Quote:
Originally posted by DavidB
Musical interpretation is an 'optional extra' in dancing. You don't need to do it. 5 years ago no-one did it.
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But it's not 5 years ago any more.
Not that I count myself as anything but the rawest beginner when it comes to interpretive dancing, but I would have given up completely long ago if I hadn't encountered it. I'd been able to freestyle intermediate moves easily enough for several years, but it just wasn't fun any more - because I had been through several cycles of learning and forgetting hordes of intermediate moves, none of which was much more interesting than any other any more.
I sooooooooo wish that someone had taught me the basics of interpretive dancing long before.
I'd also dispute that you don't
need to do it - unless you want to seriously limit yourself.
I had got to the point where intermediate classes were easy enough, and I was confident enough to ask some of the better dancers to dance during freestyle, in circumstances where more interesting music was being played - and I started to find that I'd get funny looks when I did nothing with the breaks and other accents in the music.
The better the dancers, the more, it seemed, that they were expecting something to happen in the breaks - and the looks I was on the receiving end of caused me no little pain - I could see that the good dancers
could do interesting things with the music, and I wanted to give pleasure to these great ladies on the dance floor.
So I started to learn. And though I can't do much, I don't get the funny looks any more...
... and dancing is fun again.
...and (at least for social dancing) I now get more pleasure from the tiniest extra thing I can learn to do with accents in the music than any number of new moves.
Chris