Dance Classes

Class Format Lesson One

• Activity: Name game. Why: Fun and moving
• Activity: Guy hands vs girl hands. Hips and waves. Why: Its fun. Boys are boys etc. Why: You’ll see it in the next video.
• Video: This is wcs Why: This is not so hard. How it is like and dislike other dances.
• Activity: Relax to Yuna and move fluidly. Count 8 music but 6 beat dance.  Why:  6 count patterns. Starting on beat. Musicality.
• Talk: Explain why dance seems hard. Difference between dance floor and classroom (environment, not teachers and fellow students, lessons are artificial for teaching).  Guys learn to lead six moves. Staying in slot. Asking and leading girl to the floor w confidence. Finish dance with complement and a question.
• Activity: Closed position. walk the woman back and forth and turn with hand eyes closed. To do this you need frame. Switch roles. Add turns. Small sure leads.  To Music. Why: communication, confidence, trust, from both points of view.
• Have woman lead hustle steps slowly. Add music.
• Activity: Show walk – walk. This is the step for merengue and 4 count hustle. The walk walk does not change the weight bearing foot. There are only two things that happen in two beats. Your weight ends up on the same foot or your weight ends up on the other foot. Walk-walk is same foot. Step-hold, kick-step, slid step, hop step, slow step and triple step all switch weight.
• The words for WCS are walk-walk, tri-ple-step, an-chor-step.
• Activity: practice leading turns and anchoring. Right side pass. This time man does little or no footwork. Why: Man feels the woman anchor and leads her into next move.
• Video: Show steps don’t matter with funny salsa guy. Also the last part of English guy.
• Activity: Walk in tuck turn – right side pass. Men can add a walk walk, or two turns, to make it 8 beats. Don’t worry about your feet. Just do what you need to get the girl to walk-walk do-something an-chor-stretch . Add an extra walk walk in the beginning. After the “turn the girl”. Chain two right side passes skipping the anchor step (same as inserting a walk-walk).
• Activity: Back to sugar push with men doing all the steps. Talk: Springs and rubber bands and ball bearings.
• Talk: Practicing by yourself. Top model.
• Different ways of leading turns. Arms low. Shoulder push.
• Activity: Recover from errors.
• Video: Rolling turn

• Activity: Tuck turn, rolling left side turn and (right side pass linked to another right side pass) whip.
• Fun stuff. Funny faces girl salsa. How to practice. Review: Lead stepping back on your left then right, triple step (the move), an-chor-stretch (the embellishment). Men lead this SugPush (as many as you want), TuckTurn, RightSidePass, SugPush (as many as you want), PassingTuckTurn, RightSidePass, SugPush (as many as you want), rollingLeftSideTurn.
• Videos: Country X for concepts, Brian for moves. When you go out to dance and you can’t find a partner or not the right vibe, guys, do the guy hip hop moves.

Class Format Lesson Two

2hrs  – motivate, set the stage, find the beat and walk to it. Walk in WCS pattern. Frame: Closed frame. Handhold. How to Practice

• Warm up to Yuna. Left side pass (practice at home with video)
• Video – Counting music with counting video – way to practice.
• Review “Concepts” (above)
• Exercise – Man leads random walks with random triple steps forward and back.
• Ways to walk, walk.
• Video – Country Dance X, West Coast Swing 5 Basic Steps  
• Left side pass with tuck turn. Right side pass with turn.
• Leading Turns, wind up, gentle, both sides
• Try no foot work, only concentrate on leading the woman
• Ways to embellishing the an – chor – streach. Embellish the walk walk.
• Video  – Just for fun. 10 worst salsa dancers women’s
• Left side pass tuck turn.
• Chain  right side turn and right side pass.
• Women’s practice. Men’s practice top model. When watching videos – everything can be turned into walk walk, turn the girl, an-chor-stretch (with addition walk walks).

Class Format Lesson Three

• Men will do the 5 basic moves in a pre-determined order so they don’t have to think
• We will use Sugar Pushes to separate the moves and give us time to think. Insert as man Sugar Pushes as you need.
• Notice that tuck turns, either as part of the sugar push or left side pass, are always followed by right side passes.
• Feel free to change the order in any way that makes it easier for you. But do have some order memorized when you hit the dance floor.

1. *Sugr Push
2. Sugr Push w Tuck Turn
3. Right Side Pass
4. *Sugr Push
5. Left Side Pass w Tuck Turn
6. Right Side Pass
7. *Sugr Push
8. Wrap
9. *Sugr Push
10. Whip
11. *Sugr Push
12. Rolling Turn

Concepts for Every Class

• Goal – Get Guys Dancing Fast
• Footwork doesn’t matter. Weight changes matter. Well no, only “Feel” matters. Simplify footwork.
• The feel is continuous with springs and rubber bands.
• To begin the dance, men start the dance by finding the “sev-en eight” in the music. Move your body with it so the woman knows you are ready to lead her forward on “one”.
• WC Swing is: walk walk, turn-the-girl, an-chor-stretch, walk walk… In other words, the pattern never ends, the an-chor-stretch flows directly into the next walk walk. If you count with numbers, dance step numbers are different than the music count. Music is always sets of 8 beats.
• Walk Walks can be added anywhere. They do not change the pattern of weight shifts.
• The man is always “counting” in his head. He makes decisions.
• If you can lead it and the woman follows, then it is a “move”.
• Ease your mental burden. Mark left foot with clip. Teach passes first.
• Men, have a set of patterns you can lead without thinking.
• Close your eyes to cut out distractions.
• Recover from errors gracefully by going to closed position and moving the girl to to the music.
• Without Frame, you can’t dance at all.
• Women need to turn both directions, turn 1 and a half. Balance exercise helps with that. So does “winding up”.
• Women, add flourishes and look pretty. Have fun with the anchor.
• We teach so the woman does not predict the next pattern. It has to be lead by the man.
• Men are taught to make decisions and communicate intention such as which side to pass, which way to turn, when to allow the woman to anchor. This is part of the art – communicating clearly but without forcing.
• Top model for practicing alone. There are a limited number of ways to turn a girl – cross hands, hold hands (wraps).
• How to lead turns (wind up and pushes).

List of West Coast Songs

• This is West Coast Swing”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWO_bFvs_8o
• We Belong Together (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0habxsuXW4g)
• Love You Down (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q96o9AvJO0M)
• One Call Away (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhPiBZLun5k)
• Cuffed, Nick Hakim (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCnPqwgEAJY)
• Crush https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9SGHPQ2FVm8
• Shape Of You – Sheeran, Thinking About You – Harris, Slide – Harris, Get You – Caesar, One Evening – Feist, All The Stars – Lamar, Redbone – Gambino, One Call Away – Chingy, Something Like This – Chainsmokers, Crush – Yuna, Your Woman – White Town, most Usher, most Mariah Carey, Any R&B tempo.

Reference Material

Simple basic dance in high level competition (waltz)https://www.instagram.com/dancesport.ru/p/BjoaOyKldZ4/

Show off salsa steps for men. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLv_di6Q-zI

Beginning West coast swing lesson brian: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKcamMuk3sA Rolling turn is at 12:12. Whip 17:05

Brian WCSwing easy shifting pattern: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oaCIu2p0RA

Brian WCSwing inside turn variations: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPq2nazW7bA

36 Salsa moves starting with basic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aV8dS2m9Adc

Research: “Dance ability was a more useful indicator of one’s quality as a prospective mate for men than for women, a pattern that would be expected in species where females are thought to be the more selective sex. At least three other research groups have found evidence to support the notion that differences in dance ability among human males reflects some underlying biological or genetic quality, and that females are attentive to those differences”  http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20121030-lords-of-the-dance