| To: Jonathan Atkinson Your Dance Lesson: Leading & Following is very interesting. For us, in previous Lesson, Exercise 3 seems complicated. As far as we know, beat value of Jive basic is 3/4 beat for 1, 1/4 beat for a, 1 beat for 2 (1st triple step); 3/4 beat for 3, 1/4 beat for a, 1 beat for 4 (2nd triple step); 1 beat for 5 and 1 beat for 6 (rock step). But in the end of Exercise 3, Jive basic was added some more new a (may be 1/4 beat) to call "impulse". We are so confused about this. We are not sure, but may be "a" and "new a" are quite different. Thank for your and any responses HaOanhTranThanh |
| Hello Fred Bolder. - Resend our message, We don't know why, in previous one, lost some paragraphs Thank for your answer, re: Beat value of Jive basic
As you wrote : "if you dance a jive, you will never dance 3/4 1/4 1". So sorry, we did not agree with you. May be, it has got some difference between your Jive and Latin American Jive by new ISDT book, as we dance. We also checked out our book - Latin American Jive (Red Book - 2000) in page 7. The book tells:
· Beat value (of the Jive chasse) Step 1 3/4 beat Step 2 1/4 Step 3 1beat.
The same, you can look at The Dancemax Letter 2 (http://www.dancesport.uk.com/tid-bits/), June 11, 2000 . He wrote : "Swing and Jive: Swing chasse is commonly counted as 1 & 2 (triple step). Now we know that "&" belongs to 1. Since "&" has a beat value of 1/2, the beat value of Swing chasse is 1/2 1/2 1. Jive on the other hand is danced 1 a 2, thus beat value of Jive chasse becomes 3/4 1/4 1. Swing therefore feels more swingy and Jive more jivy (bouncy)" .
That why , we dance 3/4 1/4 1, for Jive chasse.
For Samba basic, the beat values is also 3/4 1/4 1, but it's count is 1 a 2. We don't know any chasse for Samba. Kind regards,
HaOanhTranThanh |
| Hello HaOanhTranThanh, The beat values for the Jive basic are 2/3 1/3 1. The beat values 3/4 1/4 1 are used for Samba. Download number 16 of my free dance magazine for more information about this. http://www.dansblad.nl/2000_e.htm Also check out my dance information pictures and look at the Jive music titels. All songs on this list are written in triple time, so you have to dance 2/3 1/3 1. http://www.xs4all.nl/~fghb/0405e.htm You can also dance a Jive to "straight" music, but then you have to dance 1/2 1/2 1. In other words, if you dance a jive, you will never dance 3/4 1/4 1, no mather what is written in all ballroom dance books  Kind regards, Fred
fghb@xs4all.nl
http://www.xs4all.nl/~fghb/ballroom.htm
http://www.dansblad.nl |
| Hello Fred Bolder Thank for your answer, re: Beat value of Jive basic You wrote . So sorry, we did not agree with you. May be, it has got some difference between your Jive and Latin American Jive by new ISDT book, as we dance. We also checked out our book - Latin American Jive (Red Book - 2000) in page 7. The book tells:
· Beat value (of the Jive chasse) Step 1 3/4 beat Step 2 1/4 Step 3 1beat.
The same, you can look at The Dancemax Letter 2 (http://www.dancesport.uk.com/tid-bits/), June 11, 2000 . He wrote :
That why , we dance 3/4 1/4 1, for Jive chasse.
For Samba basic, the beat values is also 3/4 1/4 1, but it's count is 1 a 2. We don't know any chasse for Samba. Kind regards,
HaOanhTranThanh |
| I have to agree with Fred on this one. Yes, the books all say 3a4 (3/4, 1/4, 1) but I don't think it's actually danced like that. We all try to dance the way the music tells us, following its rhythm and dancing to that, correct? Well, I have a suggestion on how to find out if you're dancing 3/4, 1/4, 1 like the book says or 2/3, 1/3, 1 which is closer to the rhythm swing music has. It's not *exactly* 2/3, 1/3, 1, but it's a lot closer to that than 3/4, 1/4, 1. Dance, then listen: Put on some swing/jive music and dance to it. Pay attention to your chasses and whether or not you're stepping at the same time the music is playing the rhythm. I'd assume you're dancing with the music and thus stepping when some rhythm beat is being played. OK, so you're following the musical rhythm. Now stop and just listen to the music. Count the rhythm being played. You should find that it isn't 3/4, 1/4, 1 like samba, but something closer to 2/3, 1/3, 1. You were just dancing with the music, so you were dancing 2/3, 1/3, 1 and not 3/4, 1/4, 1. So swing is really 2/3, 1/3, 1 despite what the books say. Right? Alternatively you can listen first and then dance and you should find the same thing in reverse order. Or try consciously dancing 3/4, 1/4, 1 to swing music. Don't just follow the sound of the music and dance the way it tells you, really think about making your steps on 3/4, 1/4, 1. This will probably be difficult to do because that's not how the music sounds. It will feel wrong and probably look bad. In the case of swing/jive music, I think the timing listed is a simplification. The books are writting for dancers and not musicians. The music is really closer to 2/3, 1/3, 1, but the books aren't always perfect. They don't tell you *everything* there is to know; if they did my books wouldn't be filled with handwritten notes from years of lessons. I think they try to keep things simple, but still cover things semi-accurately. The swing rhythm of 2/3, 1/3, 1 isn't really used elsewhere, so if they want to keep things simple and use familir timings, they have a choice -- call it 1/2, 1/2, 1 or 3/4, 1/4, 1. The 1/2, 1/2, 1 rhythm is clearly not swing-like; that's what we call straight eighths in music and it does not feel like swing at all. So they picked 3/4, 1/4, 1. Knowing that the dancers will try to match the music, this is a better timing to give. Dancers should almost instinctively modify the 3/4, 1/4, 1 rhythm to 2/3, 1/3, 1 so that they're dancing with the music. So 3/4, 1/4, 1 is sort of a technical simplification -- it's not exactly right (and not at all correct to a musician), but it's close enough that a dancer will use it to get the right rhythm. As noted above, try that little experiment and see what happens. You should be able to convince yourself that you dance swing as 2/3, 1/3, 1 and not 3/4, 1/4, 1 which would be too much like samba. I hope this helps. --
James Marshall
marshall@astro.umd.edu
http://www.astro.umd.edu/~marshall |
| James, thank you for your great reply. I can't explain it better. HaOanhTranThanh, you can also try the following to discover the jive rhythm. Listen to a slow jive song with a tempo of about 30 bars per minute.
Jive music is in 4/4 time which means that there are 4 beats in a measure and a quarter note gets the beat. Count 1,2,3,4 every measure.
1, 2, 3, 4, Divide by 3 and count 1,2,3 every beat.
1,2,3,1,2,3,1,2,3,1,2,3 (this is fast!) Now we have 4 groups of 3. In drum computers they call this 12 based. All counts have a beat value of 1/3. Now don't count the "2" counts and double the "1" counts.
1, 3,1 3,1 3,1 3 This is the hi-hat pattern that is often played in jive songs. It has the beat values:
2/3 1/3 2/3 1/3 2/3 1/3 2/3 1/3 The last step of a jive chasse is a combination of 2/3 and 1/3 together. You do the same with a rock step.
Now you can see that you can't make a pattern 3/4 1/4 1 based on the hi-hat pattern. After all, we are dancing to the music. However 2/3 1/3 1 is a good combination. If you still think that you are dancing 3/4 1/4 1 to jive music then try dancing a jive to a fast samba (about 60 bars per minute). You will soon find out that it doesn't feel like a jive at all, but now you are dancing 3/4 1/4 1. 3/4 is longer than you think Kind regards, Fred
fghb@xs4all.nl
http://www.xs4all.nl/~fghb/ballroom.htm
http://www.dansblad.nl |
| Hello Fred Bolder. - Resend our message, We don't know why, in previous one, lost some paragraphs Thank for your answer, re: Beat value of Jive basic
As you wrote : "if you dance a jive, you will never dance 3/4 1/4 1". So sorry, we did not agree with you. May be, it has got some difference between your Jive and Latin American Jive by new ISDT book, as we dance. We also checked out our book - Latin American Jive (Red Book - 2000) in page 7. The book tells:
· Beat value (of the Jive chasse) Step 1 3/4 beat Step 2 1/4 Step 3 1beat.
The same, you can look at The Dancemax Letter 2 (http://www.dancesport.uk.com/tid-bits/), June 11, 2000 . He wrote : "Swing and Jive: Swing chasse is commonly counted as 1 & 2 (triple step). Now we know that "&" belongs to 1. Since "&" has a beat value of 1/2, the beat value of Swing chasse is 1/2 1/2 1. Jive on the other hand is danced 1 a 2, thus beat value of Jive chasse becomes 3/4 1/4 1. Swing therefore feels more swingy and Jive more jivy (bouncy)" .
That why , we dance 3/4 1/4 1, for Jive chasse.
For Samba basic, the beat values is also 3/4 1/4 1, but it's count is 1 a 2. We don't know any chasse for Samba. Kind regards,
HaOanhTranThanh |
| Thank for all answers about Jive chasse (3/4 1/4 1 or 2/3 1/3 1 or whatever). I am a guitarist. As musician, I can play 32 notes per bar, as dancers, I can not dance more 8 steps per bar. Musician can play all music, but dancer can not dance with all music, only dancing music. My question of Dance Lesson: Leading & Following is very simple. Beat value of steps are covered all beat and bar of music, no more place for Leading & Following action. Description of step and Leading & Following action have to be separated in the charts. Kind regards,
HaOanhTranThanh |
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