Ballroom Blitz #008

Video

youtu.be/MD_xc1iJgtA

Transcript

Ian: Hey guys and girls at the end webs I'm Ian,

Lindsey: and I'm Lindsey,

Ian & Lindsey: and this is the Ballroom Blitz.

Ian: Today dancers on the interwebs we are blitzing Samba Basics. Believe it or not there are 4 (four) of them so, let's check them out.

There are reverse basics; natural basics; side basics; and progressive basics. Lots of similarities between them but newsflash; you've got two feet and we're going to use them.

So, Samba takes from a little bit of our ballroom cousin terminology in that if you are turning to the left you're going to turn reverse if you're turning to the right you are going to turn in  the natural direction.

If you're going forward on the left foot in a basic you can turn in the leftward direction or the reverse direction, hence we have reverse basics, and the same is true on the right for natural basics.

So you can go forward on either foot. We often get used to going forward just on the left, particularly here in Australia where we have this left foot love affair with our New Vogue dances.

But, you can go forward on either foot so you get two for one in your forward and bounce [it's] just whether you're going forward on the left or forward on the right.

So, with turn going in the reverse direction our standard direction I guess is…

[Demonstration with counts]

Ian: But, if I do exactly the same going forward on the right I get the opposite direction from the same action

[Demonstration with counts]

Ian: Now of course it is really uncommon in Samba to just bash out a whole bunch of basics one after the other. But, it is important to realize that you can go forward on either foot and turn in either direction to save you having to go the long way around when you have to realign yourself and your partner.

Of course the other basic which is sort of left out in the cold usually is the side basic. We usually leave this out in the cold because we blow past it and just do whisks instead and we'll do whisks in another Blitz.

But, if I take that action instead of going forward and backward I move to the side

[Demonstration with counts]

Ian: These are side basics there's really nothing else to say they're a basic action and they move sidewards instead of going forwards and backwards. These are really good stabilizing steps if you were to go that little bit extra and turn it into a whisk you might be in a position where your partner's a little bit less balanced so if you're aware that you can just dial it back and do a side basic it's really nice and stabilizing and a little bit easier for people learning Samba for the first time to accomplish.

Now progressive basics is sort of the black sheep we're going to mix a forward basic without turn with a side basic. So, you're still getting a full bar of basic so you still arrive back at where you started from; so, it sort of fits that basic pattern. But, the two halves aren't really identical or they're not really mirror images. We're going to go say forward on the right foot one two now I'm ready on my left and I might go to the side two.

So, I haven't changed my angle I've progressed down the floor which is where it gets its name but it's just sort of a little zigzag to get you out of trouble or away from somewhere. You may not use it very often but again, if you know that it's there then you can use it if and when you need to. So, if we do some turning reverse basics we have

[Demonstration with counts]

Ian: Of course as is so often the case with Samba what you can do on one foot you can do on the other what you can do forwards you can do backwards so particularly with those progressives you can completely turn it on its head and have the follower come forward and I'll let you explore that for yourself.

And that is it blitzing out four different types of Samba basics of course we haven't touched on anything to do with Samba bounce or any other technique so there is a lot to unpack and add on there and we weren't really demonstrating it with that in mind.

But, try those out on your social floor try going left and right try going forwards and backwards and just try settling with those side versions or getting a little bit out of the way or down the floor with those progressive versions smash it into your Samba and we will see you next time.