Is the forward-back basic detrimental for beginners' body movement development?

T

TikiTaka

Son Montuno
The other day I was at a non-latin party and I noticed that a lot of people when dancing did some sort of counter-motion, or however you want to call it. Upper body, hips, knees, etc.

I have also noticed that if you teach someone to do the 123, 567 basic step in place, they learn the latin motion very fast. However in most classes, they always seem to begin with the forward-back, and from what I have seen, it makes beginners move very unnaturally to the point where their movement is worse than the average dancer at a random party. That is not to say you can't have good motion with the forward-back step, I just think it is not good for beginners. Do you agree?
 
I think people who learn non-latin dance styles develop a kind of natural sway, which is a form of counter-body motion. Also, shower dancers as well as club dancers have this kind of swaying motion, which has some elements of counter-body motion but it's not the same as Cuban motion. Latin dancers have to learn both Cuban motion and CBM. You could make an argument about teaching beginners to step in place, but learning how to step back and forth is integral to the dance and eventually Salsa dancers will need to learn how to integrate Cuban motion into their back and forward basic if they want to improve their body movement.

I honestly don't think body movement is for beginners. Beginners should learn proper stepping mechanics and lead/follow mechanics first, IMO.
 
Chris_Yannick said:
Also, shower dancers as well as club dancers have this kind of swaying motion, which has some elements of counter-body motion but it's not the same as Cuban motion.
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Whether you want to call it cuban motion or not, many club dancers share a common element with merengue, cumbia, salsa, timba, vallenato, bachata dancers. They are all different, but similar.

Chris_Yannick said:
You could make an argument about teaching beginners to step in place, but learning how to step back and forth is integral to the dance
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The way I showed my friends was: first in place with proper knee, upper body and arm movement. Then I made them do the same but walking back and fourth (not forward-back) while still moving the body properly. Then I did the son basic. Finally I added different direction (forward-back, back-back, front-front, side-side), and although they had never danced salsa before, they looked way more latin than some of the dancers that get posted in the videos thread in this forum lol.

Chris_Yannick said:
I honestly don't think body movement is for beginners. Beginners should learn proper stepping mechanics and lead/follow mechanics first, IMO.
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Stepping involves the whole body, even when you walk you swing the arms. I don't think it is a separate thing.
 
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TikiTaka said:
Whether you want to call it cuban motion or not, many club dancers share a common element with merengue, cumbia, salsa, timba, vallenato, bachata dancers. They are all different, but similar.
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Cuban motion to me is much more involved. I am also looking at all the definitions of it, including the Ballroom version, which is so much more involved than Merengue.

When I go to a non-latin club, I see people moving in a way that isn't Latin looking at all. I'd say most are just bopping up and down with no lateral movement. The club dancers who move the hips are moving much better and will probably have an easier time with Latin movement, but this isn't something that you can teach easily. There's a lot more going on that prevents people from moving well, including how one perceives rhythm or lack thereof.

Basically, most guys have crap movement and can't dance with rhythm even if you gave them correct technique.
 
Great example of natural latin looking movement. Probably none of them are trained. It doesn't need to be so complicated. I believe if you can do something like this, it will be much easier to learn the movement for other latin dances. Depending on the dance, there will be adjustments of course.
 
TikiTaka said:
Of course, if they are European they will look more European :p
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I am not European but I had what I believe to be the typical 'non dancer' disadvantages. I never danced as a kid. I wasn't around people who danced. I didn't grow up with a culture of dance. I started Latin dancing relatively late in life (at age 26).

I think I am representative of many guys who aspire to dance Salsa but who ultimately struggle with the movement. Whether I was dancing Salsa, Bachata or Merengue, my body was still stiff as a board and looked exactly the same. The best I could do was keep rhythm and be a good leader. At least in the beginning.

I think I could have advanced my body movement if I had worked harder at it, but there was no magic pill and I don't believe there ever will be. Looking back, I think I did all the right things and it still took me more than a decade before I felt comfortable with basic Latin movement.
 
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TikiTaka said:
Great example of natural latin looking movement. Probably none of them are trained. It doesn't need to be so complicated. I believe if you can do something like this, it will be much easier to learn the movement for other latin dances. Depending on the dance, there will be adjustments of course.
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This is where the advantages of having a 'culture of dancing' comes into play.

Latinos are probably the best untrained dancers in the world. I think it's comparing apples and oranges.

Try to teach a European (or anyone unfamiliar with body movement) to move like that and they will struggle big time.

Even my sister who is a 'shower dancer' doesn't move as well as the lady in that video.

If this is considered 'basic' movement that anyone should have the capability to do, then I suspect many untrained dancers around the world will be extremely sad.
 
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TikiTaka said:
Great example of natural latin looking movement. Probably none of them are trained. It doesn't need to be so complicated. I believe if you can do something like this, it will be much easier to learn the movement for other latin dances. Depending on the dance, there will be adjustments of course.
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Damn. This is how I dance, if I can't figure out are we going to do it on1 or on2. :D
 
Chris_Yannick said:
Latinos are probably the best untrained dancers in the world.
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I would actually guess the best natural dancers are from some country like Ghana or Nigeria or some other country in western sub-saharan Africa. Well based on my limited sample, most Latinos are used to partner dancing but my African friends have better moves for solo dancing.
 
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TikiTaka said:
I would actually guess the best natural dancers are from some country like Ghana or Nigeria or some other country in western sub-saharan Africa.
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I don't know. I don't want to generalize too much. All I know is that whenever I see an untrained Latino dancing, I think to myself "nuh-uh, that is simply not gonna happen with me..." and many people I know feel the same way.

I think the 5 Latinos in our country have Salsa statues erected of them in the Capital.
 
There is a selection bias, people who are ashamed of their dancing usually don't go to parties and you don't see them. From my experience in Latin America and Europe there is not a big difference. Untrained dancers will stomp, sway, jiggle happily and trained dancers will do their fancy moves. I expect that people who come to salsa parties that I visited have some interest in salsa, both dance and music. Hard to generalize about entire population from such samples. Latin America have deeper connection to salsa music amongst other, Europe - to other kinds of music.
Only place where I've met couple people who actively dislike salsa is Latin America.
 
Going back to the OP,

I think as a teacher, experimenting with different ideas is good.

Guys generally don't care about body movement in the beginning, opting instead to learn moves to impress the girls.

But if you can Introduce body movement to beginners in a non intimidating way that doesn't make people feel ridiculous, go for it.

I still think there isn't a huge problem with the way the forward back basic is taught. Maybe teach beginners to focus more on stepping out their patterns so they aren't being stationary?
 
TikiTaka said:
The other day I was at a non-latin party and I noticed that a lot of people when dancing did some sort of counter-motion, or however you want to call it. Upper body, hips, knees, etc.

I have also noticed that if you teach someone to do the 123, 567 basic step in place, they learn the latin motion very fast. However in most classes, they always seem to begin with the forward-back, and from what I have seen, it makes beginners move very unnaturally to the point where their movement is worse than the average dancer at a random party. That is not to say you can't have good motion with the forward-back step, I just think it is not good for beginners. Do you agree?
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YES! A thousand times yes.

I have said that so many times on this forum, that after I started dancing Cuban (and kizomba), I really began to see how detrimental the fwd-backward / start-stop basic is to smooth, flowing movement and to contra body movement. It's a wonder anyone manages to get good at salsa dancing using this basic :p And it's why there are a lot more bad dancers in linear salsa than in cuban/kizomba/dominican bachata. It's why so few linear salsa dancers can be called good dancers (and they are usually the ones who have figured out how to make their linear salsa as circular as possible, like doing a lot of 360s). And it's why contra body movement/hip movement is so rare in linear salsa -- because the back and forth basic precludes it. Recently at the Prague marathon I looked around the room and there were only a couple people that had good contra body movement. It is really hard to reconcile the linear salsa basic with the fact that it directly contradicts with contra body movement.

I had a thread a while back about how linear salsa is an artificially created "Latin" dance based on other dances and that its backward-forward / start-stop movement in a Latin dance doesn't make sense from a body movement perspective. Latin dances are generally circular, and circularity feels smooth and continuous, not like the start-stop forward/backward basic in linear salsa.
 
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Sabrosura said:
YES! A thousand times yes.

I have said that so many times on this forum, that after I started dancing Cuban (and kizomba), I really began to see how detrimental the fwd-backward / start-stop basic is to smooth, flowing movement and to contra body movement. It's a wonder anyone manages to get good at salsa dancing using this basic :p And it's why there are a lot more bad dancers in linear salsa than in cuban/kizomba/dominican bachata. It's why so few linear salsa dancers can be called good dancers (and they are usually the ones who have figured out how to make their linear salsa as circular as possible, like doing a lot of 360s). And it's why contra body movement/hip movement is so rare in linear salsa -- because the back and forth basic precludes it. Recently at the Prague marathon I looked around the room and there were only a couple people that had good contra body movement. It is really hard to reconcile the linear salsa basic with the fact that it directly contradicts with contra body movement.

I had a thread a while back about how linear salsa is an artificially created "Latin" dance based on other dances and that its backward-forward / start-stop movement in a Latin dance doesn't make sense from a body movement perspective. Latin dances are generally circular, and circularity feels smooth and continuous, not like the start-stop forward/backward basic in linear salsa.
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Well most cuban instructors I have come across also teach the forward back step as the first basic. Some of my friends had taken a "salsa cubana beginner class" and while my other friends who hadn't ever taken a salsa class picked up the contra body motion fast, those who had taken the class were stuck in the forward-back step
 
TikiTaka said:
The other day I was at a non-latin party and I noticed that a lot of people when dancing did some sort of counter-motion, or however you want to call it. Upper body, hips, knees, etc.

I have also noticed that if you teach someone to do the 123, 567 basic step in place, they learn the latin motion very fast. However in most classes, they always seem to begin with the forward-back, and from what I have seen, it makes beginners move very unnaturally to the point where their movement is worse than the average dancer at a random party. That is not to say you can't have good motion with the forward-back step, I just think it is not good for beginners. Do you agree?
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My on the spot is okay. My forward and back is okay, with a partner it's the drizzling $h!ts so I hafta agree
 
Chris_Yannick said:
I am not European but I had what I believe to be the typical 'non dancer' disadvantages. I never danced as a kid. I wasn't around people who danced. I didn't grow up with a culture of dance. I started Latin dancing relatively late in life (at age 26)..
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I started at 37.75 (partner dancing).
 
1derpalm said:
My forward and back is okay, with a partner it's the drizzling $h!ts so I hafta agree
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I assume you're talking about your body movement.

When dancing the forward-back basic with a partner, practically every Linear dancer dances with less body movement. It looks funny seeing people trying to move their hips and dancing back and forth with a partner. Like super stylized ballroom dancing.

So I don't think it's necessary to dance with good body movement while dancing the forward-back basic in Salsa. First thing should be the maintain proper stepping, which is usually more than enough for the average dancer.

For me, body movement is something I do as an individual pursuit, not a partner pursuit. This is why I love shines so much, because I can switch gears and do things I often can't do with a partner.
 
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