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.