I live in different universes. Follower's toe turned in on step 1 of natural turn is a *requirement* in my universe. It took me years to get there, btw. Not a beginner thing at all.

Out of curiosity, are you seeing Alessia's toe turn in on step 1 here? I'm not. Or, rather, to the extent that there's toe turn in, it's doesn't seem to be enough to be visible along the outside edge of her foot, although one could perhaps argue for it along the inside edge of her foot, so maybe half the angle the toe box makes from the heel, at most 10 degrees or so.

 

[j_alexandra]

This is the error that people are trying to correct when they say "not to do this". Mirko does not make this error - although, in that 2015 British Open Professional Final video I linked to a few weeks back, now censored off of Youtube, some of the competitors do make that error, in my opinion, so there are some high level dancers that make the error and probably teach it.

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. ;-)

 

[j_alexandra]

Out of curiosity, are you seeing Alessia's toe turn in on step 1 here? I'm not. Or, rather, to the extent that there's toe turn in, it's doesn't seem to be enough to be visible along the outside edge of her foot, although one could perhaps argue for it along the inside edge of her foot, so maybe half the angle the toe box makes from the heel, at most 10 degrees or so.

not really seeing her toe turned in, more inside edge of foot with a little turn-in.

As Peter Eggleton once told me, "Even the [then British and World Champions] aren't perfect; they're just better than anyone else right now."

I would call the things the other couples in the finals were doing that caused them not to win "errors". In fact, the implication of Eggleton's statement is that even the winning couple might be making errors.

Or that they have a different style.

 

[madmaximus]

There seems to be a great discrepancy between what different instructors say about what I'd categorize as CBM usage in figures like the natural turn. . . . Can someone explain this apparent contradiction?

It is not a contradiction tyner, but rather a different style of CBM imposed upon the dancer by the nature of the level they are dancing.

Our teachers can only teach us what we can comprehend at the moment of explanation because there are related (and, at first glance, apparently peripheral) technique that have to be in place before we can begin to understand advanced versions. Hence, the seemingly lack of correspondence to what we know and what we see when we look at dancing beyond our level.

Higher-order movement is more refined, as preceding discussions here already suggest. There are nuances that any beginner or a novice would miss entirely yet be instantly recognized by an advanced dancer.

(A couple of examples:
WHY does Alessia not do a deep tuck or toe-in on the first step of the NT—and yet other advanced dancers do? (position and stylistic preference).

WHY does the couple start as facing DW but then resets on the prep to face LOD, only to take the same prep step towards DW? (Silhouette and form). )

CBM discussion (as with myriad dance technique) has a rich history in DF spanning decades. There is a treasure trove of information scattered among many threads.

At the end of the day, CBM will have the same fundamental function regardless of dance skill—what differs is the implementation of the CBM which can vary as there are levels of technique.




m2cw

M

 

[Warren J. Dew]

Or that they have a different style.

Eggleton's "better than" certainly implies the other couples were more than just "different": that they were "worse".

In competition, if a "different" style prevents everyone who uses it from winning, it is reasonably characterized as an erroneous style.