Fancy footwork anyone??

[Templejazz]

I don't think I've seen anything about dancing on this board yet but I'd like to share my experiences from this summer.

When I got my first teaching job last year it was a major accomplishment after a year or so of less-than-favorable situations and health problems, physical and mental. As a reward for crossing that hump I decided to try some new things, pick up some new hobbies. I took on a beginning acting class and a few months later, last March, I decided to take a Salsa dancing class.

Now I knew some basic steps from a couple semesters playing trumpet in my college's Latin American Music Ensemble but I was intrigued to learn more (Also wanted to meet more women B-)) With dancing, I've always had two left feet. Never went to dance clubs, never moved right regardless of my musicianship and ability to feel a groove. I decided to take a beginning Salsa class in Philly and needless to say I became hooked from the get-go. It was very intimidating going to the clubs at first not really knowing how to lead (Women who dance well have NO tolerance for novice gentleman ) but the more I went out the better I picked it up. I'm happy to say that I stuck with it and have been Salsa dancing regularly for about 6 months and am just finishing up an Intermediate level class. I'm gonna take a break from the classes for a while cuz I'm about to go back to teach school but will continue going out every other week or so.

Anybody else do any dancing? Salsa? Ballroom? The Mashed Potata?? FESS UP and share your footwork!

Peace!!

Bill

[Templejazz]

Only left feet in here??

[A Lark Ascending]

I went to two Morris Dancing lessons in 1973. Quickly realised it was just rugby with bells and hankies i.e. lots of blokes getting drunk together.

Just as well.

I'm convinced Richard Thompson wrote that song about me!

Always liked the idea of that Cajun dancing. Very formal, very graceful.

[JSngry]

I love to play for dancers of all types. It's an incredibly natural experience as long as there's not an air of "demanding" in the air (as in "we only want to hear one thing played one way all night long"). Then it gets to be a drag. Fast.

I wish I could dance really good, because I feel it. But there is a disconnect between my sould and my feet, no doubt hampered by some weirdass congenitality from my knees downward. Still, the dance impulse is something that I feel very strongly in both music and life. It's fundamental, I think. At least to the rhythm that I prefer to live my life in. Not the pound-pound-pound beat of "dance", but the natural, graceful, and ever mutating yet ever staying the same pulse of life.

I've played for dancers of all different ilk, and I tell you, the flow thing that gets going when everything is honest and true is profound, and I try to bring that with me to everything I play, including (ESPECIALLY including) music that is not intended for dancing. I want it to be someting that makes you want to dance anyway, even if it means doing a dance that only you can do!

And a dance that only I can do IS the only dance I can do, or so it seems...