Natural Spin Turn In Modern Waltz

Ballroom Blitz #112

Natural Spin Turn In Modern Waltz - May 02, 2024

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: Welcome back ballroom blitzers to another Ballroom Blitz. You are here to blitz ballroom steps, and we are going to do that today. We are going to do the Natural Spin Turn in the Modern Waltz. So, let's get into it.

We have already blitzed the Natural Spin turn, but we have blitzed it in Quickstep, and we blitzed it as part of the “Scary Steps” Halloween episode. We will leave a link to that in the description. It's a little bit of a ham up. The steps are good, but there's a few comic bits of relief in there, so I do think you should check it out. The guts of it is the same. It is, for all intents and purposes, the same step, the same figure in a Waltz with a few rhythmic changes to make it suit the Modern Waltz rather than the Quickstep. But we're going to go over it again just so that it has its own video, and that way you can either revise it in the Quickstep from the “Scary Steps” [video], or just, take what you know here and adapt it back into the Quickstep rhythm. But we're going to cover all the same bases and get you up and dancing the Natural Spin Turn in your Modern Waltz slash Quickstep.

[Demonstration without Music]

Ian: You saw there the demonstration of the entire Natural Spin Turn figure for the Waltz. And yes, it does start with the leader progressing forward. And it does start with a leader progressing forward on their right foot. may be foreign to some of you, because the back half is sometimes what is taught as the Spin Turn. And we're pretty lazy as teachers and students, we often just, abbreviate it to “Spin Turn” instead of “Natural Spin Turn”. But if we think of it as all of its six steps, and if we remember that it is turning in the clockwise direction, the natural direction, by reminding ourselves with the full name Natural Spin Turn, you can answer a lot of your troubleshooting questions about what it is straight off the bat. Now, also notice that a bit like our Double Reverse Spin video with the heel turns in the Foxtrot, there's not a lot of spinning in a in a “Spin” Turn and a Natural Spin Turn. We often convince ourselves that there is more turn, that there's more to do, and we often focus on that word “spin”.

When we can learn not to do that, to take a chill pill, to actually relax and get the movement, progressing through all of the steps without Tazzie Deviling the spin portion, it's actually quite an achievable and lovely figure to dance. So, let's break it down into the two halves. The first half, which will be, the same for your natural turns, and it's the same as we do in Quickstep, just with the rhythmic change. And then we'll do the back half the last three steps, which are the same in both dances, with the exception of how you count. So let's break it in half.

Ian: Leaders, you have arrived where you are facing diagonal to wall, ready to progress forward on your right foot. So in this example, my line of dancing is this way and my wall is where you are in the camera. I am going to turn clockwise. I'm turning in the natural direction and the first three steps of the figure basically block my follow, and without adding too many higher level, will leader type tweaks, basically, it will feel exactly the same as if you were doing: Natural Turn with Hesitation, leading into an Impetus Turn; or just a straight Natural Turn. So at this point, the follow doesn't have too many clues that it's going to be a Spin Turn, and that is the way that it should be. This first step, a lot of the time will progress in line with your partner, but depending on what you've preceded it, we can also progress outside of your partner.

That's okay, the second two steps are the same. I'm going to move forward, for those that are aware of CBMP and movements in of that sort. You're going to prepare to turn with your driving step on the right, stepping forward in CBMP around your partner, rising onto your toes and then lowering and compressing ready for the next drive step on three; or really after three, your classic Waltz timing with the elongated two, the nice graceful rise. Drive two closing our feet, settling and preparing for the drive step which now comes from the follower as they are facing line of dance.

Lindsey: Followers, I'm going to go the same direction as Ian, saying that that is my line of dance, so apologies for my back at the start of this. But, hopefully you'll be able to see my feet well enough for that, so they're coming forward on the right foot, either through my feet or past me, doesn't matter. Either way, I'm going backwards on my left foot, so I'll feel the drive sending me backwards on my left to the side with the right closing feet and lowering down.

We will have the drive step next, so we want to make sure that we are nice and secure there, and we should be facing dead down line of dance at the end.

[Demonstration of Steps 1 to 3]

Ian: You can see that the first three steps are quite like your regular Waltzing steps, and they're not too complicated, and you will recognize them from other figures. That is okay. That's how it should be. As you progress more, leaders, you will learn tricks to slightly under turn the last step to give yourself a little bit more to do in the next part.

But for all intents and purposes, you are going to drive side, close your feet and settle. Arranging you and your partner in a way where it is very clear that after you lower and invite the follower to drive, they are driving down line dance. So now let's have a look at the the guts of the figure, the part that makes the Spin Turn, a Spin Turn, and not just a Natural Turn, the Pivot, the Spin and the Settling Action.

Let's check those out.

Ian: Leads, we've arrived at said position; line of dance is that way, followers are going to drive forward on their right foot, which means you should be ready and waiting to go back on your left. Here, when you invite the follow to drive and accept that driving power, you are going to turn your toe inward as you step under you, creating tension across the top of your thighs, allowing you to perform a pivot. We don't have Pivot Turns in Modern Waltz, because there aren't enough steps in them. But, you do get Pivot Turns in the Quickstep, and these are a good stepping stone into understanding your Natural Spin Turn. I'll leave a link in the description to the Natural Pivot Turn so you can get a bit more on those. I'm going to turn my foot in as the follow drives.

I'm going to pivot around Five, beg pardon, Four. This is step Four of the figure. Step One of the new Bar and you’ll note that I have held my leg in position, really creating that pivoting sort of action and step. This also allows me now to walk forward into the next step, and it is going to be a bit more of a walking step. I can take a slight heel here, a little bit unusual mid, figure for a Waltz, but it is quite okay. Here we're going to pivot backwards, hold our leg in position. We're going to walk forwards, not a power drive step but a walking step for stability, and now we are going to actually perform the “spin”. So after walking on step Five I'm going to release my heel, lift onto the toe, close my feet together and spin.

And that's the only spin of the Spin Turn. You can see, it's the end of step Five and only about this much. No need to Tazzie Devil. You get a whole beat to do that. You've closed your feet without weight, that creates the balance. So, all of you is under one spot where not have any limbs holding out that pulling us off balance, and now I'm going to step to the side and slightly backwards, allowing my follow to come slightly forwards, inviting them to drive in the next figure. So the guts of your Natural Spin Turn is a Pivot, Walk and Spin, and Settle, settling slightly back, ready to be driven back on your right foot to go into the next figure.

Lindsey: Followers, let's have a look at our second half of our Natural Spin Turn, and I hope you enjoy this move because we've got most of the forward work. So we are now at a point where we are ready to drive forward on our right foot. The leaders started the figure starting with a forward movement on the right that helps turn us to the right, we're going to continue on with that, it's our turn to help this Natural Turn. Forward on the right foot with a drive, and we will feel ourselves then being pivot around so that we are back, ready to go backwards on the left. Just like the lead is doing, we're holding our legs in position, so as I walk forwards on that right foot at the start of my drive, my right foot is now forward, my left foot is back there, and as we feel that turn happen, I'm going to keep all that in place, so my left foot is still backwards there. The leaders then step forward at us, so we go backwards and we are going to brush our foot in, and that action of bringing our foot in and turning on our toe is our spin portion. We are then guided forward on our final step, that should be the right foot again, and we will be no doubt driving on our left into the next figure.

So each one of my weight changes has its own beat, but if I include the pivot action, and also the brush action gets a little bit more complicated. So we have: step one, pivot on and, step two, brush on and, step three. Or if I do that with a little bit more speed: One. And. Two. And. Three.

[Demonstration with Counts]

[Demonstration with Music]

Ian: There you have it, the Natural Spin Turn in your Modern Waltz. Basically exactly the same as what you would do in a Quickstep from the Scary Steps video, except in the Waltz, of course, you are dancing One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, whereas in the Quickstep you are dancing Slow, Quick, Quick, and then three slows for the second half. Experiment with that toe turned in pivoting action. Experiment with slightly under turning, and then adding that pivot in to get a little bit more emphasis on what you can do with the power you get from step four, the followers drive, and then just remember that this figure it is a figure that should be danced down the side of a room.

If you only ever danced in a corner, you're not doing it correctly. Dance it down the side of a room, then learn to “linger longer”, one of my favorite sayings, and learn to underturn it in a corner. That way you can also then upskill and learn to over turn it and get into some amazing figures afterwards. You can't do that if you can only ever turn it in a corner.

So that's it. We hope you've enjoyed it. We hope you've got something out of it. If there's anything you think we've missed, leave a comment below. If there's anything else you think we've missed, go back to the, Scary Steps video and check that out. Probably do those the other way around. Check that out first, then let us know if there's anything else that we have missed that isn't in either video. Either way, I hope you've enjoyed it. Try it out on the floor. Everybody loves Waltz and Quickstep. We hope you do too. Let us know what you want us to blitz next and we will put it on the list. For now though, keep dancing and we'll see you next time.

Ian: Well, that's it for this blitz boys and girls. Don't forget to like,

Lindsey: comment,

Ian: share,

Lindsey: and subscribe.

Ian: See you next time.

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