You don't want to compete. You don't want to perform. You like your dancing served social.
Up until you walked in for dance lessons, the closest you came to a performance was the story you'd tell about the destruction that would most likely happen when your feet and a dance floor came crashing into each other.
As different as you may be from that non-dancing person, doing any type of performance may not be your cup of tea, and that is totally understandable.
8 Things Social Dancers Can Get From a Dance Routine
Let's clear away the rhinestones, shut off the spotlight, and break down what a Dance Routine really does for your Social Dance Hobby.
What is Social Dancing?
Social Dance is the practical application of ballroom and latin dancing to be used in places like wedding receptions, office parties, or any other social gathering where a dance floor is present. Emphasizing the skills of leading and following, this style of dance is spontaneous and does not require the use of choreography.
1. A Backup Plan
Social Dancing is like driving, you are moving with the flow of traffic, have a desired destination, but must adapt and adjust to the drivers around you.
A routine adds a layer of refined muscle memory that turns the rehearsed material into a reflex. This doesn't mean you're going to swap out the fun, spontaneity of leading and following for a full scale production, but it's nice to have a rehearsed backup plan.
2. Develop Styling
A routine is the best activity for developing style in your dancing quickly. How and where you use styling is up to you. Whether this is the way you use your hips, footwork, or hold your dance frame, a routine can refine styling for use in any other application of your dancing.
3. Improve Floorcraft
Floorcraft is the way you navigate the dance floor, and that's not restricted to social dancing either. Routines, specifically in the ballroom category, are loaded with practical and creative ways to maneuver around the corners, into the middle, or anywhere else on the dance floor.
4. Supercharge a New Dance
Let's say you wanted to add a new dance to your program. Let's say it's the Zouk. The problem is that you're a high level dancer and this new dance doesn't measure up to everything else you know.
Solution: Routine.
Having your teacher assemble a routine in the Zouk is the fastest way to get the essential ingredients of the dance into your repertoire.
5. Presentation
Nothing looks better on a social dancer than a poised and confident demeanor (while dancing, of course). If asking someone to dance is what differentiates the dancer from average people at a bar or social event, then carrying yourself with poise on the dance floor is how you differentiate from the average dancers.
A routine is the gateway to leveling up your poise and presentation skills... even if you aren't dancing the choreography, the positive residuals of your routine training will show up in your carriage and demeanor.
6. Technique
The same way that a movie can be filled with action, suspense, or romance - the same can be said for a routine. A routine is a container for technique. While themes like music, costumes, or a theatrical point of view might be more obvious, technique is the thread that holds it all together.
And just like a great movie, a routine makes your technique more memorable.
7. Timing
Oh.... that. Yes, timing can be an issue for any dancer. But timing can improve when you have a specific song, with specific movements, and specific reference points. In the same way that practicing a famous speech can help develop the timing nuances of public speaking, or singing a classic song can help develop the many facets of being a vocalist - a routine helps a dancer develop the nuances of timing.
Whether it's speaking, singing, or dancing - those nuances have a spillover effect.
8. Designer Audience
Let's think about this in corporate work terms. What if you had to take your next PowerPoint presentation to your workgroup, and show it in its entirety to your daughter's 4th grade class?
Would they be engaged?
Would they appreciate the subtleties of the quarter end earnings, and the margins you've projected for Q2? Probably not.
That's because the perfectly designed audience for that information is your workgroup.
Well, as a dance student, other dance students are like your workgroup. If you were (no one is forcing you here) to perform, doesn't it make sense to test run things in front of people that understand how challenging that can be? Those people that can appreciate the layers of detail that any other audience may be blind to?
That's your audience.
Final Thought
Hindsight can turn a monster into a coat rack, and a certain death roller coaster into one of your all time favorites.
The distance between where you are, and that all too important moment of hindsight clarity is one scary step.
Like the scary step when you decided to jump on that roller coaster, which you then rode 12 times in a row. The one scary step you took to stand up, turn on the light switch, and realize that the purple ogre with spikes was nothing more than two winter coats and a ball cap.
It's time to take that scary step, turn the lights on, and see a routine for what it can do for you. In hindsight, you'll understand exactly why your teachers suggested it.
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