This article is about self instruction in simple social ballroom dancing (and country-western dancing ). With this article you can teach yourself how to do ballroom dancing with easy ballroom dance lessons using dance step diagrams contained in this article. You must click links in the text to see the diagrams. This is done so you can print each diagram separately. At various places where appropriate certain psychological, sociological, cultural and historical aspects of ballroom dancing are mentioned. Though this article does not teach competition ballroom dancing, it references books that do for those who are interested. Even if your final goal is competition dancing, social dancing is a good place to start. This article will show the differences and similarities between competition ballroom dancing and social ballroom dancing by making frequent references to specific pages in the most important book in the history of competition ballroom dancing.
Many beginners fear that they lack aptitude for dancing, they have "two left feet". Most good dancers had two left feet before they learned to dance. Do not worry if you seem to have no rhythm or coordination in the beginning; these will come with practice. Do not worry about stepping on each other's feet; if you use the proper hold, described later, this will not happen. The thing that is most likely to prevent you from learning to dance using this article is not two left feet, it is lack of the patience necessary to read and study this entire article, and lack of diligence necessary to practice what you have learned until you get good at it. If you are in such a hurry that you must skip material, do not skip the hold section presented later on, which describes posture, position, hold and balance.
This article is intended to impart a fairly thorough understanding of a subject that is more complex than most novices imagine. This article does not assume that you have ever danced before or have any technical knowledge about dancing. Do not worry if you get confused on some points as you read. You may have to read the whole article twice to understand it all.
A dance competition is an exhibition; a social dance is not. Competition dancing involves a few people who are dedicated dance enthusiasts, music with a few standardized combinations of rhythm and tempo, and many different dance figures or maneuvers. The type of social dancing described here involves many people of the general public who are not really dance enthusiasts but more interested in a social event, music with the many combinations of rhythm and tempo found in the wide range of popular music, and only a few dance figures, so it is practical for many people to learn them. This article teaches a very finite set of dance figures, or maneuvers, that are ideal for casual social dancing. The ballroom dancing steps presented are suitable for weddings, country club dances, civic center dances, church dances, proms, formal balls, night clubs, and honky-tonks. It is about ballroom dancing, not the swing and latin dancing that is sometimes erroneously called ballroom dancing. But it is about dancing to any kind of music with constant rhythm and tempo and an audible beat: ballroom, swing, latin, country, rap or none of the above, not just ballroom dancing music.
The books published by the ISTD that define ballroom and latin dancing as they are danced in competitions over most of the world serve as useful definitions of the terms "ballroom" and "latin", not as particular dances but as categories of dances. These categories are broader than some might think. Some would say, "we do swing or country, not ballroom or latin". But they would be wrong. These categories are broad enough that swing is included in latin, and old fashioned country couple dancing is included in ballroom.
Some Americans are opposed to ballroom dancing and would like to discourage or prohibit ballroom dancing. They prefer to re-define ballroom dancing to mean latin dancing, the category of dancing that they are not opposed to. Since I like ballroom dancing, I am opposed to these efforts to define it out of existence. Some "social ballroom dance" classes in America include only latin dancing, absolutely no ballroom dancing. This article illustrates what social, as opposed to competitive, ballroom, as opposed to latin, dancing is.
In America professional ballroom dance teachers teach competition ballroom dancing, not social ballroom dancing. There are two very different kinds of professional dance teachers known as ballroom dance teachers. What I would call "pure ballroom" teachers teach a style of competition dancing known as "international standard" and are found only in small numbers mostly in the largest metropolitan areas. What I would call "mostly latin" teachers teach a style of competition dancing known as "American smooth" and are numerous throuought the country. For more on the difference click here. It should be pointed out that "international style", which consists of both "international standard" and "international latin", refers to the same assortment of dances competed by the same rules around the world. Occasionaly a class will claim to teach "international" dances, where completely different dances are taught and "international" seems to meen that some of the dances are of foreign origin. Thus, a class of "international or latin" consisted of salsa and the box step waltz, neither of which is included in "international standard" or "international latin".
How do I know what social ballroom dancing is? Am I just making it up? Now competition ballroom dancing is more prevalent than social ballroom dancing. But there was a time when it was the other way around. In the 1920's and 1930's onestep, twostep/foxtrot and waltz were popular in America as social dances. This is illustrated by social dancing scenes in American movies of the period, and in books describing the history of dancing. There are dancehalls in Texas where this form of social ballroom dancing is still the predominant form of dancing, though they prefer to call it country-western dancing, not ballroom dancing. I have studied the dances, and practiced them extensively where they are still danced. Even in Texas, there are those who are fiercely opposed to ballroom dancing and promote a newer kind of country-western dancing that is really latin dancing. Social ballroom dancing at the places where it is still done is taught by parents or friends, not by professional dance teachers. It persists for generations in spite of heroic efforts of dance teachers to substitute stationary or travelling swing dances. This suggests that when swing triumphed in much of the rest of the country in the 1930's and 1940's, it was due more to the efforts of the dance teachers than the preferences of the public.
One advantage of competition ballroom dancing over social ballroom dancing is that it has been described and defined precisely. I have had lessons in competition ballroom dancing and studied the way it is defined in the books that define it. I have tried to use these same techniques of description to clarify what social ballroom dancing is. I am trying to establish a clear connection between competition ballroom dancing and social ballroom dancing.
There are many more competition ballroom dance figures than social ballroom dance figures. The ISTD's "Ballroom Technique" book lists 25 or more competition figures for each dance. Many social dance figures are also competition dance figures. Most social dance figures are easier that most show dance figures or competition dance figures. While the very easiest steps in ballroom dancing are social, not all easy dance figures are social, and not all social dance figures are easy. Some easy dance figures have no potential as social dance figures for the same reason that some music written in the popular style never becomes popular. This article teaches only dances that have some proven record as social dances outside of dance schools, and which I have danced socially on many occasions outside of dance schools.
Average casual social dancers do not have the time to master 5 different figures for each of 15 different dances, 75 figures in all, to cope with every ballroom, latin or other dance that they might encounter. Even if they did, they do not dance often enough to stay proficient with all this complexity. There are three simple ballroom dances of such wide applicability that no matter what music is playing, they can enjoy dancing at least one of the three. The assortment of figures required is small enough that they can easily retain proficiency.
Dance schools do not make money from social dancing outside of dance schools, and do not feel motivated to teach such dancing. They do make money from dance competitions and show dance recitals, so that is the kind of dancing they teach. Most professional dance teachers have little or no experience in social dancing outside of a dance school.
Any dance, or any figure within a dance, can be used in a social dance among students within a dance school. However, not any dance can sustain a perpetual life of its own in social dancing outside of a dance school. If a school only teaches figures with no real potential in social dancing, then social dancing will only be a brief phase in a student's life, not a lifelong option.
Social dancing requires an assortment of dances that can work with any rhythm and tempo, because there is no telling what the disk jockey will play next in many social dancing environments. In particular, the only music available for dancing may not be dance music at all, it may be any of the kinds of music recorded for listening: pop, rock, rap, hip hop, or country. In contrast, a so-called social dance in a typical dance school that teaches ballroom and latin dance will have music precisely suited to each of the dances taught in the school. If these students are confronted with a social dance where none of the music precisely suits any of the dances they have been taught, they lose confidence and do not know what dance they should do.
Lest prospective ballroom dancers worry that my explanation of ballroom dancing might be less than legitimate, the book I use here is the most respected book in the world of competition ballroom dancing. Links are provided within this article to step diagrams of figures that are used in social dancing. Most social figures are also competition figures, but some are not. Most of my diagrams are also found in the book. My diagrams are not exact copies of his diagrams, but based on my own steps doing the same figures, with obvious difference in style in some cases. In addition to step diagrams, the book gives fine points about each figure that are not given in this web page. You can learn to dance using only this webpage without the book, but if your want to be the smoothest dancers on the floor you will need the book.
This article is based on considerable experience social dancing with many ladies who had a wide range of experience, from no experience to decades of experience. It will be of interest to people who would like to learn, and wonder what they should learn. The information given will make it possible for a determined couple to teach themselves without a teacher. It will also be possible for a group of interested people without a teacher to successfully form their own dance club, and teach themselves. People know the alphabet before they try to become proficient keyboard typists. Practice, not learning, is what makes them typists. The information presented here teaches the alphabet of dancing; practice is needed to become proficient dancers.
Elementary figures in the following dances fulfill the requirements of social ballroom dancing: (1) the family of dances social foxtrot, twostep, quickstep, which have a few elementary figures in common; (2) onestep; (3) the form of waltz usable over the widest range of tempos, the original old fashioned waltz, known technically as the international style Viennese waltz; (4) not essential, but to add spice, what I argue later in this article is the closest thing to the version of tango that made tango famous, known technically as international style tango. If, for instance, disco music is playing, it is possible to dance all four of these kinds of ballroom dancing to a single piece of music. In the case of the waltz, a special technique described in that section is required. With another kind of music only one or two of these dances might work. But if the rhythm and tempo are constant and the beat is audible, and if anyone else can dance anything else to the music, at least one of the dances onestep, twostep, waltz, will work.
A ballroom dance is a couple dance, not a solo dance. A belly dance is a solo dance because in the middle eastern culture where it originated a man could dance or a woman could dance, but they could not both dance at the same time at opposite ends of the same room [1]. A ballroom dance is a couple dance, not a group dance. Group dances are also sometimes called set dances. Some examples of group dances are line dances, square dances, contra dances, quadrilles, and even military marches. Military marches are used because they have the effect of teaching obedience and subservience whether the troops like it or not. It seems likely that other group dances have the same effect. This effect is entirely appropriate in a military context, but perhaps less so in a civilian context. In some couple dances the partners do not touch each other, such as rock and roll, twist, and flamenco. Because of its cultural heritage (Spain and Portugal had a Middle Eastern culture from approximately 700 A.D. to 1400 A.D.) flamenco has an obvious similarity to belly dancing with the added feature of stomping shoes and clicking castanets, but a man and a woman can do it at the same time. Couple dances with touching can be divided into ballroom dances and latin dances. The word latin as used here means Hispanic, not Italian. Not all dances classed as latin originated in Hispanic culture, but most of them did. Examples of latin dances are the various kinds of swing, disco (also called hustle), and dances of latin origin (rumba, cha-cha, samba, paso doble, mambo, salsa, and many, many more, which have been mostly forgotten). Most latin figures would best be described as having a hand lead. In contrast to the latin dances, in ballroom dancing, the man leads the lady with movements of his body, with body contact at the waist. Ballroom dances can be danced without body contact, since the man's hands and arms should provide a frame rigidly fixed to his body that moves precisely as his body moves. It is slightly awkward and clumsy to lead ballroom dances without body contact. For me, at least, ballroom dancing seems more like the man and the lady are sharing the same experience together. The style of dancing known as "American smooth" blurs the distinction between ballroom and latin because it includes many latin figures and a few ballroom figures within the same style of dancing.
In America the figures recommended in this article are called "ballroom dancing" or "country-western dancing" when done without a caller, so each couple is independent of other couples. A caller is someone, usually not dancing, who calls out to all dancers present which figure to do next, like a drill sergeant commanding marching troops. When done with a caller, the very same figures are called "round dancing". (This is the modern definition; before about 1950 round dancing meant couple dancing with no caller implied [2]. The term was used to distinguish it from square dancing, which did use a caller.) Thus, modern round dancing is a form of group dancing, not couple dancing, even though the hold and steps are the same as ballroom dancing. Round dancers run the risk of becoming dependent on a caller, and being helpless without a caller. This article is about ballroom dancing. In ballroom dancing, the man must learn to lead the lady so that she will do each figure correctly even though she does not know which figure the man is going to do next.
In ballroom dancing, the more skillful and technically correct a couple's dancing is, the more satisfying and enjoyable it will be. This is not because it looks better, which it does, but because it feels more comfortable and coordinated.
Texas style country-western dancing includes, by other names, versions of the ballroom dances social foxtrot, onestep and Viennese waltz. The figures of Texas twostep are the same as the basic figures of social foxtrot, except for the forward basic. Ballroom dancing differs from country-western dancing by including other dances and more advanced figures in each dance. The more skillfully the figures of country-western dancing are done, the more they look like everyone expects ballroom dancing to look; the less skillfully they are done the more they look like everyone expects country-western dancing to look. Many country-western dancers do not know the ballroom hold, and use a variety of loose approximations of the best hold. Some country-western dancers do not know about the right-left offset and are forced to dance at arms length. Many country-western dancers dance in rubber soled shoes on powdered floors which tends to make their dancing clumsier and less skillful. In the early days in poor rural areas in the American south floors were soft pine, not hardwood, and cornmeal on the floor was needed to make the floor slick enough. Unfortunately powder on the floor became a tradition that was held onto even when the availability of hardwood floors made it more detrimental than beneficial. If a slicker floor than bare hardwood is desired, a good wax that dries to a uniform hard finish is a much better solution than powder. Some country-western dancers with rubber soled shoes are under the mistaken impression that a good floor is too sticky, but in fact their rubber shoe soles are too sticky. They should have leather soles; suede leather can be glued on rubber soles very inexpensively. In addition to the traditional country-western dancing that is true ballroom dancing, recently there is a newer form of country-western dancing that is not ballroom dancing known as country-western swing. It is my impression that it has been pushed by those opposed to ballroom dancing. In a purely technical sense country-western swing is a latin dance. Because swing was originally a stationary dance, and country-western twostep was a travelling dance, those opposed to twostep feared difficulty replacing twostep with swing. The solution they devised is very clever: a travelling swing dance where the man twirls the lady at arms length as they travel around the floor. They like to call this new dance twostep. This is not the only example of a term in dancing being redefined so as to capitalize on the fame of the old, while surreptitiously replacing it with the new. This attempt to replace twostep with swing suggests that the forces behind it are attempting to "latinize" American culture the same way the corresponding forces did in Argentina, as described later in this article.
With regard to ballroom dancing, some comments on the basics of leading are in order; exercises to improve skills in leading and following will be described below in the last paragraph in the foxtrot section. The man leads the lady. He creates the motion, and she goes with him. A primary concern is that the lady feel taken care of, and not feel that she is being handled roughly. She will tolerate much more force forward and backward than she will sideways. The dance figures are designed so that little or no sideways force need be applied even to lead the lady to the side in a chasse. The lady does not step forward or backward in response to the man's foot stepping forward or backward. She steps forward or backward in response to the man moving her forward or backward. It is possible for a man who does not understand this to kick the lady in the shin with his foot. He must be sure which foot her weight is on before he starts to move her forward or backward, so he will know in advance which foot she will move when she takes a step. This knowledge and control of the lady's side to side balance before the couple starts moving is easier with body contact than without, but is possible either way.
I prefer my description of the ballroom posture, position, hold and balance to Alex Moore's. Mine is given in Appendix B of "The Viennese Waltz" at this website. Read the hold section that describes the posture, position, hold and balance. The hold and position are easy, and are necessary for beginners. When a beginner is learning at a social dance, and not in a class, it is difficult to achieve good posture and balance in the beginning. As noted later, it is not absolutely necessary in the easier dances at slow tempo, but becomes necessary later when it is desired to learn a fast waltz. You need to practice stepping forward and backward using the ballroom hold before you start learning any specific dance. If you have a slow internet connection you will have to wait about 10 seconds as the other article downloads before your browser will jump to the hold section. The hold section includes 10 paragraphs. Read until you see "this is the end of the hold section". After you read the hold section be sure to click the "back" button on your browser to get back here or you will get lost in the other article. To see the hold section click here
Why do social ballroom dancing? Fish swim, birds fly, and ballroom dancing offers the nearest equivalent satisfaction for humans. Furthermore, it is easier to get people together to meet and socialize when there is something this enjoyable to do.
Human beings are psychologically constructed so as to achieve fulfillment and satisfaction in being a couple. They like to socialize and have fun as a couple. Ballroom dancing provides a way to socialize and have fun as a couple. Even single people are grateful for the opportunity to be a couple with one other person even if for only one dance. The steps of ballroom dancing can be done alone or with a partner. It is not very satisfying to do the steps alone, but is very satisfying to do the same steps with a partner. This is true for both the man and the lady, even though the experience is very different for the man and lady since one is leading and the other is following. There is something very satisfying about doing dynamic maneuvers together as a couple rather than alone as an individual.
Rulers and leaders tend to treat ordinary people as subjects. A capitalist democracy expects people to be citizens responsible for their own choices, not subjects. People like a chance to attend a social event in the role of adult citizens, not subjects. Meetings and concerts are social events where people attend as subjects and observers, not participants and citizens. People at a large shopping mall are attending as citizens, but it does not feel like a social event. A dance can be a large social event where people can attend as citizens and participants, not subjects. At a dance people participate as couples, not as individuals. Ballroom dancing seems adult and civilized and feels like real dancing. Swing and latin seem more juvenile and feel as much like calisthenics as like dancing; furthermore, while you may be dancing in collaboration with each other, you are no longer dancing so much together as a couple. The dances typically done to rock, hip hop etc. seem infantile and uncivilized. Group dances reduce people to being subjects, not citizens; some people find them degrading and humiliating.
There are rare moments in social ballroom dancing so thrilling that both partners will remember and talk about them years later.
Many people will not get enough exercise unless the exercise is recreational. Ballroom dancing appeals to many people who do not find other forms of exercise appealing.
Social ballroom dancing can provide a recreation that husband and wife can share together, instead of having separate sources of recreation.
Social ballroom dancing can overcome excessive shyness among single people who have difficulty making the acquaintance of other single people. However, this benefit cannot be obtained without some effort. Many, perhaps most, single people do not have the courage to attempt social ballroom dancing if they do not already know how to dance. Instruction in ballroom dancing, either in writing or in person, and practice is required before they can participate in social ballroom dancing.
This description applies to group classes in international standard; American smooth classes tend to be less formal and vary more with each teacher. The teacher shows the men first how to do their part of a single figure. While the men are left to practice, the teacher shows the women how to do their part. Men usually need more time to practice than women, because the men have to lead. When the instructor shows the man's or woman's part of the figure, the instructor steps slowly through the figure several times. As each step is taken slowly, the instructor calls out a parameter listed in the book to describe the step. The terms used here are defined in the book. In successive demonstrations of the figure the instructor will call out feet positions relative to the body, alignment relative to the line of dance, amount of turn from the previous step, rise and fall, toe-heel footwork, C.B.M. (contrary body movement) and sway. Alignment is expressed relative to the line of dance only for clarity in describing the figure. When dancing, the entire figure could be rotated relative to this standardized way of describing it. Finally, the instructor dances the figure at normal speed calling out the rhythm in slows and quicks. Each time the instructor takes a step, the students are to take the same step, trying to concentrate their attention on getting the parameters right. The students must concentrate on the details until they repeat the figure enough to get the feel of the figure. Then they can do the figure automatically without thinking about the details. When both men and women have had enough practice, the men and women get together and do the figure as couples. When they get the feel of doing it together as a couple, they will have learned the figure, and can use it at will. In a group class, all single ladies are shifted to the next single man every few minutes.
Obviously, a couple teaching themselves with the book can use a similar procedure. But most social dancers who intend to teach themselves will ignore some of the technical details and be content to use only the diagrams. The diagrams contain all the technical details except for rise and fall, toe-heel footwork, C.B.M. and sway. Learning solely from the diagrams will work to a degree that will be satisfactory for most casual social dancers, except in the case of the waltz, where closer attention to other details provided in this website is essential.
The steps recommended in this article are so easy that, with the possible exception of the waltz, it will not be absolutely necessary for the lady to learn her steps before dancing with the man. The man can learn his steps and lead the lady. The man should learn to do the steps by himself without a partner before he attempts to lead the lady. Teaching both the man and the lady their steps makes the class go faster, but a lady who was the most knowledgeable and experienced dance teacher I have known speculated that it might produce a better final result if only the men were taught at the beginning level. This would force the men to learn to lead and the women to learn to follow. While this is probably true, as they get more advanced with larger steps and faster tempos ladies will have to learn to be more active and energetic, and not completely passive in their following. A technique to produce this result is given at the end of the foxtrot section. This article shows diagrams only for the man for all dances except the waltz, where the diagrams are the same for man and lady. The waltz is not at the beginning level, and it is advisable for ladies to learn waltz steps separately at the same time as the men. The book shows diagrams for both the man and the lady in all figures where diagrams are shown.
Probably the chief advantage of teaching both the man and the lady their steps is that the dance can be taught at a faster tempo, provided they have leather soled shoes. If the dance is taught at slow tempo, the class must slowly work their way up to fast tempo. If the dance is taught at fast tempo, the class can easily dance at slow tempo. This is most important in the case of the foxtrot/twostep dance, and the waltz. Using the standard teaching technique in quickstep chapter in the book, foxtrot/twostep can be taught sucessfully at the speed of competition quickstep, 50 bars per minute. If, however, only the men are taught, the ladies will have to learn dancing with the men at 30 bars per minute, the easiest tempo, and work their way up with practice to 50 bars per minute. Similarly, starting with the "kitchen exercises" in the "individual practice" section of the waltz instructions at this website, waltz can be taught at the competition speed of 60 bars per minute. After learning at 60 bars per minute, slower tempos will be easy. In tango there is not much tempo advantage of teaching both the man and the lady since the tempo range is so limited. Onestep is so easy there would be no advantage of teaching both the man and the lady.
When teaching a very large class, not everyone can see the teacher's feet. In this case the class should be drilled in the movements illustrated in the two pictures in the book "Position of Steps in Relation to the Body" on p. 37 and "Directions of Steps or Positions of Body in Relation to the Room" on p. 38. These are so simple they can be understood from descriptions without being seen. Then the class can obey commands of the teacher and trace out the steps of a figure without actually seeing the teacher's feet. The other technical parameters can also be explained and followed without being seen. If one student gets confused, he can look at the other students for clarification. In theory the teacher could be disabled in a wheelchair and still teach.
An extended college class taught for credit probably should require the men to just once have the experience of measuring floor friction. Then they will have the proper background to help select a floor finish if they ever need to. Both men and women should be taught to count tempo of music using their wristwatch.
Speaking of college classes, one might wonder why there are so few of them. In Europe, there are no college classes because the students who want to take ballroom dance class take it while they are in high school, before they enter college. In America classes are not held for high schoolers, so college is the earliest level where classes could be offered in the educational system. The Brigham Young University (BYU) in Provo Utah teaches a course in social ballroom dance for credit that has some overlap with what is recommended here. About one in five of their students take the class. A similar fraction would participate at any American university. Most other universities have no such class for credit. Most of the universities that have ballroom dance instruction on campus do not offer it for credit, they emphasize swing and latin much more than ballroom, it is an extracurricular after hours club activity, and far fewer students participate. Another way participation is limited is by teaching competitive dancing, which requires more time and more talent than most students have who might be interested to learn social dancing.
Probably a combination of factors explains why most American universities do not offer a "for credit" course in ballroom dancing. The most obvious departments to offer such a course are the ballet department or the physical education department. Unfortunately, the dance floor in the ballet department is likely to be covered with rubber, and is therefore unsuitable for ballroom dancing. So few people take ballet that the floor is likely to be too small for the the number of people who would want to take ballroom dancing. The basketball gym owned by the physical education department is likely to be have a floor more suitable for a ballroom dance class. However there is a spurious friction standard that may have been applied to the floor that would make it unsuitable for ballroom dancing. Furthermore, the physical education department faculty is inclined to prefer same gender classes. Many of them would probably not have felt comfortable in a ballroom dance class at any time in their lives, and have little sympathy for young people who would prefer such a class. They are more likely to offer a class in polo, as far fetched as that may seem. Furthermore, being the least intellectual of the departments, they are the most likely to yield to pressure from the traditional adversaries of dance.
This raises the question of who in a university would be the most in favor, or the least opposed, to a ballroom dance class? To the extent that there are ideologically pure leftists on the faculty, they could be expected to be opposed to balls, and therefore to ballroom dancing. The city of Budapest, Hungary, is now trying to rebuild their traditional ball culture after it was prohibited by leftist domination during the cold war. There is leftist anti-ball propaganda in America. The book "Dance, A Very Social History" by the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1986, on p. 11 seems to define a ball as a very exclusive event: "Of course, because a ball is exclusive,...". "People still want to be invited but are not;...". There are plenty of real balls with real ballroom dancing in America and in Vienna that are open to the public and reasonably priced. The author might argue that even these balls are exclusive because they have a dress code. The dress code can be met by a $100 department store tuxedo and a $100 department store prom dress which can be amortized over many balls before they wear out. Even honky-tonks have a dress code. Some leftists seem to go past their traditional glorification of the proletariat to a point where they would deny the proletariat a chance to dress up. Presumably this is because the left fears that the proletariat will not be able to maintain a downtrodden, oppressed leftist mindset if they are dressed up and dancing to beautiful music in a well lighted environment. Better for the proletariat to spend much more money on gambling, which the left in America seems not so strenuously opposed to. Perhaps some leftists feel compelled to manufacture straw symbols of class warfare, of oppression by "the man", that they can joust against. The movie "True Lies" depicts a ball as an exclusive, forbidding event with armed guards and dogs outside, and Middle Eastern terrorists among those inside. I have never heard of a ball with armed guards and dogs, and devout Middle Eastern terrorists would consider suicide before consenting to do real ballroom dancing with a woman. Certainly "grubby chic" is more in keeping with the "workers of the world unite" spirit of the hammer and sickle than is formal wear. Formal wear is not used in a ballroom dance class, nor in most weekly social ballroom dances. If leftists insist on a proletarian bias, they can teach the same dance course as country-western dancing using country-western music. (Pardon this outburst dear reader, sometimes grapeshot is necessary).
There are some who will object to the existence of a class in ballroom dancing, and some others who might not want to be in the class if they knew what they were getting into. If an objector to ballroom dance also objects to the teaching of evolution, the doctrinal basis of the objection may be as described later in the section on the history of tango . Otherwise, the objector may find close contact with the opposite gender distasteful because of innate orientation or traumatic history. Indeed, some such individuals experience uncontrollable panic attacks with such contact, whereas most people find it pleasant and comforting. Some such individuals will protest loudly. Some people have math phobia, yet courses in calculus are still taught. Some people cannot carry a tune, yet choral singing is still taught. The simple exercise of walking with a partner as described in the hold section should serve to identify individuals who lack the aptitude for ballroom dancing. They should walk forward and backward with one hand behind their back, switching between several different partners. This is more a test of psychological aptitude than of physical skill. It is possible that an accomplished dancer in some other form of dancing, such as swing or American smooth, could fail this test, whereas a normal person who had never danced could pass it with ease. The teacher should not accept into a college class individuals who cannot pass this test. Normal people may experience arousal when first exposed to ballroom dancing until they get used to the ballroom hold, but unlike the initial shock of immersion in cool water, this will not be repeated each time the experience is repeated. When they get used to the ballroom hold the problem will go away. Most of the class will experience brief spells of mild motion sickness when learning the waltz. This will not be a serious problem if they are not pushed too hard, and they will get over it in time like new sailors do. The students should be warned to expect this before they are signed up for the class. They should also be warned that they may experience episodes of frustration and embarrassment, and that there is even a small chance that they may fall down.
After it is determined who has the aptitude to be in the class, everyone should be told to bring shoes that can be converted to dance shoes. For safety, the shoes should have completely enclosed toes and should not have high heels. So that the shoes will be securely fastened to the foot, they should either be lace-up, have a covered arch, or a strap over the arch and the heel should be enclosed. The shoes do not need to be new; old shoes with a hole worn in the bottom will be satisfactory. The next step would be a shoe sole sanding and suede gluing party to get everyone's shoes ready for dancing. This should be done before any dance steps are taught.
Since many Europeans are permitted such a class in high school, it should be possible to admit college freshman to such a class, and not make them wait until they are seniors.
Sources of recorded dance music are given in Appendix I of "The Viennese Waltz " at this website. The strict tempo dance music is recorded for use in competitions, and the pieces are only about half as long as one would want for social dancing. For class use, ask for a series of CD's that have only one kind of dance on each CD. Music such as this recorded especially for dancing is best for initial learning. However, in social dancing, one often dances to music recorded for listening, not for dancing. The rhythm and tempo are often much harder to discern than in real dance music. A course in dancing should start with dance music but end with some of the most difficult listening music. Listening music is available at your local music shop or on line. Beginners who are unable to discern the rhythm should be assured that they will get better with practice. The class may need to clap their hands to difficult music before they can dance to it. Those who do not want to spend money on music to practice by should know that there are drum sequencing programs that can run on your computer and make any rhythm and tempo you want, without melody. You could burn your own CD's to practice by.
Leather, not rubber, soles and heels are ideal on bare hardwood floors and other good ballroom dance floors. Preferably chrome tanned leather, but vegetable tanned leather will also work. In former times vegetable tanned leather was used to make the soles of all street shoes but today most have rubber soles. Today some street shoes have soles that appear to be vegetable tanned leather, but are a synthetic material with unsatisfactory frictional properties. Rubber soles make dancing unnecessarily difficult, awkward and unpleasant. For a discussion of ballroom floor friction requirements see Appendix F of "The Viennese Waltz " at this website. The appendix tells how to glue various soles to the bottom of rubber soled shoes, and to change shoe soles to get the proper friction if you cannot change the floor. Dancing places stresses on the foot that walking does not. Too much dancing in rubber soled shoes can cause foot soreness and even permanent injury in a few individuals. Proper shoes are more important for ballroom dancing than for basketball or tennis. The only activities where special footwear is more important are skating and skiing.
You should be able to find a shoe repair shop willing to glue chrome tanned leather soles on your rubber soled shoes if you do not want to mess with it yourself. An old worn out pair of rubber soled shoes works better than a new pair because the pattern in the sole is worn smooth, and because the sole is thinner. People who work in shoe repair shops often do not know the meaning of the technical terms "chrome tanned leather" and "vegetable tanned leather". If you ask for "suede leather", you will get chrome tanned leather. Suede leather feels sticky at first and takes about three hours of dancing to get broken in to its normal slickness. An alternative that is typically thicker and will last longer than suede leather is chrome tanned grain leather with the smooth side glued to the sole and the suede side on the floor. Adequate shoes can be very inexpensive. One lady bought black canvas flat shoes with rubber soles in a style called loafers for five dollars, then had chrome tanned leather glued on the soles. Lady beginners do much better in flats than in heels. Commercial ballroom dance shoes are another option .
Floor friction requirements are similar for all ballroom dances, and are generally similar to those for latin and swing dances. A bare hardwood floor that has never been wet and has been worn shiny smooth is satisfactory, very different from the rubber floors often found in ballet studios. Most social dancers prefer a floor a bit slicker than a bare hardwood floor. A coat of wax that dries to a solid finish can help. A less easily ruined vinyl tile floor with the right mop-on finish or paste wax is another way to get the right friction. Recently synthetic laminate floors have become popular that look like wood. Some of these may have the right friction for dancing; samples can be tested easily by the slope method. Other options for floors are described here.
Powder on the floor is not a good solution because when first applied it is too spotty: some parts of the floor are slick while others are sticky. If the powder cannot be crushed and smeared, the floor will never have uniform slickness. The best kinds of powder can be crushed and smeared on the floor. After the powder has been trampled on long enough, it gets crushed and smeared uniformly around the floor. After a bit longer enough of the powder has been tracked off the floor that it is no longer slick, and more powder is needed. If powder is going to be used, it should be applied when the floor is most crowded, so it will be smeared to a uniform slickness as quickly as possible. It takes hours to smear it with only a few dancers on the floor.
An individual couple teaching themselves will need to look for a place to practice. If you are teaching yourself it is not a good idea to try to learn your first steps in a crowded social dance. You might be able to practice some individual figures on a hard floor in your home, such as your kitchen. Many night clubs that have weekly dancing open as much as two hours before most people come to dance. The dance floor is empty and available for practice at this time. Some dance schools may rent floor time. A gym or community center may be useable. A wearable music player and a "Y" adapter with his and hers head phones can be used if you want your own music, and do not want to bother others with your music. Some shopping malls open early for people to exercise before the stores open, and might be a suitable place to practice.
When walking forward, either skim the moving foot across the floor or just barely pick it up; high stepping is not appropriate. The heel touches down first when walking forward. When dancing, sometimes forward steps will be taken with "heel lead", which is to say the heel will touch the floor first. Sometimes a toe lead will be used on forward steps. This will vary from step to step within each figure. In dances with slow steps and quick steps, the slow forward steps more often use a heel lead and the quick forward steps a toe lead, but there are many exceptions to this. There is no simple rule that decides all cases. Most people who follow their own instincts and do not think about it will make the right choice. The book has the details.
Walking backward is very different from the way most non-dancers naturally do it. Move the foot backward mainly by swinging the leg from the hip, not mainly by bending the knee. When you plant the foot behind you, do not drop the heel immediately. Put the weight on the toe initially, and very slowly lower the heel as the moving foot skims the floor back toward the standing foot. The standing heel should not touch the floor until the moving foot is fully even along side of the standing foot. When I was learning, this was impossible for me to do the first lesson when I tried it. A week later, without any practice, it was easy. Apparently you can learn in your sleep.
Walking forward and backward in this manner will permit smooth movement of the body which is essential in ballroom dancing.
Special technique is also needed for stepping to the side. The step is called a chasse. It is done by stepping to the side with the leading foot, then closing the trailing foot against the leading foot, and stepping to the side again with the leading foot. While this is easy to do slowly, it is difficult to do quickly. If someone in your group can do it much faster than you, then you need more practice. Another thing that could slow you down in this is sticky rubber shoe soles, rather than proper leather shoe soles. In actual dancing you will not do more than one chasse at a time, but the best way to learn the chasse is to do a lot of them at one time. The students should practice the chasse for many steps to left and many steps to the right without a partner and without music as fast as they can. THIS IS MERELY AN EXERCISE, NOT A DANCE. To see the diagram click here. It will be made much easier by keeping the knees slightly bent and the heels off the floor. Be smooth, with no tendency to hop or bounce. It is essential that you bring your feet nearly together as shown in the diagram. Football players are taught to move to the side with their feet kept wide apart; that is football, not dancing.
When doing a single chasse step in the quarter turns or chasse reverse turn in quickstep, the book says "rise", meaning get your heels off the floor. This exercise will show you that this is a necessity in fast dancing, not just a preference, and that the book does not describe dancing in terms of arbitrary styling, rather in terms of the necessities of body mechanics. Additionally, this exercise will instill the habit of getting heels off the floor for a fast chasse. The book recommends a body rise, as well as getting heels off the floor. If the man leads with body rise, it will remind the lady to get her heels off the floor; additionally, it will provide more energy to expend on a long slow step to follow. A class should be taught various figures with body rise according to the book. However, in social dancing one cannot count on one's partner leading or following with body rise. Therefore, social dancers should be taught how to do a fast chasse without body rise, by bending knees to allow the heels to be raised off the floor without body rise. The above exercise is adequate for this, it need not be used when teaching the figures in the book.
The toe-heel footwork given in the book is optimal for smooth dancing when both partners have good balance as described in the hold section. In social dancing, you will often have a partner with bad balance, leaning too far forward or more likely too far backward. In this case you cannot use the proper toe-heel footwork given in the book. You will have to make substantial changes to your footwork to accomodate your partner's bad balance.
The most detailed instructional materials are for competition dancing, not social dancing. The social dancer is forced to read materials for competition dancing if he wants the clearest, fullest descriptions and explanations. However, the non-dancer will not know how to use a book on competition dancing to teach himself simple social dancing, a deficiency that this web page remedies. In America competition dancing comes in two styles, American style and international style. There is some overlap between American style and international style, they have some figures in common. The term figure here is synonymous with maneuver. Where international and American styles diverge, the difference is in the preference for leadable figures in international style and a preference for showy figures in American style. Since leadability is especially important for social dancing, international style is a better basis for social dancing. International competition ballroom dancing includes five dances; two fast: quickstep, which is fast social foxtrot, and Viennese waltz, which is the original waltz; and three slow: slow waltz, slow foxtrot and tango. The fast dances can be adapted to a wide range of tempos; the slow dances only work at slow tempos. Since social dancing encompasses a wide range of tempos, the fast dances have more applicability to social dancing. The only one of these slow dances which was at one time very successful as a social dance was tango, and it is the only one recommended in this web page. Instead of slow foxtrot, this web page recommends onestep, which is not covered in the book but which has a vague similarity to slow foxtrot. Onestep is much easier and is useable over a wider range of tempos. In the early 1920's onestep was a popular social dance in America as well as a competition dance in England, but was dropped from competition because it was too simple and easy and therefore monotonous for advanced dancers [3, p.65].
A good book for international style is Alex Moore's "Ballroom Dancing". This book was a major factor in the spread of international style ballroom dancing around the world. It shows step diagram pictures for most, but not all, figures, and word descriptions for all of them except the forward basic, which is not used in international competition dancing. It shows separate diagrams for man and lady, whereas this website only shows diagrams for the man, except in the case of the waltz, where the diagram is the same for man and lady. This book is mainly about competition dancing, but is also good for social dancing. I am not aware of any similarly good book on American style, and to make matters worse, the various American style books call the same figure by different names. As the book is for the competition dancer, the social dancer will only use a small part of the book. This article indicates what parts of the book are useful for social dancing, and provides background information not found in the book. The book has a small section on social dancing, but I consider it inadequate; this article is much more extensive and more fully addresses the broad range of information needed by the social dancer.
A beginner may doubt his ability to figure out the dance steps with only the book and no teacher. He should not. Do not worry that the book does not show diagrams for a few of the most elementary figures. This article includes links to diagrams for all figures recommended here. The book gives only a word definition of a term, C.B.M., extensively used in the book. The term is not used in this article. The important part of C.B.M. is a small rotation of the body, but it is easiest to illustrate with a foot diagram. To see the meaning illustrated, click here.
The book "Ballroom Dancing" by Alex Moore was originally published in 1936 and went through nine editions during his lifetime. The book has never been out of print since 1936, even though some people in the book distribution industry who are opposed to ballroom dancing have listed it as being out of print. The ninth edition was 1986. After his death, the ISTD changed the official definitions of some of the figures. They split some of Alex Moore's long figures into two short figures. Finally, in 2002, Moore's book was revised to a tenth edition to bring it into line with the new official definitions. This article refers initially to the tenth edition; an appendix at the end of this article gives corresponding references to the ninth edition, in case that is the edition you have. The tenth edition is currently available from http://www.routledge-ny.com. The best way to find the book at this site is to enter "ballroom dancing" in the search window at the site. It is also available at http://www.bn.com . The best way to find it at this site is to enter, "moore alex" in the search window at the site. As of 12-19-03 they both show a picture of the cover of the ninth edition, even though they sell the 10th edition. There are other sources, which may or may not yet have converted from the ninth edition to the tenth edition. It is usually available from Ballroom Dance Supply in Campbell, CA, http://bdsweb.ballroom.com/IBooks.htm 408-871-1895, or from http://www.dancevision.com 800-851-2813 or 702-256-3830. On this last website you must enter "alex moore" in the search window to find the book at the website. It is always available at http://www.istd.org/shop/sec-bal.html. To order from England by phone, dial the number to get outside your country, (011 in the US), then 44 for England, then 20-7377-1577. You should be able to find it in stock for delivery in about a week from one of these sources. There is no need to place an order from a source that does not have it in stock. In the descriptions of dances to follow, references are made to specific pages in the 10th edition; if you have the 9th edition, the corresponding page references are listed in the appendix at the end of this article.
When dancing to music with an even beat, some ballroom dances express rhythm in "slow" and "quick". The foot is put down on a beat of the music. If the next step is slow that means wait two beats before putting the next foot down. A quick means put the next foot down on the next musical beat. The rhythm "slow, slow, quick, quick" can be expressed in print as "xsxsqq" where a foot is put down on each "s" or "q", but not on each "x", and each letter x, s, or q represents a beat of the music. The book adopts the more abbreviated convention of not showing the x's and using capital letters. Thus the same rhythm would be expressed SSQQ. This description of step timing is good enough to get started; a more precise description that covers ambiguous situations is given in Appendix B of "The Viennese Waltz " at this website.
The rhythm of music written for different dances differs from dance to dance. If music is in 4/4 time, that means each bar is expressed in quarter notes, and there are four beats to the bar. That would be typical of music for foxtrot, twostep, quickstep, onestep or tango. The beats in a bar would be expressed simply as 1234, though some beats might be emphasized more than others. The only way the listener can identify a bar is that he has heard four beats. Waltz music is in 3/4 time, three quarter notes per bar: 123, with the first emphasized. Here, the notes are really third notes, but they are drawn on a sheet of music with the symbol for a quarter note, and are therefore called quarter notes. The emphasis of the first beat makes it easy to identify a bar.
Some very danceable rhythms have beats missing in every bar. Rumba music is in 4/4 time, but the second beat is dropped: 1x34. This pattern is often made with low pitched percussion instruments, but higher pitched percussion instruments are sometimes used to add a confusing patter of complicated rhythms purely for decoration, to be ignored by the dancer. More complicated rhythms must be expressed in eighth or sixteenth notes. Very early tango music was in 8/8 time, but only expressed four beats per bar: 1xx45x7x.
No matter what the rhythm or tempo of popular music is, if both are constant and the beat is audible, at least one of the dances in this article should work with the music. While it is possible to contrive an undanceable combination, one almost never hears one in popular music. Some music with constant rhythm and tempo has no audible rhythmic beat, and is not danceable for that reason. Occasionally one hears popular music completely lacking in a constant rhythm, the beats occur at random intervals. This kind of music is not danceable by the techniques presented here.
Dancers describe the tempo of music in bars per minute, whereas musicians describe tempo in beats per minute. The musical terms bar and measure are used interchangeably, though bar means the symbol used to mark the beginning of a measure, and a measure is the notes after the bar symbol before the next bar symbol. Competition cha cha music is in 8/8 time, 32 bars per minute. In the basic cha cha figure the steps are on 1x3x567x in the eight beat bar, though in the music all eight beats will typically be expressed: 12345678. The number of beats per minute is the same as 4/4 time music at 64 bars per minute. This is near the upper limit of what is possible when dancing the twostep, and a goal to which you should aspire before declaring yourself an expert twostepper.
For an example of how to count tempo with your wristwatch click here.
Now the recommended dance steps will be presented. Onestep, foxtrot/twostep, and waltz is the simplest assortment of popular dance steps that can be used to dance to practically any kind of music with constant rhythm and tempo and an audible beat. Tango is also presented. From easiest to most difficult the dances are onestep, foxtrot/twostep, tango, and waltz. In a class the dances could be learned in this order. However, a small amount of time should be devoted to men and women learning the waltz without a partner as the other dances are learned because it takes time to overcome the problem of dizziness with the waltz, and because the lady will never be a really good waltzer if she cannot do the steps by herself. If there is not time to learn all of these dances, tango is not essential and onestep is less essential than the remaining two.
Diagrams are only shown in this website for the man for the dances where the lady can easily follow. For the exception, the waltz, the steps are the same for the man and the lady. The right foot is shown in black, the left in white. When either is shown as a white dashed outline, that is where that foot is when the next step is taken by the other foot. To see this illustrated click here. When a step is labeled "S" or "Q", that means slow or quick as explained in the previous section. Diagrams alone are not enough to define the dances, see the hold section.
The book shows all steps as danced with a partner, and that is the way the steps are normally shown in a class. In most cases there is no difference between how a figure would be practiced with and without a partner. For some figures, however, what feels natural with a partner feels awkward and unnatural without a partner, and slight modifications of the figure are necessary for the figure to be easy to practice without a partner. The diagrams in this website that include in the caption the words "when practiced without a partner" are the exceptions. After these figures are learned without a partner, the adjustments made when dancing with a partner will in most cases be automatic and unconscious.
Both in the book and in this article the steps are shown as they would be danced if both the man and the lady have good posture and balance. The man's feet are shown standing together side by side some of the time. This is the way he should practice the steps when praticing by himself. But untrained lady partners that the man will meet at social dances will not have good posture and balance, and it will not be possible for the man to bring his feet together as shown, the lady's right foot will be between his two feet. This will require a slight modification of the steps that will not require any conscious effort. This will not present any problems for the easier dances at slow tempo, but it will for the waltz at fast tempo. The waltz is the most advanced dance presented here and hopefully the lady's posture and balance will have improved by the time she is ready to learn the waltz at fast tempo.
For beginners teaching themselves, the temptation to bounce or lurch to keep time with the music should be avoided. Many self taught social dancers keep this bad habit for decades. If they ever learned to be comfortable with smooth dancing, they would never want to go back to bouncing. Smooth dancing is much more pleasant and satisfying. Some ladies may need a hint from the man about which foot to step on or when to close her feet together. The sway mentioned in the book accomplishes this. It occurs during a certain step of a turn, and is not done incessantly in time to the music.
Initial practice in onestep, twostep and waltz will take place with small timid steps. As you get more sure footed practice should rapidly advance toward the largest, most energetic steps you can manage. Even if you do not plan to dance socially with such large steps, learning to do so will improve your skill and confidence.
The turns listed here are common to all three dances social foxtrot, twostep, quickstep, but the straight line figures are not. This family of dances is easy enough, and should form the basis of any social dancing curriculum. The turns recommended here are the ones most commonly danced in social foxtrot and in country-western twostep, and are the easiest part of quickstep. Unlike competition quickstep, no steps outside partner are included, as they are not really appropriate for social dancing. As noted in the section on classes, if both men and women are taught their steps this dance can be taught at 50 bars per minute. If only the men are taught their steps this dance should be initially taught at slow foxtrot tempo, 30 bars per minute, but after a little practice it will be easy for beginners to dance at tempos up to the speed of jive, 44 bars/m. The sources of recorded dance music recommended earlier can supply recordings with specified tempo. It should not be just barely taught, it should be drilled and practiced at various tempos so that it will be retained to a useful extent. The class should practice until the they can dance it at the speed of quickstep, 50 bars per minute. If a student has trouble dancing fast, the most likely cause of the problem is either rubber soled shoes or insufficient practice at the chasse exercise. They should be given a chance to try the dance to competition cha cha music, which is 32 bars per minute when dancing cha cha, but 64 bars per minute when doing this dance. Some experienced dancers enjoy dancing every figure in this dance as fast as 70 bars per minute.
The foxtrot began in America in 1914 in an ill-defined form. It was studied, refined and polished in England and split into fast and slow versions. It evolved further in America with the American invention of the forward basic figure.
Social foxtrot is essentially a simplified, slowed down version of international quickstep. Perhaps it would be historically more accurate to say international quickstep is an elaborated, refined version of social foxtrot. Quickstep was originally called "quicktime foxtrot", then the name was shortened to quickstep [3, p.67]. Social foxtrot is not at all similar to competition foxtrot, also called slow foxtrot, which is the subject of the chapter on foxtrot in Alex Moore's book. Even he admits slow foxtrot is not suitable for social dancing. The most basic rhythm in quickstep is SSQQ, the dancer's own two feet stand together side by side on nearly every second "Q", and the competition music is 50-52 bars per minute. The most basic rhythm in slow foxtrot is SQQ, the dancer's two feet almost never stand together, and the competition music is 30 bars per minute. Advanced figures in both dances have other rhythms. International style classes in quickstep use competition quickstep music; American style classes in social foxtrot use competition slow foxtrot music, even though social foxtrot is almost the same dance as quickstep at the beginning level that is used for social dancing. Slow foxtrot is much more difficult than quickstep/social foxtrot, especially on a crowded floor. Slow foxtrot is almost onestep modified to have slows and quicks, but onestep is much easier. We will be using his quickstep chapter for our social foxtrot and twostep, as well as his rhythm dancing chapter and figures in this article.
In the American forward basic, the man does left foot forward, right foot forward, left foot diagonally forward, close right foot to left foot, slow, slow, quick, quick and the lady does the natural opposite. See p. 37 in Alex Moore to see what this means. To see the diagram click here. The sidestep helps a lady who is learning to dance to feel the SSQQ rhythm. This figure is repeated to move in the direction of the line of dance. This form of forward basic is used in social foxtrot. It is less common in country-western twostep; more about this in the next paragraph. It is not used in quickstep. The earliest description of this figure that I have found is in the book "The Art of Social Dancing", by Lawrence A. Hostetler, New York, 1930, p.93.
The form of forward basic given in the previous paragraph is the easiest for the lady to follow at the slow tempos usually used in social foxtrot. This gets clumsy at faster tempos. Country-western twostep also includes medium and fast tempos where a different form of forward basic is more appropriate. Even at slow tempos most country-western dancers dance the version compatible with fast tempos. To see the diagram click here. The slow, slow, quick, quick rhythm is the same as for social foxtrot. The position of step 4 relative to step 3 shown in the figure is not critical. Step 4 may be slightly ahead, beside, or slightly behind step 3 depending on the speed of the dance and which partner you are dancing with. When this figure is danced repeatedly at fast tempo, the man's only heel lead is step 2, the slow on the right foot. The slow form of forward basic is not necessary when a man is leading a lady beginner on her first dance if he will call out the "slow, slow, quick, quick" rhythm to her for the first couple of minutes of dancing while she gets used to it. This avoids the very real difficulty of shifting from the slow form of forward basic to the fast form as beginners advance to faster tempos.
In Lloyd Shaw's 1939 book "Cowboy Dances", he refers to couple dances as round dances to distinguish them from square dances, and says on p.70 "But the round dance today is usually a one-step, or fox trot, or some modern dance". Thus, this form of twostep was already popular among country western dancers by 1939. This form of twostep is mainly danced in Texas and adjacent states where it is known simply as "twostep". In states where it is not danced much it is known as "Texas twostep". This form of twostep has been common for decades, but Lloyd Shaw's 1948 book "The Round Dance Book" makes clear that it was not used in the early 1900's, instead four other dances were called twostep in different places. One of the dances was waltz steps to 4/4 time music, described in the second paragraph of the waltz section of this article. I danced with a lady who had learned twostep in rural Texas in 1942. At that time she had learned both the old version and the new version as presented here. She followed me easily and comfortably on both. She said I danced both just the way she had originally learned them. She said that in 1942 most people danced them with body contact.
Quickstep does not include forward basic as a syllabus figure. Perhaps this is because quickstep was standardized as a competition dance in England before the forward basic was invented for social dancing in America. However, on p.41 Moore says "The foundation of the quickstep is the walk and the chasse...". With the very broad definition of chasse given on p.30 this would include the forward basic. So presumably Moore would have accepted the forward basic as a legitimate part of quickstep, even though it was never included in the syllabus. There is a tendency for beginners to use only forward basic in their dancing. This is monotonous. Beginners should put out the effort to master the various turns presented here. The turns are useful for the maneuvering necessary to thread your way through a crowd, and make the dance more interesting and enjoyable. One should try to limit forward basic to less than half the dance.
The left turn popular in American social foxtrot is given on p. 279 of Alex Moore's book as the reverse pivot turn. To see the diagram click here. It could follow a forward basic. This figure is easy at slow tempo. For it to work at fast tempo, the man must hold the lady close.
The natural pivot turn is shown on p. 52. This first diagram shows the natural pivot turn rotated through 270 degrees as it would be danced with a partner. It feels natural to dance the figure this way with a partner. But if the man practices the figure without a partner it will feel more natural to him to dance it like this. The natural pivot turn has a pivot on the toe of the left foot on step 4. During this pivot the right foot can be held directly in line with and out in front of the left foot. This does not get in the way of the lady. The natural pivot turn is a favorite among country-western dancers, but I have never met one who knew that name for it. It is also essential for social ballroom dancers. The diagram is rotated to follow the end of the next three diagrams in this section. If the diagram were rotated to line up with the forward basic, it would follow the first "slow" of a forward basic. The natural pivot turn as shown is a 270 degree turn; it can be overturned to a complete 360 degree turn. To accomplish this with a partner the position of step 4 will look more similar to the second of the two diagrams, and the man will need to lean back on step 4. With practice, this figure can be modified so that it can be repeated to spin in one spot.
A little easier than forward basic for some lady beginners to follow, and harder for the man beginner to learn, is the quarter turn to right followed by a quarter turn to the left. Even if the quarter turns are not popular in your area, they are still worth learning. They are the best exercise to learn leading and following, and the best way to learn the heel pivot, which is also a very valuable ending for the chasse reverse turn at fast tempos. The book shows the quarter turn to the right followed by the quarter turn to the left on p. 45. Just like the forward basic, this can be repeated to move down the line of dance. To see the figure click here. The first group of four steps is the quarter turn to the right; the second group of four steps is the quarter turn to the left. The technique shown in my figure for the quarter turn to the left is a bit simpler than the technique described in the book. The technique I show is what he calls the "chasse turn" on p. 42. What he shows on p.45 is a hybrid between a chasse turn and the pure heel pivot described on p.30-31. Steps 1,2 and 3 of the quarter turn to the left shown here are the same as steps 2,3 and 4 of the reverse pivot turn shown above, but danced more compactly here. It is easier to lead the quarter turn to the left at fast tempos than the reverse pivot turn because the sudden reversal of direction on step 1 of the reverse pivot turn is missing. This quarter turn to the left is more appropriate for social dancing than the progressive chasse given on p.46 of the book because the progressive chasse requires a step outside partner, which is not appropriate for social dancing. Step 2 shown here is taken diagonal to center, whereas in the progressive chasse it is taken along the line of dance. Even though the quarter turn to the left is easy for the man to lead, some ladies at some tempos express a marked preference for the man to do a heel pivot. The lady's step will remain the same as before. To see the figure click here. The man beginner will not be able to do this right away, but should aspire to learn it if he wants to be a really smooth dancer. The 1S2Q3Q timing shown on the heel pivot refers to the timing of the lady's steps while the man is taking his one step. The use of the man's left foot during his heel pivot on the right foot will depend on the tempo. At tempos considerably slower than quickstep the left foot will be used freely as shown in this figure. At tempos considerably faster than quickstep the left foot will be nestled beside the right foot as described in the book. In the 1993 revision of the standards the ISTD "ballroom technique" book substituted a toe pivot on the right foot called a "reverse pivot" for the heel pivot on the right foot shown here. I am skeptical that the toe pivot will be as practical at tempos faster than quickstep. However, I find the toe pivot sometimes more appropriate than the heel pivot for tempos slower than quickstep, depending on which lady I am dancing with. The man's left turn has apparently been a troublesome figure, so many different versions have been proposed.
A final figure is worth adding, consisting of the chasse reverse turn shown on p.58 followed by the quarter turn to the left. To see the diagram click here. This last figure may be hard for the lady to follow if she has not been taught it, because the rhythm is different on this figure: SQQSQQS. The best way to get used to this figure in the beginning is to repeat it to go around a large circle, in which case the last S and the first S are the same step, and the rhythm SQQ is repeated several times to get around the circle. A man who is teaching a lady to do this should repeat out loud "slow quick quick" as he leads the lady around the circle, otherwise she may not understand what is expected of her. The man should first lead the lady at very slow tempo or it may be too difficult for her. Once she makes it work she can rapidly progress to faster tempos. A single invocation of this complete figure can be overturned to a complete 360 degree rotation while moving in a straight line. This figure can be overturned well beyond 360 degrees so as to curve to the left in a circle. This is thrilling to do at fast tempos. It requires the man to bend his knees, lower his body slightly and lean backward slightly to lead it successfully. I only learned to do this left circle after doing it with the reverse turn in the waltz, and I use similar foot crossing. As with the quarter turn to the right, sometimes the heel pivot is a better ending for the chasse reverse turn than the quarter turn to the left.
This completes the list of figures needed for this dance. This collection of steps works for a wide range of tempos, and provides enough variety to make a reasonably interesting dance. I can take a lady with little previous dance experience and lead her through all these figures except the chasse reverse turn, provided I start off with the quarter turns to get her used to the slow, slow, quick, quick rhythm before I launch into the other figures. This dance can be danced with endless repetition of the rhythm "slow, slow, quick, quick" except when the chasse reverse turn is danced. The change of rhythm in the chasse reverse turn is quite easy to get used to, and without the chasse reverse turn the dance seems incomplete or unbalanced.
The last step of a quarter turn to the left, where the man steps forward on his left foot, would become the first step of a forward basic which would follow. This sounds more complicated than it is; we will show you how to sort this out in a later section on joining figures.
This dance is a good dance to use to teach the basics of leading and following. A repeated series of the quarter turn to right followed by the quarter turn to the left should be practiced by a couple until the lady can maintain her position relative to the man even though the ballroom hold is broken by the man having his right hand behind his back, and the lady having her left hand behind her back. This will only be possible if the man leads in a smooth and predictable manner, and the lady uses her feet to stay with the man, not expecting him to drag her with him.
Once the man learns to lead smoothly and the lady learns to follow properly, the lady should feel that she is treated gently and considerately through every figure in this dance. The man should concentrate on making it possible for her to smoothly follow every figure without the slightest stumble, without even an instant of momentary mild awkwardness. Fortunately, this is an easy dance, and with practice this level of perfection is within reach of every man and lady.
There is another beginning level ballroom dance that is not as essential as social foxtrot or twostep, but should be included if time permits, namely onestep. If there is time to include onestep, it should be taught first, since it is the easiest dance. It is the most appropriate dance for 4/4 time music slower than 30 bars per minute. If music is too slow for twostep, do onestep to the "quicks"; if music is too fast for twostep, do onestep to the "slows". As compared with twostep, onestep to "quicks" moves faster, onestep to "slows" moves slower. Shifting between twostep and onestep is a way to "shift gears" by shifting dances.
For some tempos, nothing else will do for a gentleman who wishes to ask a very inexperienced lady to dance. It helps that she has known the step since she was two years old, since the step is just a walk. A lady who has never danced before will probably be able to follow onestep with ease the first time. Onestep was popular among ballroom dancers in America in the 1910's and 1920's. It can be seen in ballroom dance scenes in silent movies from the 1920's. Dance teachers could not be expected to like it for the obvious reason that it is too easy and can be taught too quickly: they cannot make much money teaching it. It is still done occasionally by a small minority at country-western dances, and is resurrected at a few annual rag-time festivals. Many people do onestep without being aware of it, as it is usually the easiest way to do slow dancing to very slow music. Some country-western dancers do onestep to waltz music, though others do a real waltz.
Onestep has gone by a confusing assortment of names. It is also called the rag presumably because of its popularity in the ragtime era, and the Castle walk after Vernon and Irene Castle who toured America demonstrating it before WWI. Irene Castle's book "Castles in the Air", 1958 on p.113 says it was also called the Turkey Trot, the Grizzly Bear and the Bunny Hug. Some country western dancers call it the shuffle. Hostetler on p.92 of his book says it originated in America in 1911.
The basic step is simply walking forward or backward using the ballroom hold. There are no slows and quicks. Below 80 steps per minute it feels like slow dancing. At 100 steps per minute it is a gentle and graceful dance. A medium tempo is 120 steps per minute, and 140 is fast. A military march is 120 steps per minute. These step counts can be achieved by dancing to the "quicks" of slow music or to the "slows" of fast music. Thus, the "slows" of competition quickstep music would be 100 steps per minute, the "quicks" of competition slow foxtrot music would be 120 steps per minute. Some ballroom dance CD's have tracks labeled "blues" that are good for 80 to 100 steps per minute on the quicks. There should be no tendency to bounce in time to the music. Most of the time heels should be slightly off the floor and knees slightly bent to achieve a smooth and surefooted dance, especially at faster tempos. This is the only dance where heels should be kept off the floor most of the time.
Steps 1 to 3 of the natural turn from international slow foxtrot on p. 169 in Alex Moore's book can be used for turning around to the right when the man is moving forward. When the man is moving backward a figure a little different from the closed impetus, which I choose to call the impetus swivel, is useful. It can rotate through 270 degrees and be used to turn a corner. To see the diagram click here. The combination of quickstep figures chasse reverse turn followed by the quarter turn to the left works even when the lady has not been taught it, which it does not with the more complicated rhythm of the twostep, social foxtrot or quickstep. Another way to turn left when the man is moving forward is steps 1 through 4 of the reverse turn from Viennese waltz. Here, unlike in the waltz, he would start facing the line of dance, end backing the line of dance. To make a 180 degree turn when the man is moving backward, a backward reverse turn consists of steps 4561 from the reverse turn in the Viennese waltz. Other turns will occur to the experienced dancer, but these are enough to get started.
Onestep can be adapted to several kinds of music: slow foxtrot, samba, west coast swing, merengue, mambo, polka, hustle and some country-western twostep. I have successfully led a lady beginner in onestep to 4/4 time music at 70 bars per minute, dancing to the slows at 140 steps per minute.
The original, old fashioned waltz, which dates from the mid 1700's, is now often called the Viennese waltz. In social dancing, waltzes are likely to be played at tempos ranging from the standard 30 bars per minute for competition slow waltz, up to the standard 60 bars per minute for competition Viennese waltz, and any tempo in between. The slow waltz figures are danceable only near the low end of this range; the Viennese waltz figures are danceable throughout the range. Even though international style Viennese waltz is one of the styles of waltz used in competition ballroom dancing at the highest level, it is the predominant style of waltz at the most elegant formal social balls. It is also commonly seen in country-western dancing, though some country-western dancers do onestep, not waltz, to waltz music. The section named waltz in Alex Moore's book is about slow waltz; he discusses Viennese waltz in a section by that name. Since the International Standard Viennese waltz figures are so few and so simple, they are by far the most practical for social dancing. They are described with step diagrams in Appendix B if "The Viennese Waltz " at this website. If you have a dial-up connection it will take about 10 seconds before your browser jumps to Appendix B. Viennese waltz steps are easy for beginners at slow and moderate tempos. They are thrilling to do at fast tempos, but much more difficult to learn to do at fast tempos. If the steps are learned at fast tempo, they will be easy to do at slower tempo. Viennese waltz steps at fast tempos with large steps burn more energy than any so called aerobic exercise dance that I have ever seen.
When dancers get more practiced, so they are not beginners anymore, they will be able to do the foxtrot/twostep steps at tempos as fast as quickstep, 50 bars per minute. They will welcome more variety in their dancing than just social foxtrot or twostep. Dancing to 4/4 time music, it is more satisfactory to use onestep for tempos below 30 bars per minute, tango for tempos from 30 to 35, Viennese Waltz steps for medium tempos, and foxtrot/twostep steps for the fastest tempos. The steps are taken on beats 1, 3 and 4 of each measure. The step pattern on the rotations will quite naturally differ slightly from what they are for 3/4 time music. More change steps than rotations will be used on crowded floors. As an example of how to use this in social dancing, suppose a slow foxtrot or a jive is playing. Before you start, count to your self 1,..,3,4 to each measure, then start dancing on those counts. This dance is particularly suited to music written for west coast swing and for samba. Sometimes you can hear more than one way to apply it to a complicated rhythm, and one way will work, but the other will not. Rap or hip hop music often has a complicated rhythm that will work with this dance, but no other dance presented in this article. This dance will work on a wider variety of rhythms than any other social ballroom dance. Why should it not have priority over foxtrot/twostep? It is harder for a lady novice to follow, and it is not as well known or popular. Some country-western dancers now call this dance the triple step, though it was called the twostep before the modern twostep was invented.
As a couple gets more experienced the foxtrot/twostep dance may seem boring at tempos below 34 bars per minute. The easiest way to make slow foxtrot music more exciting is to do onestep to the quicks. As an alternative, a couple might want to teach themselves the tango for slower tempos. There are five different kinds of tango. The kind currently called "Argentine tango" apparently did not achieve any popularity in Buenos Aires until the latter half of the 20th century. The one we present here is international tango, which is closer to the style popular in Buenos Aires in the early 20th century.
International tango can be thought of as "Argentine twostep". However, tango feels different from twostep; it feels even more different from twostep as you get more familiar with it. The danger is that the novice will give up on the dance as awkward and pointless before understanding the firm, aggressive, deliberate feel of the dance, and the fun of the various closed finishes and the natural promenade turn. The walk and promenade are like a cat stalking its prey; the promenade turn is like the cat whirling round to follow an evading prey, and the closed finishes are like the cat pouncing on its prey. The word pounce is not an exact description since there is not the slightest bit of up and down motion of the body. After you learn the steps it takes a while to get the tight, precise, controlled feel of tango, then it no longer feels awkward.
Tango only works over a narrow range of tempos. Most of the recorded music for ballroom tango is from 27 to 33 bars per minute. It is easiest at 30, but more fun at 33, which is the standard for competition. Some experienced dancers enjoy it as fast as 40 bars per minute. While some of the figures can be performed faster than 40 bars per minute, there is no point in doing so because the special deliberate, firmly grounded, determined, forceful feel of tango is lost at tempos faster than 40 and the feeling changes into a flying feeling which is more easily experienced with twostep/quickstep or waltz.
The most basic steps are the walk p. 223 and p. 228, progressive sidestep p. 230. Progressive sidestep and walk steps can be combined to establish a slow, slow, quick, quick rhythm like the forward basic of a two-step, even though the step pattern is different. To see the diagram click here. At the beginning and end of this diagram the man's weight is on his right foot. This diagram looks peculiar because it does not begin with a standing start, but with the end of a previous figure just like the one depicted. The diagram shows that the tango version of forward basic can be danced on a much smaller floor than the other dances in this article. It can be danced around in a small circle. In fact, it can be danced in such a small circle that it ceases to be a progressive dance, and is danced in place. Perhaps it was devised for use in taverns or parlors with small floors. To appreciate the special nature of the tango this figure should be danced in a very small circle in a tense, crouching prowl. This is international style tango; American tango would add a closing step to the end of this basic figure which completely changes the character of the figure, making it more of a straight line standup figure like forward basic in twostep instead of a crouching curve. Even though this basic figure has a slow, slow, quick, quick rhythm like twostep, the rest of the figures do not.
Following the first two "slows" of a basic figure one could do the open reverse turn lady in line p. 246. Following the first "slow" of the basic figure one could do the rock turn p. 233. Both of these figures end with a closed finish and could be followed moving forward by another basic figure or moving backward with a back corte p. 242, which is little more than another closed finish. The rock turn is shown here as it might be practiced by the man without a partner. With a partner, step 3 will be where the dashed outline of step 1 is after the pivot, so step 3 will be danced in place. Since tango walks curve to the left, an occasional reverse turn is necessary to keep moving down the line of dance on a large rectangular dance floor.
The hold for tango is a little more compact than the normal ballroom hold with the man's right hand a little further around the lady and lower down her back; the man's left hand not as far out to the left, nor as high up. See p. 222. Because of the compact hold the lady's left hand will not be on top of the man's upper arm, instead her left arm will be over his right arm, and her left hand hand will reach under his arm to his back. Both the man and the lady will have their bodies rotated slightly to the left relative to the direction that their feet are pointing. While onestep, twostep and waltz can be almost satisfactory without body contact, tango cannot. Firm body contact is required for a satisfactory tango except when promenade hold is used.
The tango is danced in a slight crouch, with the knees bent, and there is no rise and fall. The man's crouch is not style, but necessity; otherwise it is difficult to lead at faster tempos. When standing, as at the end of the back corte, both the man and the lady should have the feet staggered with the ball of the right foot even with the arch of the left foot. Some experts recommend a two inch (5 cm) separation between the dancer's own two feet when standing. The first figure to learn would probably be the back corte, because it is little more than a closed finish. Once the difficulties of the closed finish are mastered, the rest of the dance should fall into place quickly for someone who already knows social foxtrot or twostep, though the tango should feel very different. The closed finishes are shown with the last closing step being a "slow" as the ISTD recommends, but I prefer to dance it as a "quick".
It is permissible, though not required, to stop for a bar or two of music after any closed finish or after the end of a closed promenade. While it is possible to dance tango correctly without any stops, it is difficult. Sometimes without a stop before a back corte, one is likely to do a reverse pivot turn from social foxtrot rather than the back corte from tango. This temporarily destroys the feel of the dance. According to Victor Sylvester's "Modern Ballroom Dancing", 1990 edition, p.22, this dance was called "baile con corte" literally "dance with cut" which he translates as "dance with a stop" before it was called tango. I also have a 1942 edition of Sylvester's book which lacks the historical introduction. The historical introduction was adapted from his earlier book, "The Art of the Ballroom".
In addition to the normal hold, tango has a promenade hold used in the promenade figures. If the couple can be considered two halves of a closed book in the normal hold, the book is opened in the promenade hold on the side where they are holding hands, with their bodies still contacting on the other side. The angle between the bodies should be small, no more than 45 degrees. The progressive link p. 235, serves to get from the normal hold to the promenade hold. The closed promenade p. 237, and the natural promenade turn p. 260. are both entered in promenade hold. The man closes the lady from promenade hold to normal hold during the third step of the closed promenade. The lady's moving foot moves in front of her standing foot on step 2, and behind on step 3, the same as the man's does. The closed promenade can be followed by a basic figure or by a back corte. The natural promenade turn can be followed by another promenade figure or by the rock turn.
The figures presented are leadable and easy enough for social dancing with different partners. If a couple desires more variety in their tango, the book has many more figures, most of which are not as leadable and require more effort to learn than most social dancers can justify.
Now that the dances have been introduced, a word about leadability is in order. In ballroom dancing the man must always be trained. In the most leadable dances, the lady needs little or no training. In the least leadable, the lady may need as much training as the man.
The onestep is the most leadable. If the lady has already learned the ballroom hold, all she needs to be told about the dance is to step in time with the music, keep her heels slightly off the floor, be smooth and do not bounce.
The foxtrot/twostep does not require heels off the floor, but it does require more complicated rhythm, which the lady might need explained to her. The man should call out "slow, slow, quick, quick" as he leads the lady beginner through the basic figures. The chasse reverse turn should not be attempted until she has mastered the basic figures. Foxtrot/twostep is quite leadable, but less so than the onestep. For a lady beginner who has not been shown the steps it is only leadable at slow tempo, 30 bars per minute; medium and fast tempos can only be achieved after becoming familiar with the dance at slow tempo. If the lady has already been exposed to the chasse reverse turn in the onestep, she may be able to follow it in the foxtrot/twostep with no instruction. If she has not been exposed to it in the onestep, she will not be able to do it in the social foxtrot unless the unusual rhythm of the figure is explained to her.
The lady who has already mastered the foxtrot/twostep will have little difficulty following the tango if the man first repeats the back corte until the lady is proficient doing it. Tango is a little more demanding of proficiency on the part of the man than the foxtrot/twostep. Merely being able to follow the tango is not enough to enable the lady to appreciate the dance. It will take longer for the lady to get the feel of the tango.
The waltz is not as leadable as the other dances. If the lady does not already know how to do rotations in a straight line the man cannot lead the lady directly into them. First the lady must be able to follow a series of change figures. Then the man can lead the lady gradually into rotations. He can lead her in rotations performed in a small circle in the opposite direction from the rotations. This has the effect of unwinding the rotations so they do not seem like rotations, and seem more like simple change figures. Natural turns rotate clockwise. If he performs natural turns while moving in a small counterclockwise circle the lady will be able to follow. Similarly if he performs reverse turns while moving in a small clockwise circle she will be able to follow. If he gradually increases the diameter of the circles she will learn how to do rotations while moving in a straight line. In the reverse turn, she will not learn to cross her feet on the third step unless he points this out to her.
It is widely appreciated that a single lady must accommodate herself to different styles of leading by different single men. It is also true that single men should adjust their style of leading to what the lady they are leading seems comfortable with.
If music with an even beat is too fast to do onestep to the "quicks", ignore every other beat and do it to the "slows". If music with an even beat is too slow for foxtrot/twostep, imagine that each beat is a "slow" and imagine "quicks" in between the real beats. This is called "double timing" the music. Waltz can be adapted to 4/4 time music by dancing 1x34 to every bar. But this would be too slow with some 4/4 time music. If we write imaginary beats in parentheses, we can double time waltz to music with an even beat as 1(x)3(4). Sometimes the rhythm contains beats that are not needed. Thus if doing onestep or foxtrot to the constant rhythm pattern 1xx45x7x, beats 4 and 7 could be ignored. If the music has a random pattern of beats added to a constant pattern of beats, ignore the random pattern. If there is no constant pattern, the music is undanceable.
Most people who find this article searching for "country western step diagrams" refuse to read it. If the title of the article were "country western dancing", they would find it more acceptable. They take a dim view of anyone who would use a highfalutin word like ballroom. That such a person could have more experience country-western dancing than any of their friends is inconceivable to them. If they knew more about the history of country western dancing they would not be so offended by the title. Country-western dancers in Texas do twostep, onestep, and waltz, which are described in this article. In country western dancehalls in most other parts of America the adversaries of dance have been successful at stamping it out or preventing it from getting there in the first place, so they do swing dancing or line dancing instead. European born Argentine cowpokes used to do the particular version of tango described here, so if you stretch your definition, it is also country-western. Many country-western dancers only dance the twostep, and in the twostep they only dance the forward basic and the natural pivot turn. The very most advanced country-western dancers dance every figure given in this website except the chasse reverse turn in twostep, the fleckerl in the waltz, and the tango figures. Country-western dancers typically differ from ballroom dancers in philosophy, attitude, dress, and style of dancing, so why are the steps mostly the same? Their bodies work the same, so the simplest way for a man to lead a lady around the room is the same for both. For the differences between ballroom as it is usually taught in America today and country-western read this paragraph and this paragraph.
A historical footnote to clear up some confusion might be in order. I am aware of five different versions of the tango that have achieved some success at various places around the world as social dances. These are the international, Finnish, American, Chinese and Argentine versions. These are ballroom dances except for American tango, which is part ballroom and part latin, and Argentine tango, which is a latin dance. Why the difference, and which is more authentic?
International tango is described in detail elsewhere in this article. Argentine tango is danced over a wide range of tempos. Often, different figures are done at fast tempos from those done at slow tempos. Argentine tango is an unusual latin dance. The physical relation between the partners in a typical latin dance is represented by the two sides of the letter "H", with no body contact between the partners. In a ballroom dance the relation can be represented with less accuracy by the letter "K", touching at the waist. In Argentine tango the partner relationship can either be represented by "H" or by "A", touching at the top, but very definitely not touching at or near the waist. In this unusual dance there is reaching out with the leg to touch the partner's leg. The American tango is a masterpiece of slick marketing technique: the basic figure can be counted out to the letters T-A-N-G-O. Like international tango, it is typically danced to music at 33 bars per minute. The Finnish tango is danced to music at 30 bars per minute and emphasizes dips, like the habanera figure described later. Chinese tango is slow, 27 bars per minute. At least one figure is unique to Chinese tango, other figures are borrowed from other kinds of tango, chosen for their compatibility with the slow tempo. This slow tempo was used in some tango scenes in Hollywood movies of the 1930's.
The historical accounts of the tango claim that the version invented in immigrant lower class neighborhoods in Buenos Aires was the one that found its way back to France in 1907 and made the tango famous. The book "The Population of Latin America" by Nicolas Sanchez-Albornoz translated by W.A.R. Richardson, Univ. Calif. Press, p.160, gives the percentages of immigrants entering Argentina in the decade 1891-1900 as Italians--65.66, Spaniards--20.31, French--3.95, Russians--2.69, Turks--1.79, others--5.60. Of these, only the Spaniards and the Turks would have had insurmountable cultural inhibitions against ballroom dance .
The root of these inhibitions is the cultural mindset that results in the so called "honor killings" of women in the Middle East. Search the internet for more information about honor killings. Though the book does not mention honor killings, "Journey from the Land of No", by Roya Hakakian, Crown Pub. 2004, documents the scriptural basis of this attitude toward women on pages 164-167. Her account is vague, but it seems that the attitude is based on a severe interpretation of the ambiguous scriptural tale of Adam and Eve that seems to blame the eviction from Eden on the fact that a woman was allowed to tempt a man. Thus girls in Iran were lectured on "the apocalypse that only you could bring upon us". Apparently if a calamity like the eviction would befall those who allow a woman to tempt a man, then it would be justified to kill any woman who was inclined to commit such temptation.
Any encyclopedia has a history of Spain and Portugal. When Spain and Portugal had switched from the Koran to the Bible by the end of the 1400's, this could remain in the culture because this scriptural tale is one of the few common to both. Probably the interpretation was mellowed to some extent with the conversion, but apparently retained much of the original flavor, because of the vast difference between Hispanic and European couple dances, in other words, between latin and ballroom dances. Thus this cultural mindset came in attenuated form to the colonies of Spain and Portugal in Latin America. Men must be protected from temptation by women. That the intention is not to protect women from men is illustrated by the latin dance known as the lambada. In the lambada the man crouches down and presents a bent knee for the lady to sit astride. Women must not be allowed to get too close to men in the particular way they might with ballroom dancing. Experienced ballroom dancers will laugh at this supposed temptation.
The majority of the immigrants to Buenos Aires would have been oblivious to all this and would have been exposed to ballroom dance in their homeland. The version of tango they created was a ballroom dance, not a latin dance. This is documented among other means by a famous photo of tango dancers in Buenos Aires in 1908. The photo, being static, does not show the movement, but it does show the hold, a ballroom hold, not a latin hold. The photo is reproduced on page 148 of "Tango and the Political Economy of Passion" by Marta E. Savigliano 1995, and on page 46 of "Tango" by Simon Collier, Artemis Cooper, Maria Susana Azzi, and Richard Martin, 1997 paperback edition. Other early black and white photos in the latter book make the same point. More recent color photos show a latin hold. The concept of a latin dance is a technical one. So-called ballroom dance competitions usually have both ballroom and latin dancing. American Swing is put in the latin category in ballroom dance competitions. Of the five kinds of tango, the only one that would qualify as an exclusively latin dance is the one now called Argentine tango. This was not the only version of tango invented in Argentina, but it is the one most acceptable in the Hispanic culture of Argentina. There is absolutely nothing in common between the two kinds of tango invented in Argentina except that they are both danced to tango music. No matter what country their ancestors came from, succeeding generations of Argentinians became culturally more Hispanic, and would naturally come to prefer the ballroom tango less and the latin tango more. This cultural shift is also reflected in the music: much early tango music written in Argentina is so different from more recent tango music written in Argentina that it hardly seems appropriate to classify both styles by the same name. This is entirely appropriate, since music written for a dance tends to be a musical impression of the dance. International tango has been selected for this article for two reasons. First, it is probably closer to the version that made tango famous than most of the others. Second, it is a ballroom dance, and this article is about social ballroom dancing. The basic figures of international tango were standardized by the British in 1922 based on French tango at that time [3, p.52-54]. Other figures were added later.
A comment on the social significance this attitude toward women is in order. Women are seen as a threat to men's spiritual sanctity, a necessary evil that must be contained, controlled, and defended against. This naturally reduces the tendency to let the feminine viewpoint influence male behavior in commerce. Women are more given to cooperation, nurturing and conforming to social norms. Too little of this in commerce leads to corruption, economic inefficiency , and low prosperity, all hallmarks of societies with this attitude toward women. Demanding a bribe that you are not legally or ethically entitled to is aggressive anti-social behavior, "not nice", and more likely to be frowned upon from a feminine viewpoint. How does this relate to dancing? In ballroom dancing the lady is the copilot in the flight through the cloud of dancing couples, occasionally warning with sudden resistance of the eminent danger of a collision that the man does not see. In both latin dancing and belly dancing, the lady is a siren temptress, reinforcing the view that created both latin dancing and belly dancing in the first place
What was the original form of the ballroom version of the tango? One can only speculate, as countless steps were proposed after it arrived in France. In America today twostep dancers who learn by watching others and never take lessons prefer figures with exactly four steps. There are several such figures in tango. The figures that come to mind are the tango version of the forward basic, shown above, the back corte, the four step (p. 264 in the book), promenade, natural promenade turn, and a figure from Finnish tango that does not appear in international tango that they call the habanera. It was said that the tango was cleaned up after it was brought to Paris. This was just after the Victorian era, and standards were strict. The habanera figure would have been a likely candidate for elimination, which would explain why it does not appear in international tango. Even today I would not advocate including it in a tango class, though far less acceptable things are commonly seen among rap, hip-hop and reggae dancers. In the Finnish habanera the man steps back on the left, forward in place on the right, forward left, right closes to left, slow, slow, quick, quick. The first step of the Finnish habanera figure looks like the photograph on the front cover of the 10th edition of Alex Moore's book. On the first step only, the man's whole body is rotated slightly to the left and inclined forward. Apparently the publisher liked the picture and was unaware that the figure was not in the book.
I met a man who moved to America from Montevideo, Uruguay, just across the bay from Buenos Aires, Argentina. He had never learned to dance, but had watched his parents tango when he was young. I showed him a demonstration on an Elizabeth Romain instructional video of international tango, and a video of performers from Argentina doing Argentine tango. He said what he saw at social dances looked more like the international tango. He specifically remembered the rock turn figure. He had seen the Argentine tango, but only up on the stage during performances.
Before about 1918 the tango was often danced to a rhythm named habanera, in 8/8 time, with four beats per bar like this: 1xx45x7x [3, p.53]. One example is the famous piece "Tango" written by the Spanish composer Albeniz in 1890, Op.165 No.2. I have heard old recordings from 1913 of a tango quartet in Buenos Aires who played other tunes with habanera rhythm. In these the "slows" of tango were represented by beats 1 and 5, and the "quicks" were left to the dancer's imagination. Alex Moore's chapter on tango says tango music has two beats to the bar, and quicks are half a beat, meaning that there are four half beats to the bar. This is confusing as each beat is expressed as two half beats. Modern competition dance recordings have tempo marked as though the tango music has four beats to the bar, and the quicks are a full beat. Both habanera and modern music have two slows to a bar. The tango that I timed on the 1913 recording was 34.5 bars/minute, and the others sounded similar.
Since Albeniz' 1890 piece was named tango, one might jump to the conclusion that the name referred to the dance. This would be wrong. In Isaac Albeniz, Portrait of a Romantic, by Walter Aaron Clarke, Oxford University Press 1999, p.97, he quotes Felip Pedrell's "Diccionario tecnico de la musica" from Spain in 1894, as describing tango as a genre of folk music in Spain, Mexico and Cuba, not a dance. Similarly, the book by Simon Collier et.al. referred to above on p.42 says the name meant a form of popular song before it meant a dance.
A different version of this same attitude about women being allowed to tempt men may have found its way into the Puritanism that has a strong influence in America, and a lesser influence in England. Historically Puritanism was strongly influenced by the radical writings of John Calvin (1509-1564) of Switzerland. Calvin lived during the height of the witch burning era. Nearly all of the adversaries of dance in the present time must read at least some of the wisdom of Calvin as an essential part of their education. The Bible has many references to dancing, most of them positive. But Calvin preferred certain doctrines that had formerly been mainly associated with Koranic tradition, even though I have been told that the Koran itself does not condemn dancing. The book "Adversaries of Dance" on p.27 cites Calvin's fanatical opposition to dance as an "enticement to whoredome". Why was Calvin attracted to such doctrines? Perhaps he was persuaded to the middle eastern viewpoint by refugees from Spain, who had just been expelled in large numbers and scattered in all directions. Some Americans who do latin dancing are reluctant to do ballroom dancing, fearful that they might fall from grace in the eyes of the adversaries of dance.
The box step is danced by using a forward and backward pair of change figures to step on the four corners of a square. Where did it come from? The book "Dancing" by Marguerite Wilson, Philadelphia 1899 on page 109 describes what she calls the waltz, and what is today called the natural turn in the Viennese waltz, using ballet terminology. On the following page she says "Before attempting to turn, these steps should be practiced forward and backward in an imaginary square, as indicated in the following diagram:...". The diagram shows the box step, though she does not call it by that name. Thus, she is introducing the box step as a preliminary practice step to build coordination before learning the natural turn. She describes the method of turning on p.110. She is not describing what is now known as the "turning box", she is describing the natural turn in the Viennese waltz. She describes the reverse turn on p.113. What we now call change steps she calls the pursuit, and she prefers the man to go backward during change steps. The box step was invented to be an exercise, not a dance. The box step is not the waltz step. The waltz step is quite different. The box step is so often represented to be the waltz step, that this misconception should be corrected. To see the diagram of the waltz click here. How did the box step go from merely an exercise to being considered by uninformed teachers to be the waltz step? I do not know. Some teachers may have looked at the diagram and not read the book, thus honestly fooling themselves into thinking the box step was the waltz step. So as not to perpetuate this error, as a public service I do not show the diagram of the box step. Showing a different diagram than the one that the reader was looking for had a profound effect in Mrs. Wilson's book; hopefully it will have a similar effect in my article.
Slow waltz and slow foxtrot are both fun to do, but are not recommended here as social dances. Why not?
For the slow waltz to be the thrilling dance that it can be, large steps are required. The simplest slow waltz amalgamation of change figure, natural turn, change figure, reverse turn should cut a swath 15 feet (4.57 m) wide moving down the dance floor, which is clearly impractical in nearly all social dancing situations. Slow waltz with small steps appropriate for social dancing is deadly dull. It is more fun to do onestep to slow waltz music than slow waltz with small steps. Slow waltz music is 30 bars per minute. Waltz music needs to be at least 37 bars per minute before it starts to be fun with small waltz steps, and then most of the slow waltz figures no longer work, the Viennese waltz figures are more practical. Viennese waltz figures cut a much narrower swath than the slow waltz figures do. Dancing to slow waltz music on a crowded floor works better with Viennese waltz steps. Proponents of the American smooth slow waltz will be quick to point out that the box step and under-arm turn do not require much space. The box step was originally intended as, and certainly feels like, an exercise, not a dance. The under-arm turn is a latin figure, not a ballroom figure, and this article is about ballroom dancing.
Similarly, there are problems with slow foxtrot. Slow foxtrot is probably the favorite dance of most competition ballroom dancers, so it is certainly a very good dance. However, slow foxtrot is difficult on an empty floor, and much more difficult on a crowded floor. Social foxtrot is much easier than slow foxtrot on a crowded floor. The only couple I have ever seen who could enjoy threading their way trough a crowded floor with slow foxtrot were the former champion ballroom dance couple of America. If you have to be the best couple on a continent to dance slow foxtrot socially, it is not very satisfactory as a social dance.
Slow waltz and slow foxtrot are very good as competition dances, but not as social dances.
Competition ballroom dancing applies many different figures to a few specific combinations of rhythm and tempo, whereas social ballroom dancing applies a few of the same figures to many different combinations of rhythm and tempo. The most important difference in technique between competition ballroom dancing and social ballroom dancing is that there are no steps outside partner in social ballroom dancing. With steps outside partner competition ballroom dancing sacrifices comfort and convenience for more energetic dancing. Another difference between competitive dancing and social dancing is illustrated by the man's heel pivot in quickstep. On pages 30-31 Alex Moore insists that the left heel be nestled neatly beside the right heel, not touching the floor, while the pivot is executed on the heel of the right foot. In a competition, this might impress the judges. However, the most critical judge of the man in social dancing is his lady partner. For her benefit the man should be free to use the left foot more freely as necessary to maintain his balance during the heel pivot, to afford the lady a secure lead during the often slightly precarious heel pivot, especially at slower tempos. In social ballroom dancing the couple may not move as rapidly across the floor. This means that the steps in each figure may not be as spread out and widely separated as shown in the diagrams in the book.
In competitive dancing one focuses on impressing the judges with an elaborate routine. In social dancing one concentrates on maneuvering through the crowd on the dance floor
A typical dance competition with extravagant figures that take up a lot of floor space might have 360 sq.ft. (33.4 sq.m.) of dance floor space per couple on the floor, but social ballroom dancing restricted to the figures in this article will be satisfactory with as little as 44 s