Ballroom Blitz #033

Short Chasses in Slow Rhythm - May 18, 2023

Transcript

Ian: Hey random dancer on the internet. My name's Ian,

Lindsey: and my name's Lindsey,

Ian & Lindsey: and this is a Ballroom Blitz.

Ian: Today we are doing some more Slow Rhythm. That nice easy going get up anywhere type of ballroom dance that you can cheat a few things into and out of to make it even more fun and adaptable.

Today we are going to be doing what's called Short Chasses and we're going to use them to cheat our way into Promenade and back out of Promenade so we can get some fancy steps on the floor without needing too many fancy steps to get into them so let's have look.

So, a Chasse is usually quick quick slow step closed step and you can do them in all sorts of different ways. What are we going to do today with this thing that we call a "Short Chasse"?

Well, basically we're just going to do the quick quick or the step close.

And we're going to start in either closed position or Promenade position, and when we close our feet we're going to swap to the other one. So, we don't have to do anything like an Open Impetus turn or open Telemarks, or sort of larger scale moves that you might not usually see in your Slow Rhythm.

We're just going to side close into and out of Promenade so we can get to our walking and conversation steps and other things like that. Nice and easy does it but a little bit of a knack as well so we can both do it together.

[Demonstration without music]

Ian: So, as you can see not too hard at all and hopefully as you can imagine really really useful as well.

Where you put these in the rest of your Slow Rhythm

type of steps is kind of up to you. Anytime you have an opportunity to move to the side you can close your feet and then shift your partner to the Promenade position for your short Chasse into Promenade, and then of course whenever you're promenading and you're on the correct foot you can close your partner and close your feet and then get started again.

So, let's take a little bit of a look at exactly what we're doing with the frame, and then maybe where we can put these in so you can get the most value out of them. So, if we are in the closed position and we want to move to Promenade Position I have to politely tell my follow that I want them to change their frame from closing that right hip to right hip to rolling around the side so we can walk in the same direction; and I want to do that as I close my feet.

So if we've taken a straight stock-standard side step as I close my feet I want to give a polite push with this hand on their shoulder blade a polite amount of resistance with my forward hand so that they know that they're going to close their feet and change to promenade. This here if we close our feet under us we'll enable the follow to close their feet and we get a nice clean walk into the next figure.

[Demonstration from Closed to Promenade]

Ian: If we are closing out of Promenade position it's kind of the same thing but in reverse. We want the follow to take a forward step and at this point we can almost say that it's like any other regular promenade step.

But as we close our feet we want to inspire the follow to close their body position as well, which will then require a small swivel on their right foot, so that we have closed closed our head closed our frame closed our position ready to take usually a forward walk for the leader which then is a backward walk for the follower into whatever figure you do next.

[Demonstration from Promenade to Closed]

Ian: I like to insert these short chassis to and from promenade while we're dancing our basic quarter turns to left and right. Our quarter turns to left and right in our Slow Rhythm have a walk a step closing a walk.

So, if we imagine changing to and from Promenade in the middle you can still put those walks before and after and you can use your natural step-close to perform your Short Chasse and change position in the middle. That's what we're going to show you now.

[Demonstration with counts]

Ian: So as you can see they're easy to plop in with your basics either side. Now, of course, there are many other ways that you can put these Short Chasses in many other places and we'll let you explore that. But, if you're going to do them this way pretty much it's always going to be the leader's left foot that will walk out and that means it will always be the followers right foot that will walk out. Both into Promenade and back into the Closed Position.

Now you can do this from either half of your basic so the leader can be going backwards and then Chasse into Promenade or out of Promenade. So, there you just need to really have a command of your frame and your follower so that you can indicate to them exactly when and how and where you're going to go when you're using this move; So that you can get the maximum benefit out of it.

[Demonstration with music]

And that is it blitzing out short chassis into and out of Promenade position

Do you know what dances well in Promenade position?
- The Conversation Step.

Do you know what we've already blitzed?
- The Conversation Step.

I will put the link in the description so you can revise that one and now you can dance through your Basics into Promenade into your Conversation Step out of Promenade and Back to Basics again. Give that a go on the floor, let us know how you go, check out all the next ones, and we will see you soon.