Counting in 8s

The following section is something I learnt from Samantha Buckwalter's workshop. The information is my understanding of what was said and might include inaccuracies.

For WCS dancers who have been dancing for a while, the way to become a good lead or follow is to get out of the habit of counting in terms of 6 beats or 8 beats and to start counting music as sets of 8.

e.g. Starting at beat 1 of a phrase and doing a routine consisting of a sugar push (6 beats), left side pass (6 beats), underarm turn (6 beats) and whip (8 beats), which totals to 26 beats the normal practise is to count as follows

Move Count
Sugar push – 1,2, 3&4, 5 &6
left side pass – 1,2, 3&4, 5 &6
underarm turn – 1,2, 3&4, 5 &6
whip – 1,2, 3&4, 5 ,6, & & 8

If you are to start counting in sets of 8 the count will be as follows

Move Count
Sugar push – 1,2, 3&4, 5 &6
left side pass – 7,8, 1&2, 3 &4
underarm turn – 5,6, 7&8, 1 &2
whip – 3,4, 5&6, 7 ,8, 1 & 2

Accenting on 1

The benefit of using the sets of 8 counting method is that it makes it easier to know when a new bar of music is going to start. It therefore allows you to introduces style to the dance and allows you to accent your dance in relation to the music. As a practise, try to add some style like a shoulder roll, pointing, clicks etc, each time you hear the 1. With practise, this set of counting will be second nature and will give you more flexibility in bringing style to your dancing.

Note: To keep it simple rolling count hasn't been used in the above counting system. In practise it is advisable to use the rolling count system. So instead of counting 1, 2,3,4... etc, you can count &1&2&3&4.... and so on.

Core Beginner Moves

Following section outlines my core set of beginner moves

1. Starter Step - Open
2. Start Step - Closed
3. Starter Step (Sailor Shuffle)
4. Sugar Push
5. Tuck Turn
6. Left Side Pass
7. Left Side Pass with inside turn
8. Under arm Turn
9. Under arm Turn with change of hands
10. Low Side Roll (Back to Back)
11. Shoulder Slide
12. Comb
13. Whip Basic
14. Whip Inside Turn
15. Whip outside Turn
16. Basket
17. Hustle whip

Weight Percentage

At the strike of a beat, there should be 50% weight on either foot. This is also the case with the lady’s footwork on count for a whip. There should only be 50% of the weight forward on count 4. Weight is completely transferred by 4 &.

30 second rule

This section looks at the 30 second rule that leaders and followers should use when starting a dance.

It is important as a leader to keep it simple for the first 30 seconds. Take the time to gauge your partner's ability and slowly offer her the chance to play.

As a follower when commencing your dance concentrate on purely following for the first 30 seconds on dance regardless of how well you know the song and what you can do it. This time is for you to gauge your partner’s ability, his rhythm and also how much he is willing to let you play.

Turns

This section focuses on turns in west coast swing

Travelling Turn:Both Robert and James prefer followers to do a chaines turns when doing travelling turns down the slot. If we take a travelling turn which is a triple step down the slot then on beat 2, the follower’s feet are closed or nearly together in a chaines turn as opposed to doing three open steps.

When turning the lady, leaders need to understand the difference between an open turn and closed turn. When turning the lady the leaders need to lead open or closed turn depending on the speed that the expect the lady to turn.

Open turn: Imagine the lady turning with her arms out. This is an open turn. Open turns are slow

Closed turn: Imagine the lady turning with her arms crossed in front of her. Closed turns allow the lady to turn faster.

Foot Placements

There are three ways to place your feet when taking a forward step which are:

1. Heel Toe: Heel strikes the floor first followed by the toe
2. Toe heel: Toe strikes the floor first followed by the lowering of the heel.
3. Toe Release: Toe is folded as it passes the supporting leg, once passed the supporting leg the toe is unfolded or released and followed by a heel toe walk.

Followers are advised to practise all three modes of walking. Most Pro’s use two or even three of the above technique depending on the type of music. ( I think Brandi Tobias generally prefers toe heel while Tatiana prefers toe release ).

Body Posture

Body posture

Different body parts to consider: Head, chest, hip, pelvic and feet.

Ideal posture: Head, chest and hip all aligned and should be between the back of the ball of the foot and front of the heel. This is also the case when partners are in close hold. Followers shouldn’t lean their shoulder back to achieve maximum contact between their shoulder blade and leader’s palm. The pelvic is the only thing that should be moved back to get the stretch.

Humans are naturally designed to walk with their body weight slightly forward. Putting the weight back on to your heels or aligning your head, chest or hip behind your heels breaks the natural rhythm of walking. Dancing with your feet in front is best seen when marching your feet.

When dancing, the feet should always be under the body rather than in front of it. Common causes for dancing with your feet in front of your body is posture.

2 steps at a time

Breaking down any patters into sets of two (each set representing 2 beats) makes understanding the patterns much easier. For every two beats there are one of four things that you can do. These are:

1) 2 Walks: You can walk on each of the beat

2) Triple step: Triple steps are core to WCS. A triple step requires three complete weight changes (left, right, left or right, left, right) in two beats. A normal triple in this instance has the 2nd weight change between the odd and even been e.g. 3 & 4, 5 & 6.

3) Pause: You can pause and add your style (hit a break, play with the music)

4) Synchopation: Covers a whole loads of different things that are not covered by the above three. Things include kick ball change, synchopated triple *, taps etc

* Synchopated triple: A synchopated triple occurs when the three weight changes are made differently to the normal triple steps. e.g. &3 4,

Core Patterns

West Coast Swing is based on four core patterns. The best description of these four patterns was taught by Chirstopher Hussey and Katrina. The four patterns are descried as follows:

1) Starter Step:
A 4 count pattern containing two sets of triple steps. Usually used at the start of dance but there is no reason you can get into starter step during the middle of a dance

2) Patterns with compression (e.g sugar push/push break, tuck turn etc)
There are three things that happen during this move. Breakdown of 6 count sugarpush in realtion to this framework is given in brackets.

1) Lady enters the move ( beat 1 and 2, Lady does 2 walks towards her partner)

2 ) Man leads a compression and sends the lady back the way (beat 3 & 4, Man compresses and pushes the lady back the way)


3) Exit the move & Anchor ( beat 5 & 6, both partner anchor)


3) Patterns where partners pass (e.g. Left side pass, Underarm turn/right side pass etc)
Again there are three things that happen during the move. Breakdown of a 6 count left side pass in relation to this framework is given in brackets.


1) Lady enters the move ( beat 1 and 2, Lady does 2 walks towards her partner as gents open up the slot inviting the lady to travel down the left hand side)

2 ) Lady passes the partner (beat 3 & 4, lady does her triple as she pass her partner)


3) Exist the move and Anchor ( beat 5 & 6, both partner anchor)

4) Whip (all whip variations)
There are four things that happen during the move. Breakdown of a 8 count whip in relation to this framework is given in brackets.

1) Lady enters the move ( beat 1 and 2, Lady does 2 walks as gents do a J lead)

2 ) Lady is redirected (beat 3 & 4, lady does her coaster step and changes direction)

3) Lady exists the move ( beat 5&6, Lady does two walks back the way)


The important thing to remember is that the framework provided above (apart from the starter step) do not specify a number of steps or counts for each of the patterns. Therefore, a sugarpush/push break can be a 6 count, 8 count, 10 count etc as long as the framework is maintained.


4) Anchor ( beat 7 & 8, both partner anchor)