shoulder shimmies!

[noobster]

What does everyone do for these? Do you do the fly-flick Middle Eastern-type motion, or are you rotating your shoulders in a plane about the axis of your spine?

I've always done the fly-flick because I'm more used to it, but mine have always kind of sucked (too slow, if I try to double-time my hips tend to start moving too). I saw a performer last night who looked like she might have been doing the rotating-plane thing, maybe that's more 'salsa-ish' than the fly-flick?

 

[AlexSem]

There's shoulder rolls, there's shoulder shimmies. Shimmies you punch a wall in front of you with your shoulders. Start off slow and speed up with time. Shoulder rolls you roll the shoulders back, forming an egg shape, so not up, but back and down. You wont' learn these through explanations though, someone needs to show you and they take much practice. The reason your hips start wiggling when you try to shimmie is because you are trying to punch backwards and it's a forward motion. To prevent that, you need to punch forward and also lean forward like you are doing an afro-cuban step. Leaning forward is a bit like pretending you're about to sit down in a chair. Your spine has to be straight, your knees a bit bend, your knat sticking out. Look at yourself in the mirror sideways till you get it right. In that position, it's impossible to wiggle your whole body, and go go shimmies Good luck, and seek an instructor to show you in real life if that's possible.

 

[noobster]

Shimmies you punch a wall in front of you with your shoulders.

Is that the fly-flick? Sounds similar. (You flick a fly off your shoulder, it's a forward movement only.) I found a belly-dancing site that said the second technique I mentioned was better, it was pretty useful.

w w w.zilltech.com/OLL-ShShimmy2.html

So now I can do them both ways, but I still have a speed limit.

Leaning forward... In that position, it's impossible to wiggle your whole body, and go go shimmies

Well, I'm trying to avoid the forward lean because it looks masculine. Leaning forward is a guys' shimmy IMHO. It's true, it is easier to prevent your hips from wiggling if you lean forward. It's harder if you are leaning backward.

I learned the fly-flick/punch forward technique from a (non-salsa) instructor, it works up to a point to prevent the hip-wiggle but like I said I can't do it that quickly. I guess I just need to practice a lot more.

Anyway I did a bunch of shimmies tonight and watched my guy partners shimmying too. Actually none of them are going that quickly; if I do the shimmies at the rate they are using my hips don't start moving. But the super-fast vibrating shimmies are so much cooler looking!

 

[genEus]

Learned to stop wiggling my knat by sitting down and doing shimmies, which effectively prevented my knat from moving and let my body remember what it had to do to move only shoulders.
my 2c

 

[Paou]

Learned to stop wiggling my knat by sitting down and doing shimmies, which effectively prevented my knat from moving and let my body remember what it had to do to move only shoulders.
my 2c

Me too, do it at work tho so get a lot of comments from collegues :*)

 

[englezul]

Me too, do it at work tho so get a lot of comments from collegues :*)

If they ask what's going on say

"Don't worry I'm having an epilepsy attack, it used to be alot worse but with a lot of practice I got it somewhat under control. Oh look, it's done."

 

[delamusica]

lol! too funny.

 

[alemana]

jennifer, the instructor at Karisma, used to work our shimmies a LOT and it was a much slower motion than most of us were thinking - we'd be shaking like idiots and she'd show us in slow motion that all she was doing was punching forward once or *twice* at the most.

don't agree that leaning forward is 'more masculine.' it's the totality of the dancer and their movements that bestows (preconceived but that's another issue) the notion of gender to movement. my favorite lady (see above) in NYC always leans forward, and skews heavily to the conventionally feminine side of the spectrum.

 

[noobster]

jennifer, the instructor at Karisma, used to work our shimmies a LOT and it was a much slower motion than most of us were thinking - we'd be shaking like idiots and she'd show us in slow motion that all she was doing was punching forward once or *twice* at the most.

Yeah, the performer I was watching the other day wasn't going that quickly either. Maybe it's not so important. Anyway when I am out I don't shimmy any faster than I can go without (I think) making my hips start. But I still spend odd moments at home trying to speed myself up. I know several women who have shoulders like shiatzu chairs and rock-solid hips; I'd love to work up to that speed. None of them do salsa though.

don't agree that leaning forward is 'more masculine.' it's the totality of the dancer and their movements that bestows (preconceived but that's another issue) the notion of gender to movement. my favorite lady (see above) in NYC always leans forward, and skews heavily to the conventionally feminine side of the spectrum.

Oh well, like I said, it's just IMHO. Sometimes I do the forward-leaning shimmy as a response to a guy who's just done it (that's always a cute little conversation); but I just like the backward one better on women.

Thanks for the sitting-down tip everybody. I had been thinking that that would just get me used to the artificial crutch of having my rear end immobilized, so that I would never be able to do it standing up; but if you have successfully used it as 'training wheels' maybe it will work for me too.