rhythmtap

On Musicality

~ Lifelongdancestudent ~ Leave a comment

I’ve been vaccinated!

Great news – my SO and I both had our first Covid vaccinations last weekend! We had the Pfizer Biontech jab as they’re no longer offering under 40s the Astra Zeneca, due to the risk of blood clots. I was glad about that because I had a DVT when I was 20. I’m a little scared of needles, and felt quite worked up just before I had it done, but honestly, I didn’t even know the nurse had done it until I saw her drop the needle into the disposal bucket. I was given a green sticker to wear on my hand to indicate my nervousness, and the nurse was great and just chatted away to me about my plans for the weekend, so I was distracted 🙂 I’ve never, ever had a bad experience with needles, but for some reason I get super nervous and start freaking out. They asked me if I was likely to faint and needed a bit of time, but I said “nope, I’ll be fine, I just get a bit worked up” (i.e. just get it over with!). I posted about how I hate needles and how easy and painless it was on social media because I have a cousin who is flat out refusing to get the vaccination because she is a proper needlephobe.

Musicality

In other news…I recently attended a series of three online workshops on musicality for tap dancers. Hosted by my teacher’s tap company, we were joined by guests Jess Murray (The Tap Project/London Tap Jam/Tap Dance Research Network UK), Gustavo ‘Tato’ Sassone (The Luthier Dance School Barcelona), and Max Pollak (Rumba Tap). These guys are all amazing in their own right and I came away having learnt SO MUCH:

  • Jess got us to explore improvisation, looking at beats, units of time, accents and space, and we looked at which steps we can fit into different rhythms (such as cramp rolls into swung eighths), which will really help with future improvisation.
  • Drummer and percussionist Tato took us through the very basics of music theory, which was so helpful to me because I had forgotten a lot and my understanding was vague up until that point. We didn’t do any tap, but we spent the session clapping out the rhythms, which was helpful for concentrating on that, rather than what you’re doing with your feet.
  • Drummer and percussive dancer Max showed us the Afro-Cuban rhythms of the Clave. Stepping, clapping and singing, all at the same time – argh! But he broke it all down in such a way that you found yourself able to do it…if only for a while! These things take practise. My teacher had actually let me know about an opportunity to do online classes with him on a Friday evening, but I don’t want to take any more on right now!

I actually had clarinet lessons for a couple of years when I was at secondary school (and I hated them!), and although I could play okay and can still read music (although I needed a refresher), I was better at playing by ear than by music score. Revisiting music as a tap dance student has been interesting; our teacher will use musical terms like ‘sixteenth notes’ and ‘triplets’, and it literally means nothing to me, despite attempting to learn what they are. I’ve gradually realised over the years that I don’t really retain numbers and amounts in the way that I retain words.

I’ve attended 2 online musicality workshops with Sarah Reich over the last year and these recent sessions have gone over it all again, with things like bars and note values, and I write myself loads of notes, but I don’t seem to be able to retain the information in my head! Some students want to know how many steps we’re doing, or how many counts something is, where as I learn from retaining the ‘bah-dah-bee-bah-dah’, which isn’t a bad thing at all, because you want to move from counting into feeling the rhythm. After all, the masters did it by feel. But, I still want to be able to understand what I’m doing musically. Our teacher is very good at recognising that we all learn differently, because she’ll explain it both ways. My solution for now, has been to create index cards with the note values and explanations and stick them on the wall of my garage tap studio! 🙂

Anyone else struggle with music theory? Let me know in the comments 🙂

It’s Tap Wednesday!

~ Lifelongdancestudent ~ Leave a comment

This evening I managed to stay at work until 5pm. Doesn’t sound late, but it’s at least an hour after all my colleagues have left! But that’s another story. Went to Rhythm Tap II (tried to hydrate as much as possible beforehand) and caught up briefly with R. No sign of K this term – maybe she’s doing something else.

Once again the basement studio was like a SAUNA. I actually missed an opportunity to use a sauna at a hotel we stayed at in Birmingham at the weekend for the National Running Show, so maybe I shouldn’t complain LOL

It was a full studio as is the way on Wednesday nights and you could sense everyone’s energy – KABOOM! It’s funny how different it feels to a Thursday lunchtime which is smaller, calm and laid back. We warmed up in a circle as usual and then did some more 3 beat exercises as per last week. One exercise travelling backwards, one crawling to the side another on the spot. The one I’ve been practicing constantly because it’s in the routine! Just doing that I was sweating.

We then moved on to our routine which, you guessed it, is in 3/4 beats. I remembered the beginning and then there was lots of new stuff to learn. Some parts a little tricky, but I’ll get ’em. Loved the quick jump in the air with double-flap at the end! (jump-f-lap-f-lap!)

Class finished with the group split into 2 to perform it while the other half watched. I felt a little self conscious in the sense that my mind went blank just as we were about to start (!) BUT I trusted that I would just go with it, and I actually did better than when we were all dancing together. I think it’s that thing of doing better under pressure again, which I don’t get. Or maybe it’s because I’ve been meditating on this:

Daytime Dance

~ Lifelongdancestudent ~ 1 Comment

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.