I've had many, I call it 'onWTF'.
Salsa open diary
- Thread starter MacMoto
- Start date
TokyoDancerDoll
Changui
Definitely had lots of those too
If it's someone I know well or a classmate, I straight up tell them and/or we debate about it. If they're a dance acquaintance who I've danced with many times, I'll give a look or a little signal which usually suffices. If not, or it's someone I don't know well, hey, I'm up for the challenge of onWTF sometimes. It's good practice I guess? Unless they're not even on any count and dancing to something else not of this current world...that's NOT fun.Disgraced Alex De Silva was a star celebrity of his time and one of most well known dancers in 90s to mid-2000s. He was known to be onWTF dancer. He was known to not have any consistent timing within the same song. One of the people credited with LA style along with Vasquez brothers. Consistent timing in the 90s was more of a NYC thing than LA (according to personal retelling by ET).
He was popular and followers would want to dance with him. You could say he was Terry of his day. He won Mayan if I recall correctly. He also choreographed in Hollywood.
He was popular and followers would want to dance with him. You could say he was Terry of his day. He won Mayan if I recall correctly. He also choreographed in Hollywood.
Jaime_Pipoca
Changui
I don't know how I would've responded to this, but it sounds abusive.
I will nominate her for a DNA Lifetime Award.
In DR on the dance floor you can find people dancing on all four counts. Some will also switch timing within a song. Search YT for bachata footage of people dancing in DR.
You can also start and then correct the movement to the rhythm of the song in a bar or two.
Most followers if they think you are on wrong count will subtly let you know or correct you. When bachata socials first start around 16-17 years back, there was this one particular follower. She was a piano teacher. When we danced, she tried to put me on correct count. She insisted we start on one. My way was to start on any count and then get on to on4.
It has happened to me only once. It was at Vienna congress. I think I wrote about it.
Instead of starting the dance with back foot on first beat (classic ETon2), I would usually start with front foot on6 followed by a CBL.
The first day I asked her, she asked if I danced on2. We had a good dance she was all smiling. Next day I ask her again. As soon as I started with CBL, she says “sorry I dance only on2” and walked off
At a salsa festival (Hamburg) afternon social I danced with a guy for the first time, and he repeatedly corrected me on how I should dance and kept insisting that I should smile. I am an experienced dancer, I love to smile and always make the best out of every dance, but I had to concentrate a little as I wasn't used to his lead. Even when the song was over, he said one more time, remember to dance closer and to always smile. It caught me off-guard and was so irritating.
Curious if others have had similar experiences, and how you see this kind of behavior at socials/festivals.
Curious if others have had similar experiences, and how you see this kind of behavior at socials/festivals.
Sounds awkward. One may mention one time jokingly that smiling is a plus, but not repeatedly. It was obvious to him you were newbie follower so he fell into the trap of the teaching role, which is a bad thing on the social floor. You could have repeated to him "And you should learn: don't teach on the dancefloor!" but he would have reacted angry probably.
Dancing closer as follower: yes, newbie followers (like me, being male) tend to run too far away in CBL, which is annoying especially with fast songs. Recently I saw a woman leading very well, so I asked her if she would lead me and to my surprise she said "No, sorry, I never lead men". Instead she proposed a "normal" dance, which we did. I would have liked to ask "Why not leading men?" but of course I didn't because asking reasons for rejections is most of the time bad behaviour. But I kept on wondering about the reason so next day I asked another woman (she had leaded me repeatedly), and this woman told me that men not used to following tend to run too far away in CBL which is exhausting for the lead. Female follow improvers often have the same bad habit, but men being taller also have bigger steps, so this bad habit is more probable for men. To make smaller steps is easier said than done, you need to practice it and focus on it. But all this should not be explained on the dancefloor but outside.
I as a lead always found seeing other leads explain stuff to followers on the dance floor annoying and/or cringe.
I never do that unless explicitly asked by the follower (happens occasionally).
I also find stone-faced followers irritating (how am I supposed to know if you like the dancing without any indication of an emotion?) but I'd never comment on this - I try to smile and show a positive emotion towards them to elicit one back. For the especially unemotional and unresponsive ones, I just don't invite them again.
I never do that unless explicitly asked by the follower (happens occasionally).
I also find stone-faced followers irritating (how am I supposed to know if you like the dancing without any indication of an emotion?) but I'd never comment on this - I try to smile and show a positive emotion towards them to elicit one back. For the especially unemotional and unresponsive ones, I just don't invite them again.
Jaime_Pipoca
Changui
Similar experience. The band had stopped playing and went on break. Some bachata came on and I asked a lady I had never seen before if she'd like to dance. She asked if I knew Dominican, I said yes, we get to dancing for a few moments and I began to turn her. She yells out no real annoyed or something and her body does something, or she pulls away her hand. I let her go and began to walk away. She asked where I was going, and I said something like, you said you didn't want to dance anymore, and she replied, I said there's no turning in Dominican bachata. I said ok, and continued to turn away.
Otterpotter
Changui
I was delighted at a Cuban salsa event I went to in Germany this summer where 90% of the dancefloor were switching. You can gift the lead, take the lead, even seize it and it was so much fun learning a bit about how to dance it.That's a good point, I noticed before with other songs that this can be confusing for dancer's ears. Sometimes brass is so loud that clave/conga are not distinguishable anymore, and this can lead to confusion although actually the rhythm is consistent.
Modern young generation experiments with so-called "switch dancing" which means lead and follow can change during the song, as a lead I can handover the lead to my partner (exists not really in salsa, but in other dances). I would love to do this when I'm confused in a complicated song: "Please you take the lead now!" Would love to see my partner's face then.
There is always a chance you run into someone weird when out dancing. Don’t delve on it. There is nothing we can do about weirdos. Next time if he were to ask, you can decline.
This!!
Why do you need to know. As long as follower is responding to your lead and dancing well, that is all that matters. Smiling and other stuff is icing on the cake.
I have danced with many followers where you can’t tell by expression on the face whether they are enjoying, or liking the dance. But as long as they are fully engaged, it really doesn’t matter. It is one of things in partner dancing that (like rejection), you don’t take personally or let it dictate how you feel.
There might be people who are impaired and may not be able to express emotions the way you want.
You should observe if they are the same way with other leads on multiple days. Most often they are.
It felt intrusive as he started correcting me and my face directly when we started dancing. I would never comment on a lead having a serious facial expression, as it is normal and human behaviour for introverts. Usually evolves into more and more smiles as the dance goes on. Instead of declaring boundaries I accomodated it, but I'll be prepared in the future.
This is the problem: there is hardly a way to get proofs if others enjoy you as a dance partner, and this leaves most people in doubt about themselves. Dance partners smile even if they dislike your dancing or they don't smile even if they enjoy your dancing. It is largely confusing. The result are some dancers who overestimate themselves and others who are full of doubt while they are actually doing quite well. Salsa has no social competitions where judges can rank you. Reading dance partners if they enjoy you or not comes near to rocket science. Me, too, when I was follower in classes I faked smiles although leads were bad. Fake smiles is the norm of social behaviour. Then there are partners you love to dance with but we need to stay cool because otherwise they might find it strange. I'm not even allowed to ask for a second dance outside Germany because all women agree to find that strange.
Yeah, managing males (and females) is significant part of salsa skills. Sorry for your experiences.
That's unfortunate as it takes away a very useful tool for gauging interest. It is one of the ways I know for sure if someone likes dancing with me.
I would naturally have to ask but if they say yes, I'm quite confident they enjoy dancing with me.
If after the 2nd dance, they ask you for a 3rd dance, then you've won Salsa.
The smile thing is incremental. That can develop during the dance naturally and I feel like it should.
But I always put on a kind of 'fake' smile because it's disarming and not smiling just because the other person isn't smiling makes the dance even worse.
It also helps that I consider dancing part 'showmanship' and I dance for myself and the music. And if I am enjoying myself and I display competence, that energy can be felt.
Part of the fun is figuring out what people like and fine tuning it during the dance.
Last edited:
? That's not strange at all in my experience. I guess it depends on the scene. Last night I danced with a couple of leads two or three songs in a row. We just wait to see what the music, tempo and so forth is to gauge whether it's a good song for us.
Yes, I put on fake smiles for beginners all of the time. We all know what beginner hell is like. I don't care how basic their dancing is if they have decent timing. I can work with that. I was playing around a lot with footwork when dancing with a friendly beginner lead last night, partly as I couldn't just do basic step (or follow an off-count turn) all dance, and also to make him feel like he was leading some cool steps. He commented at the end about how much he loved the footwork and how he'd never seen that before. I told him I was experimenting with the music; couldn't bring myself to tell him I was avoiding boredom
.However, if a lead is unpleasant to dance with, such as trying to force you into a (very) close hold on a bachata (really, dude, I actually do not want to feel everything) or dancing way off time or throwing me into other couples' slots, I am not going to fake a smile. If it's helpful feedback delivered respectfully at the end of a dance, I will absolutely take it on board. However, being corrected during a dance or being told to smile (on the dance floor or in external life), is not okay. That's patronising and that's crossing a line. It bothers me if you're letting him get away with it (you're much more polite than I am
). It's not okay to address women like this. We've all experienced it. I would firmly ask him to desist or even politely end the dance. I have delivered an F-bomb (in a 'fun' rather than aggressive manner) at a lead in a similar situation (which, surprisingly, worked! He stopped the correcting and kept asking for dances at socials; go figure). You don't have to put up with behavior like that.That’s your problem. Not theirs. Others can’t help you with your own self doubts. As I said - did they accept the invitation and were fully engaged. Most of the followers who may not enjoy dancing with you are not likely to accept an invitation. Especially second or third time. Unless they have forgotten about you. Inability to say no and accept even when they don’t enjoy dancing with you would be rare.
As experienced dancer, I think we can tell with a fair degree of accuracy if the follower is not liking the dance.
In those rare circumstances where it is genuinely a puzzle, the best you can do is strike a conversation off the dance floor. But now we are getting into art of conversation and not dancing. Do you ask directly in non-offensive non-accusatory curiosity manner or indirect manner or humorously or not ask at all to just build a rapport.
It indeed is. But don’t delve on it. If you have doubt don’t ask again.
As with any other skill.
It depends on how much importance you assigned to it. It is akin to the natural tendency of human beings to be liked by others. How much people accomodate and compromise in order to be liked at one end of the spectrum and how much selfish at the other end. And then there are those that take advantage of people’s inability to say no or push back. The same dynamic reflects in dancing.
Class setting can’t be compared to social dancing. In class I would always give feedback to the leaders on what felt wrong. Most appreciate it because it helps them correct. As a leader it is easier to demonstrate what they are doing wrong. But we are getting sidetracked.
There are two camps about it. I am not sure all women find it strange. @Chris_Yannick would disagree. On the SF we have two camps. One, like me that won’t ask for a second dance (consecutively) and others who find it almost a right to ask
desconocida
Son
Haven't found the proper section to ask this, but I guess here should do: have any of you experienced any issues with the forums last week? If I remember correctly starting on Wednesday or so the website would load very, very slowly, and sometimes not at all for me. No other sites seemed to be affected, just salsaforums.