Tuesday Night Blues

Tuesday Night Blues
I was able to make it to another Tuesday Night Blues. The crew at Sea Scouts all flaked out and didn’t come so I went dancing instead. The lessons went well for me.
I liked Scott and Carrie’s lesson because it brought up some very good basic points. They were very interactive and gave you feedback as you went. Scott mixed it up for the couples if they were doing well to challenge them a bit more. Carrie had some good feed back for me and then when she had wanted to help more she danced with me to show me more and let me feel what it was supposed to feel like. It helped me a lot. They gave positive comments and good feedback. I would like to see a similar fundamentals style mini-lesson to cover frame and etiquette. This has always been a problem though. When frame isn’t reinforced over and over people ignore it. They seem to think floppy is good. It seems to be the default for follows. I am not sure why it is not stressed and focused on more. As a lead it is the thing that most frustrates me. A close second is to anticipate what I am trying to do and do the move before I lead it. Vic and Molly tried to cover this in their mini-lesson.
I only wish people had listened and applied the things Scott and Carrie taught when the lessons were over and the regular dancing started. There was one dancer that did; it was the young lady name Susan.
I also liked Dylan and Alex’s Dip. It was well broken down and easy to get from a lead’s point of view. I could have used more practice with a willing follow. The follows depending on their level of trust did well or poorly. One of the follows said I was the first lead they had felt comfortable when doing the dip. I found it hard to do later on the dance floor because the follows were a bit timid and I didn’t want to force them out of their comfort zones. Good dip hard to find a follow that would do it. I believe some of it is that I am not a large enough guy for them to trust that I can do a dip and not drop them. If I were Dylan I would ask everyone after I taught them if they felt comfortable trying the dip they just learned on the dance floor. If they answered no then I would ask what would make them more comfortable and learn for the future what to include or exclude from the lessons that way.
Vic and Molly needed more time and did about half as much as they started out trying to do. They set out trying to teach good communication and improvisation. Again it was hard to put into practice, because the follows stopped thinking about it as soon as Vic and Molly walked away. I think it would help most of the people on the dance floor. From a lead’s point of view it would help if I were able to improvise a bit more freely. It was hard because the non-swing follows have a limited repertoire of moves and the swing follows run off and finish the move for you. The part that bothers me is that as soon as the lesson is done they forget it all and go back to the way they did it before. It doesn’t make sense to me why would they go to the lesson and then not try and learn it. Did they decide that it was above their ability level? Did they not like the stuff they learned? Do they not want to change? That wouldn’t make sense they came to the lesson. Maybe they don’t have confidence in themselves. I am not sure of the reason and I may be off base in my theory.
Aurelius and Heidi’s lesson was good to think about for me personally because I don’t do a lot of spinning and that maybe to make it more fun for the follows I should try and do it more often. They could have also used more time. It was the first lesson that my group did that night so they were still getting used to the idea of the lesson format. Also Heidi was having trouble talking over the music and noise in the room.
I think that all of the instructors need more time and people need to get over themselves and let loose a little and try new stuff. It is a Blues practica. That is why they encourage participation by raising the price of the dance if you don’t come for the lesson. They want to improve the ability level of the dancers in this area. They want us to all get better so we can enjoy it more. D