What’s the Point?
Posted on: August 2, 2012
- In: blathering
- 5 Comments
So my sister dragged me and some other folks out to salsa last night. I was sitting there with a non-dancer friend of mine, watching the dancers, and he asked me a question.
“This dancing thing,” he said. “What’s the point?”
Of course, I laughed.”There has to be a point?”
“No, really,” he said. “I mean, other than romance or whatever. What’s fun about it?” He seriously wanted to know.
Spotting a potential dance convert, I immediately switched into proselytizing mode. After I blathered on for a few minutes, I started organizing my thoughts. And here’s what I came up with.
“I think for the leads,” I said, “the fun part is dreaming up stuff that matches with the music, and then seeing if you can transmit that to your follow and get her to do what you dreamed up. And for the follow, the fun is in seeing if you can stay totally open and responsive to the lead while keeping in control of your own balance and movement.”
“Oh,” my friend said sagely, “connection.” Well, he hangs out with a lot of dancers.
“Yeah,” I said, with that give-your-life-to-Jesus tremor in my voice. “Connection.”
“Sounds sort of like a game,” he said.
“Exactly!” I said.
And I guess that’s definitely a huge part of the “point” of dancing for me. It’s that game of follow-the-leader. I think I approach every new dance, and every new dance partner, like a game of skill.
Oddly enough, that seemed to make sense to my friend. “That makes sense,” he said.
Well, I don’t know if I actually made a convert, but I didn’t do too bad.
So now I ask you. How would you answer my friend’s question? What do you tell non-dancers about why you love to dance?
5 Responses to "What’s the Point?"
August 2, 2012 at 5:49 pm
What Jeff said..
to me it’s All about the music and interpreting That song in movement that portrays That song..Being a rhythm junky I just really enjoy having the music move me , and love sharing that with a partner that can enjoy the same feelings..The closest thing to soaring like an eagle I have ever known .
August 3, 2012 at 12:15 am
I feel like a broken record to also say it has a lot to do with the music. Which is funny, because that’s not why I started dancing. I started because I was mesmerized by it. It seemed like this fantasy world from a movie where men still ask a woman for a dance. But it’s the music that’s kept me dancing. My favorite dances are those when the lead connects with the music and uses it, thus allowing me as a follow to use it as well.
More dancers should listen to the music. Not just hear it, but really listen. Feel it. Analyze it. Learn it. Decide what you like and don’t like…. not what your friends like or what the DJ’s like…. but what makes YOU want to tap your foot or pulse your step. Then take those things and put them in the dance.
I giggled at your line, “Yeah,” I said, with that give-your-life-to-Jesus tremor in my voice. “Connection.”
But it’s not just a connection with the person, but also the music.
August 3, 2012 at 2:43 am
The joy of dancing for me is to meet with people, with no social pressure. If I go to a night club to dance, the women always assume that there is a ‘hidden agenda’ and that there is no point in dancing with somebody you do not fancy. I enjoy dancing with most followers, and having a laugh if it goes awry. The musicians give us the notes, dancers fill the space between the notes.
August 2, 2012 at 5:29 pm
For me, it’s also about being able to connect more fully and deeply with the music itself. I’ve been listening to swing music (many kinds of music, actually) literally my entire life. And the music has affected me pretty-much the entire time, sometimes profoundly. But as a listener, I felt like a receptacle for the music. As a dancer, I feel more like a channel for the music. More than one dance instructor has pointed out that, when you’re dancing, if you’re doing it right, you become one of the musicians. That’s exactly what I’m talking about. The music used to go into me, now it passes through me. And then, to be able to channel that into my partner, who is doing her own channeling, is about as sublime an experience as I can imagine. That’s the point.
August 3, 2012 at 9:32 am
With you on not wanting to feel like a receptacle! Just listening to music can be great, but I tend to have more fun when I’m participating on some way- dancing, singing, sharing the experience with other people. I like that I can actively respond to and build on the music rather than just consuming what’s handed to me.