Formation

I think I’ve mentioned this but we are doing a formation at the next Showcase in a few weeks. Ours includes a hustle section, a rumba section and a cha-cha section. And there are multiple partner switches during the thing so I end up dancing with three different partners. It also moves around the floor a bit with the goal of all of us doing the moves in sync.

It is interesting that so many of us can be talked into doing something like this. The good thing is that the studio doesn’t charge you anything for the practice sessions. And maybe a group formation is less stressful than doing a true solo routine. Or it is just that many who take dance lessons have some secret desire to perform. It could also be that the instructors can be very persuasive and many students just have trouble saying no.

There is just one 45 minute practice session per week so not a lot of time to get things down. At the beginning, we had no-shows and people who said they wanted to do but then backed out after a session or two. Fortunately, we’ve had a full house for the last two.

They’ve also just recently introduced the actual formation. For the first set of lessons, we were just learning the steps without really focusing on where we were supposed to line up and how we were going to move around the floor and change partners. Now, we have assigned partners for each section and we know how the thing is supposed to look so it is really coming alive.

I imagine this has to be tough to choreograph because it is open to all levels so you can’t toss in really complex material. But, for some of the beginners, this is still new material so they have the challenge of learning that along with remembering where they are supposed to go for each section. If it goes well, each section is in sync and the transitions to new partners are smooth and sharp. It will create almost continuous motion but with each move having a purpose.

Having done a few of these in the past, the likelihood that it goes off without a hitch is near zero. Staying in sync requires perfect timing and timing is something many of us can struggle with. You get on the floor and the nerves and adrenaline are going and it is easy to speed up. There is also the chance of simply forgetting a part of the choreography and just getting off. The key is to remember it is just for fun and not stress too much but that is also hard to do.

But it is a fun way to interact with other students and there is something about the shared experience. So it will be fun to see how it turns out.