Do you dance (voluntarily)?

[Unk]

Just curious.

[JSngry]

I try, but I suck.

[Dan Gould]

I try, but I suck.

I suck, and I don't try.

[Bright Moments]

i dance

i wish i could dance better

i hope to take lessons some day

define musician please

[medjuck]

I was born to dance.

[John L]

I play music and dance, and love to do both, although nobody pays me any money to do either of them. I don't know where that puts me in the poll.

Edited July 4, 2011 by John L

[sidewinder]

I was born to dance.

I was born not to dance.

[mikeweil]

I play music, and I dance occasionally, but my problem is: Being a percussionist, most music is rhythmically not very inspiring to me. I need a rhythmic challenge to make me want to dance.

My wife loves to dance - she would love to go out with me dancing, but the one style I would love to learn, Cuban Danzón, nobody teaches over here. And I have to be careful and take it slow, as my leg muscles were in pain for some time due to a slight pelvic obliquity - I have to take it slow. Right now I am glad I can take an hour's walk without my leg muscles aching. Fortunately, it does not affect my playing.

I think every musician should have a basic knowledge of dance - I have been accompanying dance lessons and improvisations in dance therapysessions since I started playing. It is great fun playing for live dancers, and I seem to have the "dance view", as some professor phrased it. I see some dancer's movements and can translate it into rhythm instantly.

I stil have to meet a drummer who can match my dance movements ...

[A Lark Ascending]

My body is attuned to Bartok, Stravinsky and Bulgarian folk music.

This makes waltzes, polkas or any 4/4 dance completely beyond me as I constantly misstep.

Edited July 4, 2011 by A Lark Ascending

[papsrus]

When I dance, it tends to be involuntarily.

Kind of like spontaneous combustion ...

[BillF]

Re poll: Pleased to the see the armchair-and-earphones party is ahead!

[paul secor]

My wife once told me that I beat out Al Gore for the "stiff white guy" title. Guess that says it all.

[7/4]

not me. Too shy when I was younger, now it's just dangerous. I have too many health problems (fragile bones, then old scar tissue in my leg makes me unstable) to risk it.

I didn't notice this was a poll, now I voted: I am a musician and I do not dance.

[sonnymax]

St. Vitus, only.

[jazzbo]

I am a musician and I dance. Suck at both being a musician and a dancer, but I do both.

[Unk]

(From the OP) Thanks for all the thoughts, comments and poll votes. This has long been a slightly troubling situation for me. I'm a (lousy) musician. I don't or can't dance. (The line here is blurry.) I've always found myself unable to do much with music, other than listen. If it's worth dancing to, it's worth listening to. Oh, I tap my feet and listen in other "active" ways, but, fundamentally, I can't dance. Too few operating brain cells, perhaps.

I threw in the "Voluntarily" because, well, men desiring to get married or stay happily married may be dancing to an "external motivator". At least that was my experience.

I've attributed my condition to being a musician - not that NO jazz musicians dance - but I have thought that my playing left me in a different place, dancing-wise, than my non-playing wife.

And so my fascination continues.

[Harold_Z]

I, and most musicians I know, dance badly and only when we have to. Unless I'm lit and do a monk like groove thing. Somewhere in my body there is a part of me that is in time. I know where that part is but no one else does. IOW when I'm alone I'm dancing my ass off.

[kinuta]

Occasionally.

JB's Doing It To Death and Papa Don't Take No Mess always hit the spot.

[Tim McG]

Hit it Boys!

I won't dance, don't ask me

I won't dance, don't ask me

I won't dance madame with you

My heart won't let my feet do things that they sould do

You know what, you're lovely you know what, you're so lovely

And you know what you do to me

I'm like an ocean wave that's bumped on the shore

I feel so absolutely stumped on the floor

When you dance, you're chairming and you're gentle

Specially when you do the continental

But this feeling isn't purely mental

For heaven rest us, I'm not asbestos

And that's why I won't dance, why sould I?

I won't dance, how could I?

I won't dance, merci beacoup

I know that music lead the way to romance

So if I hold you in arms I won't dance

I won't dance, don't ask me

I won't dance, don't ask me

I won't dance madame with you

My heart won't let my feet do things that they want to do

You know what, you're so lovely, ring a ding-ding, you're lovely

And you know what you do to me

I'm like an ocean wave that's bumped on the shore

I feel so absolutely stumped on the floor

When you dance, you're chairming and you're gentle

Specially when you do the continental

But this feeling isn't purely mental

For heaven rest us, I'm not asbestos

And that's why I won't dance, I won't dance

I won't dance, merci beacoup

I know that music lead the way to romance

So if I hold you in arms I won't dance

Edited July 5, 2011 by GoodSpeak

[jazzbo]

I, and most musicians I know, dance badly and only when we have to. Unless I'm lit and do a monk like groove thing. Somewhere in my body there is a part of me that is in time. I know where that part is but no one else does. IOW when I'm alone I'm dancing my ass off.

When I was just finally getting a little dry behind the ears playing drums and involved in the first band I was a part of I worked with two young women who were night flies and had drinking problems, and we'd follow the Angela Strehli band and the Lou Ann Barton band from club to club, and I spent half the night dancing with one or the other of them. After a while I was asked by other gals to dance now and then which was a huge thing for me.

I took the opportunity to dance close to the stage and watch the drummers. I really learned so much on that dance-floor especially from the amazing drummer George Rains. I really thank the opportunity to have those friends to dance with, I would hardly have become the mediocre dancer I am without them. With me it's mainly footwork, I sort of think of the dance beat as a high-hat/bass drum thing and my feet respond accordingly. The rest of me just sort of goes along for the ride.

That spell was broken after about eighteen months. Traci lost her job when she was busted drinking at work, and went on to become a topless dancer for a year and one night according to witnesses just ran out onto the freeway in front of the club into oncoming traffic. When Traci lost her job, Christi started trying to be more responsible, and had actually been out of a drying out clinic for two months when Traci died. That was a very sad time. I still include Traci at times in my infrequent prayers. She was a beautiful kind woman who deserved much better.

Been a while since I've been out dancing in a club, probably five years ago was the last time Helen and I cut a rug. I do dance in the house sometimes with my lovely Anadina.

[JSngry]

From May of 2008 :

[Shawn]

musician and I only dance involuntarily or at gunpoint.

[Big Beat Steve]

Didn't vote (yet) but I am not a musician and I do dance (time and again).

But only the jive that goes with a certain brand of swing, 40s/50s R&B and 50s rock'n'roll. Got into dancing kind of late and have recently gotten back into it after a couple years' hiatus and am enjoying it immensely (though I certainly am not the biggest jiver in the world) as this adds another dimension to enjoying your favorite music. Having a favorite dancing partner helps enormously, of course, as we are pretty well in tune with each other dancing-wise. Things tended to get out of control, though, once other ladies started dragging me onto the dance floor too (shortage of men, like everywhere, I guess ): As there are variations in the moves and dancing styles these excursions with others didn't go over quite as smoothly as with my #1 dancing partner, so it wasn't THAT much fun (neither for them nor for me), and I am not enough of a dancing pro to spontaneously anticipate everything somebody "moving to a different drummer" (beyond the beat, of course) might be up to ... But it's O.K. and fun anyway ...

[Noj]

I can't stay on rhythm, and I don't really know what to do with myself, but I'll dance with a pretty girl if she wants me to. It's difficult to not be embarrassed or self-conscious while doing so, but I just smile and laugh and make self-deprecating jokes if necessary.

[GA Russell]

I'm a terrible dancer, but what the heck, I never let that stop me! Twenty years ago when line dancing was popular I was never able to get the hang of it.