Floorcraft 104 – Dancing Small. To dance small is not exactly a simple proposition for a whole wide range of realities. Most notably the fact that the skillset isn’t taught anywhere by anyone. If it is, then it’s usually part of a step, a pattern, or a figure and talked about in passing as part of something else and not necessarily the focus of the topic. Most, if not all, but 1 or 2 in a class or workshop don’t see the smallness factor. 95% of the class gets lost in the vocabulary, and the execution of the vocabulary and not what actually has to happen in relation to making it compact. Usually there’s a lot of pushing, and pulling, compressing, squeezing going on for both partners. Further still what’s actually taught is nothing close to actual Floorcraft as it’s such a wide and vast topic. Again, people only see the pattern and not what you do with it or how to make it small and compact. This isn’t a rant against teachers, or vocabulary as a tool to sell lessons. No. It’s statement of fact about the state of things when it comes to something seemingly so simple, and yet is completely tossed by the way side for a variety of reasons. Secondarily, we have a related topic in our library called Dancing In A Small Space – Part 1 and Part 2 (The Addendum), and while those topics are completely valid, they’re what happens at the 50,000 ft level of all the vocabulary you can do in a small space, and things you haven’t necessarily thought of. This topic deals specifically with the floorcraft issue, and making things ‘compact’ and what that looks like. Today we look at Floorcraft 104 – Dancing Small and why it’s important.
What does “Dancing Small” mean ? In its simplest form, it is exactly what it sounds like. Your dancing space contracts, your vocabulary choices, and more importantly the execution of your vocabulary choices, becomes smaller, compact. It’s not that you drop vocabulary, it’s just that the vocabulary that you choose (walking, turns, ochos, crosses, etc) are made to fit within the available space deliberately. Or put another way, what you Lead/Follow takes up less space to accomplish one’s goals musically. In it’s more grandiose version, and in our opinion where this stuff really shines is when you’re dancing in Buenos Aires and you have to make everything fit in less than 2 or 3 Millimeters of space. From one stand point this is all about the Lead, and from another more important stand point it really is all about the Follower’s awareness, and really the partnership working together to create “Dancing Small”. It should be noted that more than likely one is going to invoke (and to dance) the Five Common Social Figures….more than likely. That’s not always the case, but it’s a pretty good bet that you’ll end up dancing these five things. (See: Five Common Social Figures).