Categorization of leaders and followers

O

Offbeat

Son Montuno
[Moderator's note: Removed first part of this post since it's from the 'Open Diary', but this question deserves more attention]

If would be interesting to start a thread on how leaders categorize followers and how followers categorize leaders.
 
[Moderator's note: Removed first part of this post since it's from the 'Open Diary', but this question deserves more attention]


Offbeat said:
It is not that difficult. How you style and execute your moves tell us (leaders/guys) a lot about what kind of dance you prefer.

If would be interesting to start a thread on how leaders categorize followers and how followers categorize leaders.
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if it were that easy, offbeat, most men would be good in bed. whereas many men - present company clearly excepted - struggle to....read clear non-verbal signals. ;)

that is a good idea for a thread. :cool: i can start with leaders:

negative
smelly (breath or BO)
sweaty
snobby
no eye contact
no smiling
sleazy
jerky
rough
claw-hands
show-off
off-time
gets angry if a move doesnt work

positive
light lead
smooth
musical
romantic (will chase these guys down for slow songs others dont quite 'get')
playful
flirty
sexy
passionate
pleasure to watch doing shines
can dance on clave
enjoys dancing with me
inventive (and laughs when it doesnt work)

followers: negative - heavy, worried i might be a lesbian just because i can lead, launches herself into a CBL by pushing off my hand on her back, spins without being asked to, wants the boys to get off on her flirty dancing with another woman. positive - light, smooth, fast, mind-reads, flirty, interesting styling, musical, playful, can dance on clave, enjoys dancing with me.

azana said:
Sorry, music. ...all kinds of ugh!!!
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preach it to the choir, sister! :cool: guess who was bopping along (solo, charleston-stylee) to......MAMBO NUMBER 5!...yesterday night. :eek: otherwise a very atmospheric night with some great music. :)
 
Offbeat said:
It is not that difficult. How you style and execute your moves tell us (leaders/guys) a lot about what kind of dance you prefer.

Just take an example of single outside turn. A few turns can tell whether a follower is a beginner, Ms. Spinny, someone that likes to style, someone who likes to interpret the music, or someone who is an average dancer (dancing for few years, has reasonable technique, and does same turn every time). Just as I am sure, followers can tell what type a leader is.

If would be interesting to start a thread on how leaders categorize followers and how followers categorize leaders.
Click to expand...


This is interesting, because a few days ago I finally asked a guy I've seen around a lot, who only dances with the 'advanced' follows, so I was expecting something amazing, and it was really funny how within 16 beats I quickly dropped him into various categories, in this case: spin-nut, rough, pincer hands, unmusical.

Generally I think I can categorize someone quite well fairly fast. But sometimes, like last weekend, I was dancing with a guy and it was good right from the start, but then after about a minute it was like we both mentally went, 'huh, yeah' - and both took it up to a whole other level, and he ended up going into my super-fun, mind-blowing categories.


How do I categorise:

Positive categories
• Light – I like a light, smooth, clear lead
• Musical - hitting breaks, patterns and moves that reflect the music, energy level that fits, interpretive body-movement, gives me space to play with the music
• Inventive - does this feel like a dance I’ve never had before, does lead use combination of moves I haven’t had a hundred times
• Challenging – I get a buzz from being pushed, could be in patterns, shines or just encouragement to play around with walks/CBLs
• Shiners - leads that interact with you during shines, and are inventive/musical with them
• Playful – smiley, fun, nice, good eye-contact, good interaction and feeding off each-other/responsiveness, leaves you feeling-good
• Sexy – I like a flirty dance, I’ve had some really powerfully sexually charged dances that were also lots of fun. There is a difference between these and being a Leach (see below)
• Mind-blowing – normally a combination of all the positives leading to amazing chemistry during the dance and gives you that buzzing feeling that lasts for days

Negative categories
• Categories that are the opposite of the positive ones above plus:
• Pattern Monkeys - boring
• ******** – looks bored, not putting effort in, finishing dance early, never asks you to dance because clearly you don’t measure up to their level of greatness, makes no effort to gauge comfort level of the follower
• Dangerous – no floor-craft, doesn’t look where leading, tries to do moves above ability level especially if this ends up causing pain, really rough/excessive power levels, pincer-hands that make it hard to do turns safely
• Leach – all the obvious things; basically if your **** comes into contact with my body other than by accident you are in this category, hands on butt or boobs, regular moves done with slimey intent.
• Gross – smells bad, other unhygienic behaviour, anything that forces me to spend too much time up against your dripping-with-sweat shirt (bring a change or 5)
• Annoying – i) bad timing especially in leads that have clearly been dancing for several years, ii) spin-nut where most of the dance is spins without reflecting the music, iii) Cuban dancers at a cross-body nights, who have watched you dance, and then ask you to dance without checking if you actually dance Cuban style or not (beginners are forgiven/not included). And when you have clearly struggled through it then ask you straight away for another dance...
• Total ****-wits – clearly intermediate or above level of dancers who don’t know what style they dance. If I ask you whether you are on1, on2 or Cuban (with associated finger movement to indicate on-the-line or going round-and-round) and you say on2 I don’t expect you to launch into Cuban and only Cuban that means that I end up having a shitty dance to my favourite Mambo song because my Cuban is crap plus I don’t want to dance Cuban to Mambo anyway. Grrrr.
 
forgot to add "gives the follower 'space' to interpret the music" into the positive leader categories. :) also "guys i fall in love with for the duration of a song".

interesting to note im pretty selfish (assertive?) and 'judgy' when it comes to salsa dancing, in a way i tend not to be in other arenas. eg, if i met someone who was really into talking about cars, we'd probably spend a lot of time talking about cars (though i might in general avoid them, to avoid car-chat). offbeat implied that if the follow likes spinning, he'll spin her....if i met a guy who was into pain (in a non-salsa context, ahem), i'd get the clamps out, even though it's not my thing at all. but if im dancing with a guy who clearly gets off on showing off/showboating, i wont go into performance mode for him...usually quite the opposite. weird.

if i get a leader who insists on giving me a 100 spins during a 'grindy' bit of music, i'll often let go of their hand and grind away regardless, lol, and so on... should i be more eager to please in salsa, or less so in other areas of life...hmm. :confused:
 
My positive category has 2 sub categories.

Either
  • Flirtatious&Playful
or
  • Light
  • Musical
  • Technical
  • Sexy
  • Smooth
  • Good spinner
Single negative category
  • If not one of the positive categories above
 
Some Negatives

Attack of the GO GO Gadget arms - people that break back to a full outstretched arms length and then some

Attack of the cuban cross body dancer - people that are dancing cross body but insist on either:

a) switching the tangent of the line
b) consistently turn out too much (trying to achieve cuban motion in the wrong way) forcing you to move off your line to face them.

Attack of the hypnotizer - people that stare almost unblinkingly (like a fish) into your eyes for the whole dance (too much eye contact makes me nervous!)

Attack of the vice hand - people that hold on way too tightly and or think its a good idea to grib your thumb

Attack of the inconsistent muscle - people that undercompensate their hand grip with floppy lifeless fingers and overcompensate with stiffness in the elbow leading to me usually getting elbowed in the jaw/head at some point
 
TrulyMadlyAmanda said:
forgot to add (...) "guys i fall in love with for the duration of a song".
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YES! This is a very important category ;)

TrulyMadlyAmanda said:
interesting to note im pretty selfish (assertive?) and 'judgy' when it comes to salsa dancing, in a way i tend not to be in other arenas. (....) but if im dancing with a guy who clearly gets off on showing off/showboating, i wont go into performance mode for him...usually quite the opposite. weird.

if i get a leader who insists on giving me a 100 spins during a 'grindy' bit of music, i'll often let go of their hand and grind away regardless, lol, and so on... should i be more eager to please in salsa, or less so in other areas of life...hmm. :confused:
Click to expand...

D'you think it's because the lead-follow dynamic is naturally less 'equal' than life in general for example? So it makes you feel more inclined to push back. As you say, you 100% have a choice to talk about cars or not, but convention says a follower shouldn't break the rules and take herself out of a bunch of spins... Interesting point though. I'm the opposite, I think I am much more eager to please in salsa than in life, in life when I am bored or have no interest in something or someone I cut and run - and I have no idea why salsa brings out the opposite emotions in me.
 
Weeelll, I'm still new, and those in glass houses etc...

I hate floppy or rigor mortis arms, or attack of the killer clamps on my fingers.

Also follows who apologise if they can't follow my lead. I shouldn't have such a cr*ppy lead, or they would be able to follow it! Stop apologising!
 
hmmm....followers...how I would categorize them in order of priority.

Eye contact?

How much are they enjoying themselves? There are quite a few beginners who are higher on my to ask list as they are really enjoying themselves. I am happy to do reduce my repertoire for a dance if the follower and I are really enjoying ourselves.

Frame/connection

Can they follow my style? I don't like to distinguish between salsa linear on1 vs cuban salsa (my emphasis is cuban salsa though), and also put in some other dance moves in as well such as from swing and Argentine tango. That is what I enjoy the most...the freedom to improvise.

Extent of solo dancing comfortable with?
 
Some pet peeves and golden rules...

Gogogadget arms like someone said.. don't fully extend the arms, ever. You will hurt me.

Not keeping your legs under your body, in other words, extending the legs but not transfering your weight. You will step on me or trip me.

Browsing the encyclopedia - When a guy will do a basic for a few measures while he looks at the ceiling trying to think of a move that he hasn't done yet in that dance and possibly not in a while or possibly ever. If you have to pause to think of how it is done, please don't do it, because you probably won't execute it smoothly and you will hurt me.


Act like I'm there... look at me. It is possible to learn to sense where other people are without turning your head all around to look at them.

Smile, laugh when connections are missed, do what you're comfortable with, and don't try too hard. Don't apologize or say its your fault when something doesn't go right, just keep dancing. Don't call attention to it, I'm a big girl and I know there are no perfect dances in salsa.

If you let me go and I just do a basic its because I'm not comfortable shining. Also don't do the T stance with me every time we dance when I never do anything in it.
 
londongirl said:
D'you think it's because the lead-follow dynamic is naturally less 'equal' than life in general for example? So it makes you feel more inclined to push back.
Click to expand...

interesting point...i dont know. i think it may be that in most areas of life (even physical ones) i intellectualise a lot: i want to be nice and 'do the right thing'. whereas in salsa i want to get 'out of my head'...to respond to the music and my partner instinctively. i guess it's quicker/easier to access my own feelings and wishes than my partner's, especially with the music in the driving seat.

in...other areas...(look at me, all PG13, lol) i get 'out of my head' by focusing entirely on the other person and their reactions...it's like a form of self-effacing meditation. chess is a bit like that too (bear with me, lol). youre thinking so hard about the task in hand that you lose yourself completely. whereas with dancing you have to be fully in touch with your emotions to be able to let them out to express the music. that's part of why i love most salsa music - it's joyful, so that's the feeling it brings out. when i see a truly great dancer, it's like theyre 'channelling' the music....and feeling the emotions the music provokes is a key part of that. in a way, that's an utterly selfish process.

just guessing, but it seems to make sense as an explanation.
 
Moderator's note: I've moved these posts from the 'Open Diary' thread into a new thread, since this topic deserves more attention then being hidden among the others posts.

As for the topic itself, I think it might be interesting to check the following previous threads, that are partly related to this topic:

What makes a favourite lead/follow?
Leader's blacklist
 
chrisk said:
Moderator's note: I've moved these posts from the 'Open Diary' thread into a new thread, since this topic deserves more attention then being hidden among the others posts.

As for the topic itself, I think it might be interesting to check the following previous threads, that are partly related to this topic:

What makes a favourite lead/follow?
Leader's blacklist
Click to expand...

Thanks!


quixotedlm said:
good, bad
hot, not

that's all ;-)
Click to expand...


Keep it simple ? :)

But then what's good and what's bad :P
 
wonderwoman said:
Some pet peeves and golden rules...
Act like I'm there... look at me. It is possible to learn to sense where other people are without turning your head all around to look at them.
Click to expand...

Agree with the sentiment, but remember that men have worse peripheral vision that women.

I'd like my list to be just:

positive: has fun dancing with me
negative: anyone else

but I don't think i'm quite there yet
 
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