Well, I have just found this site and this thread is very interesting. With no background in dancing, I've been learning salsa for around a year and sometimes I feel I am almost half way there! It may be difficult for experienced salseros to remember what it was like to learn but it's currently vivid to me .... and I seem to have had just about all the experiences in this thread except the thrill of making it to the stage when I can ask a competent lady to dance and really feel I have done OK during a whole number.
On leaders and followers: I go to classes with male and female instructors and it seems that very few devote much time to the essential bits in a lead; one or two are good, but I reckon that like any other skill, once you (the instructor) have mastered it it becomes automatic and obvious to you and you can't see why it may be difficult for a student. Learning sequences is OK as far as it goes, and does help to build a repertoire of moves, and - probably more important for a leader - to make it easier to recognise a position you've got yourself into and maybe a few ways to get out of it. But as others have pointed out, learning by choreography rather than by the principles of giving and feeling a lead leads to those situations where you and your class partners can do the sequence of the evening just fine (by the end of the class) but it goes to pieces with a stranger or after a week of forgetting ...
.... so I am very much with those who try to mix things up a bit - intentionally or not - in a class, to explore whether the follower is actually following, rather than anticipating the lead because it's all choreographed. Instructors might actually encourage a bit of variation .... and yes, I have had outraged ladies beefing about departures from the strict sequence. I can see their point, as we are learning certain moves that may be new and need practising. But there is this other point, and some compromise (preferably led by an instructor) seems desirable.
Of course I went through the typical male stage of thinking that leading was more difficult than following, but I've come to realise that this is bunk. It helped to reverse roles sometimes (good instructors!). Each has its own problems and difficulties. The follower, who if learning is just as worried about things as the leader and just as unpractised, generally has to start her move a few milliseconds behind the leader simply because it takes those moments to sense what is being led. If the leader is crisp and precise in his own moves and right there on time (even a few milliseconds ahead) then things go well. But any fumbling or delay (maybe due to uncertainty, maybe also because of interaction with an uncertain follower) and it gets to be a rougher experience for both.
Equally, I don't buy the idea that it is always the leader's fault if things go wrong, although one takes a gentlemanly view towards the lady. In the last few months I've been trying out stuff learned in one class, on very good ladies (instructors where possible) in other classes. With one or two, I can often get them first time through a sequence I've just learned elsewhere. With other individuals, almost never. The practical conclusion is that some swish ladies are good followers, paying attention to a lead, and others not - maybe not a question of skill, but of how much attention they are actually paying to sensing a learner's lead ....
But isn't salsa great?! I am definitely with those who go out there to have fun rather than cut a figure! And the ladies who are fun to dance with are the ones who enjoy it and laugh while we're trying out, even if they judge me a lumbering oaf. And isn't it a thrill when, even for a few moments, something you try comes off well, and you and she are just in the right place with that lovely graceful timing? If only it happened more often ... And aren't ladies lovely when they are dancing salsa? .... sigh.
XY (no, I'm not in Cardiff but may visit over Easter ... and report ...)
