Eye Contact

[Chris]

Originally posted by Minnie M
methinks The Hon Chris has a thing for blonds have you met the lovely Lory yet - she IS a bit of a boombshell

As far as dancers go, I have a thing for women - all women are equally special - young, old, blonde, brunette, redhead.

Lory certainly looks quite a boombshell from her photo but I'm sorry to say I apparently danced with her at Bognor without recognising each other

On a personal note, try as I might to be unbiased, my long term friends who have known me for many years wind me up about "if she's not a blonde she won't last." Aesthetically I think red hair looks great on a woman, and on the dance floor it's more to do with what she does with it, whether it's in beautiful condition / compliments her features etc, but off the dance floor I suspect there's something at the genetic level that primes some men to react to blonde hair (real or dyed) and others to brunette. We're attracted to certain genotypes. But if I was a woman I'd dye my hair blonde if it wasn't already blonde - see? I can do superficial . . .!

Didn't want to duck the question but you sure put me on the spot Minnie!

[Lory]

Originally posted by Chris
but I'm sorry to say I apparently danced with her at Bognor without recognising each other

Did we??

[bobgadjet]

Originally posted by Chris

Lory certainly looks quite a boombshell from her photo

Bigger and BETTER than the photo.
If you had danced with her you would know it, and would not have forgotten it, so i guess you have that pleasure (and it will be) to come

[Chris]

Errrm yes, so Amanda told me I think. Main dance floor. This is after I had looked out for you at Hipsters and given practically every blonde girl in the place funny looks to see if she had one eye different colour to the other :sorry

[Sheepman]

Originally posted by Gadget
would you take offense if we just did some slow, close arm jives?

Of course the way to double/triple the eye contact effect is to dance West Coast Swing, where for much more of the dance you are facing your partner, and you have to worry far less about what other dancers are doing around you (assuming they're also West Coasting).

Did someone say you can have too much eye contact? Is this possible, for those 4 minutes you are in love with your partner (and the music of course), how could you not gaze into her eyes? Of course there are times when it gets too intense, and you have to look away, but checking for space normally covers that. Hmmm, can't remember what I do when I'm dancing with a man, perhaps Andy will do me the honour . . .

Other tips that I've heard (along the lines of James') if you struggle with this are: focus just past her eyes (going boss eyed isn't recommended!): focus on the bridge of her nose, or just above her eyes, ie basically look in the right direction, even if you can't look into her eyes.

I do wish I could remember eye colour(s) (the plural is for Lory), after I've danced with someone, I guess I'm just concentrating too much on the dance for it to register. The same applies to dress, it's extremely rare for me to be able to remember what someone was wearing at a dance, but I'm much more likely to be able to remember the track that was played, certain moves that went well or badly and so on. Perhaps there's another thread here?

Greg

[bobgadjet]

Originally posted by Sheepman
focus on the bridge of her nose, or just above her eyes
Greg

...or an ear, or a cheek, or her forehead.....

If you do that you might give her a complex and she thinks she's got something nasty on her face, like a zit maybe (or hairgel ! )
then it's her off the dancefloor to find the nearst mirror I would think

[Chris]

Just focus on something wonderful - it can be in your imagination.

[Pammy]

Originally posted by Sheepman
for those 4 minutes you are in love with your partner

I must be doing it wrong then...

I'm only ever in love with half of my partners

[Rachel]

Originally posted by Pammy
I must be doing it wrong then...

I'm only ever in love with half of my partners

The top or bottom half???
R x

[JamesGeary]

Originally posted by Neil

As ChrisA rightly says, these things become easier once the moves are "hardwired" into your brain and you have some spare mental capacity for all the little things that actually make dancing fun.

Heres a thought. How about "hardwiring" in smiling and eye contact, then you have some spare mental capacity for the moves!

[Bill]

At a tango lesson on MOnday the teacher informed us that it was really 'bad form' to look at your partner while daning and if anyone tried to keep eye conyact with her she' probably walk off the dance floor

partly it would seem because the leader should be looking at what's going on around them and possibly because it might be considered rude to stare at the follower.

Pointed out that in jive we've been discusisng the point that it's rude not to keep at least some eye contact - although the leader should certainly be keeping an eye on what's going on around them !!!!

[Jayne]

Originally posted by Bill
At a tango lesson on MOnday the teacher informed us that it was really 'bad form' to look at your partner while daning

But Tango is just soooo sexy when you look at the girl in your arms at some point in the dance. She doesn't know what she's missing out on Bill!

J

[Yogi_Bear]

Originally posted by Jayne
But Tango is just soooo sexy when you look at the girl in your arms at some point in the dance. She doesn't know what she's missing out on Bill!

J

The point about dancing tango is that you will usually be in a fairly close hold with your partner and looking over their right shoulder so (as a leader) you can see where youe are taking your partner (she is commonly stepping backwards, except with rotary type moves).

In modern jive you are commonly standing further from your partner much of the time in an open hold of some sort. Keeping some degree of eye contact is much easier and safer- and is to be encouraged.

[Pete]

Based on my extensive experience of tango (ie, 2 lessons) I thought the idea was that the absence of eye contact created a kind of tension - more mystery, less full-on and all that?

[jivecat]

Originally posted by Minnie M
I was told that eye contact also keeps the dancing frame which will help to become a great dancer

(hard to do all the time, without the guy thinking I am coming on to him, yes even me )

I am fully understanding of the difficulty that beginners have with eye contact and don't expect it of them. Of the others, I try and work out if I think the lack of eye contact is due to shyness, which I can forgive, or because my partner is a supercilious & discourteous person whose attention is elsewhere, which I certainly can't. How do I tell the difference? Not sure, really. Intuition.

What I'm increasingly beginning to notice is how incomplete a dance feels without eye contact, even if technically it was otherwise a good dance. And it's not just the social aspect, important though that is. I find that concentration is a key element in dancing well and good eye contact helps me to focus on my partner and concentrate better. If any peripheral event snaps that concentration, then, whoops, I start falling over my own feet!

I also feel that eye contact forms part of the lead; if the guy won't look at me I always feel a sense of insecurity about what I should be doing even if other signals are O.K. I think that by looking at your partner you pick up & transmit all sorts of subliminal signals about speed, direction, intention, musical interpretation etc. which enhance a dance technically as well as socially.

I think the need for eye contact is taught in Ceroc. It's regularly mentioned in beginner's classes. The usual reponse is that the crowd start shifting their feet and giggling nervously!

[DavidB]

Originally posted by jivecat
I also feel that eye contact forms part of the lead

There is a major visual element to the lead. I'm not talking about signals for particular moves (eg sticking the little finger of my right hand in my ear whilst standing on one leg and winking madly means 'First Move' ). I am thinking about reinforcing the physical lead with your body position, and figuring out the options for the next move by your partners current body position.

The easiest way to do this is to watch your partner's body.

But if you keep eye contact, then you have to still be aware of what the rest of your partner's body is doing. I find this difficult - the eye contact seems to get in the way of the visual lead.

For my way of dancing, there is a time and a place for eye contact. Similarly there is a time and a place for looking at the audience. This 'time and place' is not when you are actively leading your partner. But for me the visual lead is very important. Sometimes that is all I do. For other people it may be different.

Obviously if you don't look at your partner at all then you lose this visual lead. This is a far more common problem than too much eye contact!


David

[Gadget]

I don't think that I do much "eye contact" when dancing... at least not that I'm aware of: Combs, leans and a few UCP moves perhaps. And I normally try to catch the lady's eye coming out of a freespin or turn/return. {unless I go to the opposite extreme and purposefully look away}
I find that with a lot of "drawing in" moves I look at where I want the lady to be, then watch her flow into the space. Most of the time I am looking at floor space and my partner as a whole - not only does it make good dancing sense, but it looks more dramatic if the head has a long way to turn to look at your partner.

I also find that smiling goes so well with eye contact: If I catch my partner's eye, I smile- natural reaction. I normally get a smile back.

This form eye-contact is also a good way to communicate with your partner on how well a dance is going; more than once I have looked confused or amazed. If my partner smiles back - a good sign. If they don't - I'm not doing something right, so concentrate more. If they grimice - I've just screwed up, wrap them in and see what's wrong. If they look bored - concentrate more, throw in a few knotted moves and look again. If they laugh - it's close to a smile, keep going and hope that it's not at your expense. If they look amazed - try very hard to remember what you just did, and try it in the next dance. If they stick their tongue out* - they want to play, give them space and mirror them or do some showey moves...

[font size=2]* or raise an eyebrow, or look mischevous, or...[/font]

[JamesGeary]

Originally posted by DavidB

The easiest way to do this is to watch your partner's body.

If we must.

[Jayne]

Going off on my wee tango tangent again (sorry all MJers who don't care about tango...)

You're right - normally when you're dancing tango you're too close to form eye contact with your partner. There are rare opportunities though, like in ochos it can be really sexy to bring your eyes up and look at your partner as you slink across in front of him...

The other thing I was thinking of was a workshop I did about 18 months ago. There was an excess of women so we all had to be a man at some point during the day. As part of the workshop we were covering some of the aspects of lead and follow. To encourage the ladies to follow without using visual clues from where the guy's feet were we had to close our eyes. I remember doing this as a "man" and looking down at the girl I was leading. I was *completely* taken aback by how sensual, empowering and priviledged it is to have a gentle female form curled up in your arms with her eyes closed and completely trusting you to lead her around the room without doing any harm to her (either by abusing her trust or by crashing her into things). I don't think I would have really felt that if I hadn't looked at my partner. That was a real turning point for me for seeing tango as more than a technically demanding dance!

J

[Yogi_Bear]

Yes, absolutely right about the ochos, and it's quite common in tango for the follower to close her eyes and rely on the leader to manoeuvre her safely. Of course it also helps both partners learn to use and follow the non-visual cues.

Dancing tango is a very valuable complement to dancing MJ, in my opinion....