Ballet - helpful for ballroom/latin or not?

[QPO]

what about the turned out feet that comes with ballet that does not help ballroom?

[TangoDancer]

Fencing is very good. Especially for the lady as she will learn to stay between feet. She will thereby learn to be ready to go anywhere at any time.......like when she is responding to the man's choices of directions, timing, steps and power.

DSV

OMG!  Someone finally backs me up on this! Should have known it wuold have been you.   

[Dora-Satya Veda]

Fencing is very good. Especially for the lady as she will learn to stay between feet. She will thereby learn to be ready to go anywhere at any time.......like when she is responding to the man's choices of directions, timing, steps and power.

DSV

OMG!  Someone finally backs me up on this! Should have known it wuold have been you.   

I know most people in the US look at me like I have lost my marbles when I say this.

My teacher used to say this very clearly but most people didn't hear the second part of the sentence. He would look at the man and say "you should always dance from foot to foot" then he would turn to the lady and say (the second part) "you must always stay in between your feet". It used to be that the man and the lady were taught separate so whatever the partner was told the other person would never hear. It was not until the couple made the top 12 in the world, had retired or declared themselves as being teachers that both the man’s and the lady’s jobs were revealed to both partners.

It is very logic to do so if you think about it. It is really a shame that most ladies learn the man's technique and not the lady's technique. I guess that is why the feminine look is so hard for many lady dancers to achieve. Ladies are taught to dance like a man and therefore looks like a man. Shame but nevertheless a clear fact!

DSV

[TangoDancer]

Almost daily, I say this, and almost daily, I am looked upon as if I had just turned a bright shade of green or something. It is a very logical concept, and yet so elusive to most persons. I had a very difficult time yesterday attempting to get a lead to feel the middle before rolling onto the foot. I beleive that he finally understood, and will eventually be able to do it.

Right you are re many females looking so masculinely on the floor. Too much emphasis on "dancing as one", and not enough on "dancing as two".

[albanaich]

I can't think of any more bad advice than. . . . 'Staying between two feet', that suggests the wieght is evenly distributed, great if you are doing the martial arts and don't want to be forced off balance - absolutely hopeless if you want dance - or play soccer.

One foot must always be locked, and one must always be free.  The leads body givens direction to the follows body, the follow moves her free leg  to support that movement, the lead moves his leg, then moves his torso again, and so on. That's all there is to dancing, any kind of dancing.

[Becca]

I took classical (Vagonava method) Ballet for 16 years In ballet there is a very specific center of balance, because you have to be able to do it on your own... but there are certain movements where you split your weight because you need the extra power. It is just common sense that if you want more power behind a movement that you use 2 legs instead of one... In ballroom the lady has to be ready to move based on her partners lead so she stays between the two feet because that position is the easiest to move from. It's much harder, and takes much more time to change direction, if all of your weight is on one locked leg... thats just stupid... anyway OK heres an example: try to jump off of the ground using just one leg... the best you can probably achieve like that (unless you have legs like the Hulk) is probably a little hop. Now if you use both of your legs and push off with your feet really using the floor, you can get much higher... Now in ballroom when you say use the floor and split your weight between your feet, is this not what you mean (just without the jump)?  Now, ballerinas are not trained to hold a position with our weight split between our feet, (it is only used in a preparation for something else) but we do know it's there... and can use it if we are told to.I think ballerinas have a great concept of this.  We know how to really use the floor, how to balance on one point and how to split our weight. Ballerinas , I think at least when you are learning, learn to move efficiently. It is about what muscles can i use, how do i move to produce the required movement best. Now the advanced Ballerinas (meaning company soloists and high ranking dancers) learn to make it look artistic, but it really comes down to hard core technique. It can be put together artistically and be awe inspiringly beautiful, but when you break it down to an individual movement, its just straight technique. But thats the same with any dancing... when you break it down to seconds and you're just talking about things like balance and speed and direct v. indirect motion, on the foot or between the feet... it's all just technique...

My point/ question/ statement is that once you have some sort of an advanced understanding about any kind of *technical* dance, can't you learn to adapt basic fundamentals of movement to any other style? Once you get down to the fundamentals of how the body moves and works it should just be about what does my body need to do to produce this best.

In every style of dance that i have ever tried to learn, I have noticed that they all use most, if not all, of the types of balance and weight distribution. Some much more than others but you still use it at some point...

I dunno just my 2 cents on the topic...


oh.... and what albanaich says  is great if you want to look like a trained monkey...or a robot out of StarWars maybe.... definitely not so good for learning how to move well.... Dancing is never 'always' do this or that for an entire style...

[Some guy]

Love the post! 

[QPO]

In Australia we have a style called new vouge where the use of arms is very important. We are considering seeking out someone who can give us pointers with ballet arm styling so we can improve our performance. It is the most challenging part of the dance, especially for the men. SW does a wonderful job of it, but for some of us it is not natural

[elisedance]

My point/ question/ statement is that once you have some sort of an advanced understanding about any kind of *technical* dance, can't you learn to adapt basic fundamentals of movement to any other style? Once you get down to the fundamentals of how the body moves and works it should just be about what does my body need to do to produce this best.

In every style of dance that i have ever tried to learn, I have noticed that they all use most, if not all, of the types of balance and weight distribution. Some much more than others but you still use it at some point...

Lovely post and insight B.  And I think everyone will agree that there is an element to learning to dance that is univesal.  Ballet dancers probably learn this to a greater extent than any others because of the rigorous method and highly evolved style.  The big difference and challenge is adapting control over one body to doing the same while in the arms of another.  Interestingly, much of our emphasis here is on establishing your own ballance, maybe too much emphasis since it can lead to the impression that you ONLY have to dance alone and the two of you can dance together.  What this approach misses is all the nuiances of body positioning that are required to allow the other person to do the same - something that I would guess would be very odd to a ballet dancer.

[TangoDancer]

Returning from an unexpected absence.......

Thank you, thank you for the post  http://partnerdanceonline.com/index.php?topic=839.msg56491#msg56491 . You have iterated beautifully what I was trying to get across.

[phoenix13]

Interesting thread, especially the concept of the lead having his weight on his feet while the follow has her weight between her feet.  Very enlightening.

Somebody who's done ballet answer me this (if I'm making sense ...) To me, the spins and turns in ballet often look ... umm ... stiff, compared to spins in other dance forms.  Stiff s not the right word; it sounds negative, which i not what I intend.  But I can't think of a better word.

Am I just  imagining things, or is there something different about the way spins and turns are done in ballet?  Is it something to do with spotting?

[elisedance]

latin dancers spot too I think - but I know what you mean about stiff.  I think its because a ballet dancer has to maintain a perfectly straight frame whereas latin dancers do not.  But I know very little about ballet...