Ballroom Blitz #105

Video

youtu.be/h2di055dXlg

Transcript

Ian: Hey guys and girls from the inter-webs. My name's Ian,

Lindsey: and my name's Lindsey,

Ian & Lindsey: and welcome to Ballroom Blitz.

Ian: Hello again Ballroom Blitzers, welcome back to another Latin Rumba Ballroom Blitz. Today we're going super simple but super important, we're doing a forgotten figure called the progressive walks. You should be putting it into your Rumba, so we are going to show you how.

(Demonstration without music)

Ian: As you can see from the demonstration we are doing what is advertised on the tin, we are doing walks in our Rumba rhythm and they are, for want of a better expression, progressing us down the floor in some fashion; hence Progressive Walks. But you can see we can do them in a side-by-side position either left side or right side, it really doesn't matter, or we can do them in an open position. In that example you saw the follow going backwards the leader coming forwards, you can easily reverse rolls and do it as the opposite as required as, as you would like in your creative Rumba. So, we're going to focus on exactly what we need to do just to make these Rumba walks pop, make them work, make them balanced, and then it's over to you to put them into your Rumba.

Usually speaking, just to give you a little bit of guidance, you would perform your Step-Rock of some sort of figure, and then you would start to walk on the Four-One, and then progress after that. You don't have to, but it is a very easy starting case. So, if you're wondering where to put them in, try them out of a Hand-To-Hand first up, but for now let's get to what they are.

So it doesn't matter whether you are a leader or a follower and it really doesn't matter what position you're going in, let's have a look at what the progressive walk forward entails. You will obviously be starting with your weight on one foot, and these, these go on either foot, so it really doesn't matter. What do you want to do with your foot progressing forward?

Ian: We want to imagine, in the very Latin fashion, that we have something very valuable under our foot, we're going to push our big toe, the ball of our foot, through the sand; we're not going to lift up and plonk. So, we're going to keep our nice settled straight leg actions on the standing leg, moving forward, extending through the leg, and as we transfer weight we extend and settle into that hip on a faster beat; two. Repeat on the opposite leg; three, and then we're going to break that action in half on the Four-Ones. We still want to stick to our Two Three Four-One or Quick Quick Slow type of timing, if you prefer.

We're going to use that leg extension and placement on the first slow, pardon on the first beat of the slow, and then settle into that hip on the second one, to get that really nice Rumba slow settling appearance.

I will let you explore in adding the arms uh, they're not my uh, best feature of my Latin walk uh, so I'll let you add those if and when you choose. Today, we're focusing on the feet with our Quick Quick Quick-and-Settle, of course making a Slow, and our Two Three Four-One so with our beats of the bar.

(Demonstration without music)

Ian: There you have it, the Progressive Walks in Rumba. If you haven't come across them before they are really worth putting in some effort for, and once you get those working, think of your basic steps as a checked forward walk; it will really change how you go into your basics for both Cha and your Rumba. So, if you've got this far that's one last note for you. Smash them into your Rumba, try it out, enjoy your dancing, as always let us know what you would like and we will see you next time.