Daytime Dance

This week I was way too tired to hang around after work and go to Wednesday night’s Rhythm Tap II class, so I emailed my teacher to ask if I could come to the Thursday lunchtime installment instead – all good!

I got to the college and checked the display board to see which studio we were in. Not the usual one. But then I spent 5 minutes running around the building looking for studio C10 when it turned out to be just along from where we are on a Wednesday night! I have to say, even after someone showed me to the corridor where it was, I still went through the wrong door (towards the boiler room) and then realised it was round to the right and up a short dark staircase! I should have just asked at reception *sigh*

I walked in to what is usually used as a rehearsal studio (it has mirrors, black walls, stage style lighting and an upstairs gallery area) and saw all these people milling around, chatting, changing; a couple of theatre-types furiously practising intricate tap steps in full leg warmers and stuff (honestly, it was like Fame when I walked in) and couldn’t see our teacher or anyone I recognised. I thought, am I in the right place? Then I spotted some older ladies I knew from level I daytime sitting to the side changing out of their tap shoes – phew! I was in the right place.

After the level one-ers cleared out, it was a class of about 7 students. I think I had been slightly nervous on the way there of a smaller class being quite exposing, but actually it was really good and more laid back. I need to stop being afraid of not getting it right away. After all it’s 45 minutes a week. I found 2 particular steps difficult when we learned them last week but after going over them all week (in the kitchen, in the corridor at work, in various larger shops!) I had them down by yesterday. One involves travelling backwards and then changing it to perform it on the spot. The other is a drop-shuffle-ball-change step where you change the shape of the shuffle so it goes around you so that you can travel forwards. I had to remember to begin with a drop-step in front first. It also helped to snap up the second part of the shuffle. I did find this more difficult on the left leg, but there we are!

I realised that this daytime class was a week behind, so I got to repeat week 1 – boom! We filmed the routine we’d learnt and our teacher showed us the next little bit too – this helps because she said to me afterwards that they did a bit more on Wednesday night (being week 2), but I’d be fine.

As it was a small class and we didn’t have to exit the studio right away, I got a chance to chat with our teacher afterwards about tap shoes (she has some lovely custom Ruben Sanchez shoes) and find out a bit more about her dancing background which was nice.

Before next Wednesday I’m going to practice the routine as much as possible and watch the video to get a feel for the next bit.

One thought on “Daytime Dance

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *