Male or Female Instructor for beginner lead?

[azzey]

I just started taking the body movement class as well. It's really awesome.

From my limited perspective it seems to me that Frankie has gone off on his own a bit in creating a Salsa style that is unique.

His style is still built on well known fundamentals if the person looking at it is knowledgeable enough.

There was a video thread a few years back about Frankie dancing with Nancy Ortiz and the comments about the styling was all "how original but I could never dance like that", so I broke down the video into elements of Rumba, Son and other dances, provided some videos and everyone was like "oh yeah! now I see". Saying that doesn't take anything away from the dancer or instructor that Frankie is. Every good instructor learns from the roots at some point.

All the other schools I've visited so far do things similar to each other and a bit dissimilar to Frankie.

Hmm.. well another way to describe that is they may be derivative or leaving important bits out. Hard to say without spending a lot of time doing their classes.

So my concern as a beginner is that if I learn to do things Frankie's way there won't be many others on the social scene who do it that way. Perhaps this is a silly concern? I have never been out social dancing yet Somebody set me straight, please.

At the end of the day, no matter who you learn to dance with you will inevitably have to deal with dancers whose expectations are different. You'll need to learn to cope and adapt to them. That's the big challenge for any social dancer.

Better to be taught by somebody who knows their stuff than a teacher who doesn't know or doesn't care. Perhaps it will be harder in the beginning for having your eyes opened quickly but in the end you're more likely to become a better dancer with the right teacher.

As another example, in Frankie's classes the man points his middle and ring fingers down and his pinky and index finger forward and the lady wraps around her fingers (sans thumb) around the gentleman's down-pointing fingers. Other schools teach the more "traditional" ways.

One of your jobs as a leader is to "connect" with your follower. Frankie is providing one specific example of how to connect but there are others. Learn one, learn them all. It does not matter. What matters is how you dance with your partner.

P.S. I said I may have to go to San Francisco. It's for a job, but I don't have to take the job. So I might end up staying in NYC.

If I were you I would take the opportunity to learn as much as possible from Frankie while you can. Rather than worrying about how compatible it is with how they dance in SF. Otherwise you may kick yourself later.

 

[tripleg]

Thanks azzey, that was very helpful.