Salsa City Forum » Salsa Music and Dance » Leading ladies

I have just been reading through the many items on men leading etc, it amuses me as to the problems that everyone seem to be making it to be, agree with some of the comments, I agree it a social dance its fun its a nice way of meeting new and intresting people , and if they don't want to dance or talk who bloody well cares as there are plenty of people wanting dance.
Try some one new people go to new nights, and if people still don't want to dance or talk, take a look at your self and ask why that might be !!.
But wise up go out have fun and stop being a prat.
Treat the people as you wish to be treated and don't expect so much.
Also be honset at how good you are and choose what level you are, if you are old enough to go out on your own you should be able to do this.

Sorry about the spelling Im dyslexic so don't be hard on me.

If I am good boy my mum will let me out of the Caravan tonight and I can come dancing.

I will not look down tops
I will not dance to close
I will ask to ladies if they want to be dipped
I will not swing women like sacks of spuds

I will only do this if they request

OK El Marco, we know who you are...Glad to see you were allowed out of the caravan last night.

I do think it's a big problem if teachers allow people to join classes where they are completely out of their depth - particularly men. While a competent man can lead almost any woman, even if the class is a bit advanced for her, the converse doesn't apply. It must be extremely frustrating for women getting yanked about, or not getting led at all, when they're in what is supposed to be an intermediate or advanced class. Yes, salsa is supposed to be fun and we shouldn't take it too seriously, but people do go to classes to learn.

I think people should try harder classes. There are no progressive lessons in Cardiff, where you sign up for a certain length of time and the teacher can move the group forward. There are a series of lessons with a step change between them. Therefore, when you can do everything in the beginners' class, you can do very little in improvers' class, the blokes won't be able to lead and the girls won't know the building blocks of the more complicated moves.

I always have, and encourage people to try, the harder class than they feel comfortable in, after all, when they are out of their depth they can just run away.

I have just started going to a class where they do more La Rueda then freestyling. I have hardly done any La Rueda before, and don't know the moves well enough to lead the ladies, but give the advanced class a go as they don't have enough blokes and I can do most of the intermediate class. I have found all the girls very tolerant and have shown me the moves as they have been called out, so I can now do the core of the class and only get confused with the harder stuff. And that is after only 2 weeks of muddling around.

So don't be afraid of pushing yourself. Going up a class is just as daunting as asking a girl to dance for the first time, or the first time you freestyle out of the lesson, but nearly as rewarding as both.

Thanks for your input, Bob. The problem is, people do not "just run away" when they are out of their depth. They hang around wasting the time and money of the people who could actually get something out of the class.

I agree that pushing yourself is a good idea. But going into a class where you're clearly out of your depth is a bad idea. If a lot of people do this when they don't actually have the basics, the overall level of the class will go down.

I'm speaking from experience here - I went to an intermediate/advanced class for a while when I was really at improvers level. While it was an enjoyable class, I didn't learn anything I could reproduce, just got confused. I certainly didn't learn to lead until I dropped back to an improvers class with a different teacher.

You're absolutely right that progressive classes are a good idea. Even though he was running a 'drop-in' class, Paul used to teach beginners in six-week blocks which was a very good way of ensuring that everything was covered. Only thing is some people liked his beginners class so much they never moved on!

Another problem with going to a class at a higher level than you can cope with is that you may put off the followers doing the class. I can't comment on the classes in Cardiff but with many of the higher level ones I do go to the followers don't tend to get as much out of them - the focus tends to be largely on the leader and technique for the follower isn't really explained. If you add in a number of leaders who are clearly out of their depth then it starts getting a bit frustrating for them. This may not be the case in Cardiff but I've seen it in other places (Bristol and Bath mainly). I've noticed that a lot of the more experienced followers tend not to do many classes any more and I think this sort of thing may have something to do with it. Any followers care to comment?

It certainly is the case in Cardiff. But I also think the reason experienced followers don't do classes is that they've found out salsa's little secret: women who really know how to follow don't need to learn moves and will learn more by just dancing. (Of course, if too many women realised this the whole partner-class system would collapse!)

I sort of agree but not completely. True, followers don't need to learn routines or sets of moves but I think they do need to learn what the different leads mean and 'basic' technique (how to spin, spotting, footwork for multiple spins,...) A good teacher will normally drop that sort of thing in every so often. Unfortunately I haven't seen too much of that and the classes have usually been about the leaders remembering a long sequence of turns. A follower may pick up some technique by just dancing and watching others but it will take a lot longer and they may end up fudging it.

Yup. And of course, the sort of teaching you're describing doesn't teach the leaders a lot either (apart from testing their powers of memory).

I've just read the current responses of the concerns and I agree mostly with what is being said.
One of the big problems is that most of the classes are taught buy men whom lead so the perspective on teaching is from this aspect.
When women teach this is opposite, I would suggest that the balance needs to be altered and to have more women teaching style classes. this could even happen at the end of most classers, 5min covering one aspect would be a great help for all involved.
Also on the issue that the people whom are confident don't do many classes ,is that quite often there is not enough room to do the moves in the manner intended.
And others have poor control on the space and style of their dance technique.And crash into people ending up in kick ankels, torn tights etc.
And also, when the teacher is trying to do more advance things , they are having to remind people of the basics, and its these people whom should step back and let those who can do it.do it.
The teachers also need to be tough on students doing the class and tell them to step back and try something else.
I quite often drop out when things get to complex and would like to feel that I am a compertant dancer but everyone needs to be aware of there own limitations.
If this happened things might improve.
Also all of the teachers I know are more than happy to run through the apects of the class in a quite corner so ask them for help.