Salsa City Forum » Salsa Music and Dance » Tension in arms

The attitude that really holds people back - and puts some people off salsa altogether - comes from men who think they have a right to tell women off. Unfortunately we seem to have rather a lot of them in Cardiff.

As Elena says, no sensible dancer minds ‘non-judgmental’ advice. I value it when a woman gives me feedback on what’s wrong with my lead on a particular move, and it would be useful if more women were prepared to give this kind of advice (and if more men were prepared to accept it).

What I do object to is men, who often aren’t particularly good dancers themselves, taking it upon themselves to lecture women. Very often it’s the lead that’s at fault, and the answer isn’t to stop in the middle of the dancefloor and tell the woman where she’s going wrong.

Case in point: I recently bumped into a woman who I hadn’t seen at salsa for a year or so and who I used to enjoy dancing with. She told me she’d stopped going because of the unpleasant way in which one individual criticised her salsa. The man concerned is a notoriously rough dancer, and the woman concerned is a professional (non-salsa) dancer.

I’ve also seen another notoriously bad dancer lecturing one of the best women dancers in Cardiff on how to do a particular move. If he’d led it properly, she’d have followed it.

Let’s not use the word tension or relaxation because they both have some hangups.

Rather than tension think of the telephone you made as a kid with string and two cans (if you go back that far). For the phone to function, the string had to be pulled slightly. Too lightly and the vibration would not travel, too much and the string would pop from the can. When the dance comunication is working well, there is a similar feeling that your “center” is connected to your partners “center” through the arm hand... However, in dancing the connection feels a bit more firm or light as needed for the pattern. Bottom line, dancers learn when and where to adapt and it takes time to learn.

As for the relaxed martial artist. Although the combatant looks very relaxed, I think they would describe the feeling as fully alert, focused and ready to adapt (there’s that adapt word again)
Furthermore, it takes time to master this state as well.

Perhaps the simplest advice is that a follower in most cases simply matches forces. The feeling of pull is matched with a pull. The matching force is not so strong so as to cancel the lead but to create connecting resistance.

Well said, PAS. Thanks for your contribution.

What’s important is to be aware at all times of the effect you are having on your partner’s comfort and enjoyment. That goes for leaders and followers, both.

Ahhh PAS that was a great reply! And an amazing metaphor. Truly the words get in the way and I think that’s the problem that alot of people have both teachers and students.

For the teachers its really hard to describe it without using words like tension and relaxation but we all have our own hang up and ideas about what these words mean.

With the telephone line - wow that’s such a sweet example really, its not tense, its not relaxed, it just is... and when it is right it works. That’s how we should be.

And then what you said about the centre - spot on in my opinion, and I may not be an expert dancer but I have seen the light martially and its ALL and I mean ALL about the centre:

Case in point is Taijiquan (Tai Chi) most people who do this just move their arms and hands around following certain moves but don’t really do much else - do taiji like this and its pointless. Move from the centre, and I mean really move the centre into the limbs, and you get a completely different experience. You get power for one thing, you get relaxation, you get subtlety.

Peter Ralston - see link above, the great internal martial artisit at once stage considered making tango an integral part of what he does because of one Dutch Tango teacher who took to Cheng Hsin so well. Now I know that my salsa is so much improved since I started Cheng Hsin, I forget about leading with the hands and lead with my centre... My friend Hugh in oxford finds the same thing...

Oh and Bruce Lee was Cha Cha champion of Hong Kong for anyone else who needs proof of the link.

Just give me another 20 years of Cheng Hsin and then dance with me and see if it feels a bit different to dancing with other people...

Tommy says:

“For the teachers its really hard to describe it without using words like tension and relaxation but we all have our own hang up and ideas about what these words mean.”

Not me, mate. I already told you I did physics in school, I know exactly what it means! ;-)

You are right though, people do use the word carelessly with negative connotations. But think of it this way; you need to apply tension to a guitar string to tune it to a note, and without that, how much lovely music wouldn’t we have?

Yeah but,
The definitions of relaxation and tension for physics may not be the ones that most people are using, and they may not even be the most appropriate. Tension can just be ‘stretched’ or it can be ‘held tense’ like holding a pose with biceps tense, or etc.

Some people define relaxation as held in position but ‘not tense’ (then using different defs of tense) for others its flaccid or floppy,

Then there’s all kinds of stuff about antagonistic muscle groups which kind of means that its impossible to have either tense or relaxed arms because if one group of muscles is tensed then another will be relaxed etc, but would it benefit students if teachers said ‘relax your triceps... tense your biceps’ etc?

But since you know ‘exactly what it means’ please tell us the physics definition?

I bet you didn’t know that kangaroos use less energy the faster they travel?

Sorry, I’m getting very confused with all this talk of muscles and physics!!! I’ve not been dancing all that long but I’ve always been taught that the arms need to be ‘relaxed’ but still have enough ‘tension’ to feel the next move through the finger tips?? Does this make sence,(very hard to discribe the feeling of something coming through the arm into the finger tip!!) I guess it’s exactly like the ‘can’. A follower should never have 'spaghetti arms, (like in Dirty Dancing!!) but should never feel heavy on their lead, which would make life difficult. I think it’s just something you feel, you can tell as a follower when you’re too heavy as the lead almost has to spin you himself, you feel like you’re not in control. If you’re feeling it but not too heavy, you take yourself.

Hazel, x

You’ve put it perfectly, Hazel!

As I said before, it all comes down to attitude, if you want to please and help your partner, you will.

The problem is always having to adjust the tension and it’s not always easy, some guys use a lot of strength other almost none. Usually after the first basics together you can try to adjust to your partner. Some considerate men do this too, some are forced to if the women are holding on to them for dear life. The law with tension is always give back what you are given. Most men say the best dancers are light, and most women say most great leads are light too but they are so clear and directional. If like me you find it hard to adjust your tension you need to be aware of this as I recently hurt my wrist quite badly, trying to match someone’s strength. Tension is needed to comunicate between the couple especially in some particular moves. How much tension is another question I guess. Most are taught, if 10 is strong and 1 is light then you should both meet at 5 and give each other the same middle of the road tension.

“Always give back what you are given.” Seems to me to be a recipe for disaster, in some situations.