Musicality on a new song

[Ashwin Jain]

Hi,

I have been wondering do you guys know most of the songs played in clubs beforehand so you know where are the accents or other things to know.. or can you anticipate accents in a totally new song. How does it work? Is anticipation built into music. From what i think, some repeated phrases we might be able to predict in later parts of the song. Can we also anticipate in the begining?

I am also missing endings (cannot predict when it is coming if i want to do a dip ending). Any tips for that?

And how to incorporate song structure into the dance. eg. say.. do shines on instrumental breaks. Are there any guidelines on that?

Thanks,
Ashwin

 

[SalsaTO]

If one knows the song, then knowing where the breaks come to set up a dip or trick is easy.

If one hasn't heard the song before... it's a little harder, but most music does rise or build to something... and some of the music has verses and choruses so there is some predictibility...

Like everything, the more time you spend working with the music or listening to it, the easier predicting and working with breaks and accents will be.... practdice practice practice...


Some of the old mambo songs are very predictable. A lot of Cuban stuff is predictable, Oscar de Leon's stuff is predictable too...

 

[azzey]

I have been wondering do you guys know most of the songs played in clubs beforehand so you know where are the accents or other things to know.. or can you anticipate accents in a totally new song. How does it work? Is anticipation built into music. From what i think, some repeated phrases we might be able to predict in later parts of the song.

Yes, a little of both. Accents and rhythmic arrangements can be very similar from song to song and also from phrase to phrase within a song.

And how to incorporate song structure into the dance. eg. say.. do shines on instrumental breaks. Are there any guidelines on that?

See here for both:

How to fit things to music/musicality

Can we also anticipate in the begining?

Once you get good enough at responding quickly, yes. It's no good if you have to hear 20 seconds of song before you realise it's a Rumba solo that's playing.

Try this test and see if you can get it right first time. If not, try and try again until you know why it has to be a particular order.

Musicality Test

Discusses your question, but make sure you have a big chunk of time as the argument rages on a long time. I do some song breakdown into phrases and accent arrangements on page 14 which you'll find interesting.

World's Best Leads E-mail From Edie

I am also missing endings (cannot predict when it is coming if i want to do a dip ending). Any tips for that?

Listen to lots and lots of salsa music at home, focusing on when the ending is coming. Rewind the music again and again. Get used to counting the beats of the build up and when it ends. What you are listening for is the break.

Dip the girl on the 1, just after the last phrase has built up and up and up "dadadada baba". The build up often ends on the 8. There are always exceptions to rules and musicians love breaking them, that's why there's so much variety. So find a song where this works and go from there.

 

[Flujo]

Like everything, the more time you spend working with the music or listening to it, the easier predicting and working with breaks and accents will be.... practdice practice practice...

Agreed! Practice, practice, practice. There was an interview with Magna and during that interview she mentioned something called 'active listening' where you are consciously tuned into the music and almost playing along as a member of the band in your head. That's a good way to get familiar.

I've found that the easiest instruments to tune into are the brass and bass. Think of a greeting. If you say to someone "Hello, how are you?", it's more than likely that you'll get one of these responses:

"I'm fine thanks."
"Not to bad thanks."
"I'm ok."
"@?%£!"

Those responses might be followed on by a repeat of your initial call/question, "how are you?". It's a recognisable pattern.

If you apply that to music then when you hear the bass say something familiar (think of it like a conversation) then it's more than likely that you'll hear one of a few responses as a follow up. The best way to start learning and becoming familiar is to get listening.

 

[sweavo]

Agreed! Practice, practice, practice. There was an interview with Magna and during that interview she mentioned something called 'active listening' where you are consciously tuned into the music and almost playing along as a member of the band in your head. That's a good way to get familiar.

Yes yes, and thrice yes.

Great thing about the conversation.

Talking about finding the endings, I think there are three ingredients:

(1) paying attention to the melody at the start of the song. Often, the end of the song will remind you of the start of the song, either by simply playing the opening melody again at the end, or by re-using some of the backing parts like the chord progression. This tells you "get ready for something, probably the end!

(2) paying attention to the rhythmic figures used in the genre. The rhythm section (which includes piano and bass) often announce that something is going to happen, whether it's the end or a break or the start of a new section like singing or solos. These little figures are punctual, so they can give you enough clues to hit the exact note that something happens. Together with (1) this can help you anticipate the end of a song down to the exact note.

(3) keeping your partner in an easy position to dip. So once you hear (1) above, then don't got for any bonkers 32-beat arm-tangly-untangly turn patterns; make sure that you're never too far from the position from which you can execute one of your finale moves.

With these three I usually have the follower in a dip on the last measure of the song (though fairly often I go too soon if the ending is a little drawn out, so I also need a "get out of dip" move...) and a couple of times a night I will nail the exact ending of the song, down to the last trombone parp.

 

[lolita]

you can almost tell about how high or low the song will get by listening to the intro. After a while, your brains would pick sub messages from the tunes before your ears could translate them into music.

Yes, it takes practice, and time

 

[Ashwin Jain]

Thanks guys, very helpful replies from Azzey, Sweavo and all of you.
I did not know until the quiz that there needs to be different style for different music. I dont know for sure, but i think we dance LA ON1 in my studio. What are other styles, and would learning more than one style enhance musicality or dancing in general? eg say learning ON2 would help improve ON1 dancing? or learning ON2 cuban (if that makes sense) improve ON1 LA dancing...

 

[PielCanela]

Agreed! Practice, practice, practice. There was an interview with Magna and during that interview she mentioned something called 'active listening' where you are consciously tuned into the music and almost playing along as a member of the band in your head. That's a good way to get familiar.

Yes yes, and thrice yes.

yes yes yes !!! Practice, practice, practice active listening and moving and hitting the music, you will progressively get better at it.

 

[sweavo]

I did not know until the quiz that there needs to be different style for different music. I dont know for sure, but i think we dance LA ON1 in my studio. What are other styles, and would learning more than one style enhance musicality or dancing in general?

There don't NEED to be different styles. The important thing is to listen... to use the music for more than just a time base. Let your mind wander into the sounds. In time your mind will automatically start to group music into different types as you notice similarities and contrasts in the songs. Ask yourself how a song makes you feel. If the answer is "nothing" don't worry. If the answer is "it sounds like it's played in an alley" then that's something to run with. If the answer is "it makes me think of werewolves" then that's also something. It's all good.

As to different styles, if you only have one style it doesn't stop you feeling the music and allowing your feelings to inspire your movement. Later on as you might pick up more styles, you'll likely find that a song might suggest that you dance more like one or the other style. There are some conventions here but I'd rather let you discover them in due course than lay them out here for you to conform to. We're never going to discover anything new by limiting ourselves to what has gone before!

 

[chrisk]

My fellow members have already given you some great answers and advice, but I still like to add my two cents anyway.

I completely agree with the advice of listening, especially active, to lots of salsa music outside the dancefloor. In case when you got out dancing, you're focus is usually going to be with your partner and not just about the music. So, better plan in some time when you're active listening to salsa music, so you can learn more about it. There are then two ways to focus on the music. One will be to listen to a lot of different salsa tunes and try to find it difference and common elements, so you can group some music, ie. jazzy, romantica, mambo, etc. And the second will be to pick a song and repeatedly listen to it and focus on different aspects of it. You might once try to keep the focus on the voice of the singer, then on the percussion or something else that you'll notice. This will help you start to notice the structure of salsa songs as well as the hints in the music that indicate that a change, ie. a break, is going to happen.

This is only to say that salsa music follows a certain structure and once you start to understand it, it can help you in predicting the accents, the breaks, the highs and lows of the music as well as when the song is starting to end. But don't be too hard on yourself and expect some fast results. It's rather a long process, but it'll pay off, as over the time you're dancing will become more musical.

As you also asked about general guidelines for including song structure into dancing: Since you especially mentioned shines, I'll talk about them first. I think one suggestion that's often repeated in my experience is to do some shines, when you hear the drums 'go crazy'. But this isn't always true, as sometimes the drums might be so fast that it s hard to keep up with shines or you might still want to continue dancing with your partner. You can also split from your partner, when ever you feel that you both can 'shine' to the music.

In general, I would say that one might try to keep his dancing in connection with the music. As most songs have a kind of intro and then start to build up, before going down for the end, you might want to have the same in your dancing. So rather start out slow, like the music before using your 'best' and 'crazy' moves on the lady at the height of the song.