Square Pegs and Round Poles

[shanmonster]

I have successfully kicked my flu in the ass. Yesterday was the proof. I taught a dance class, then had plenty of oomph left afterwards to go and do a pole dancing class. And I kicked that pole's ass, too!

I "invented" a new spin. I hooked a knee around the pole, shoved off, and halfway around the turn, did a body twist and a back arch so I was spinning in reverse, then twisted again so my legs came up and I was spinning forward again. I know it's not a new move, but it was not a move ever shown to me before, and one of the women there (an instructor in training), asked me to do it again so she could figure it out, too. W00t! I also found a way to climb the pole upside down from the floor so my feet and legs are straight up, and then do a 1/4 turn. Now, if I can just get my arm strength and stability going, I'll be able to do all sorts of inversions.

What I need is my own pole so I can experiment and practice.

And as far as my belly dance class went, I think I may have fluked into a better understanding of "square" versus "round" movements.

This can most easily be illustrated with horizontal hip movements. To begin with, I typically teach a square movement. So, I'll get a student to do hip slides sideways, and front and back. Then I'll break it down into a square. Side, front, side, back, side, front, side, back, etc. Once the student is comfortable with these movements, I get them to round out the corners, turning the square into a circle.

I also stress that squares aren't better than circles, and vice versa, but serve different purposes. Square movements work very well for percussive beats and accents, whereas circles work well in places where you want a smooth, sinuous movement.

The same principle works for many movements in belly dance. Undulations (or camels, in non-ATS parlance) can also be broken down as a square movement. I learned the square breakdown from Freyja of California. Before this, I'd only ever done round undulations, even broken down.

The square undulation goes as follows:

1. Chest lift.
2. Stomach releases out.
3. Chest drop.
4. Stomach pulls in.

Done in a square fashion, this is a very sharp, percussive combination. Smoothed out, it becomes a serpentine top to bottom undulation.

I've always taught undulations in a different way, getting the students to learn to isolate different parts of their abs in order to get a flowing undulation. I kept the chest movement to a minimum (as in Egyptian-style raqs). Historically, most of my students take several classes to nail the basic parts of an undulation down. Even after they have figured it out, many end the undulation with duck butt. This is something that takes a while again to correct.

I think I forestalled the learning curve by breaking the undulation down as a square movement with my students last night. I had them working on the square undulation for about ten minutes. When they finished, I demonstrated the smoothed-out version. Virtual light bulbs appeared over their heads, and without any coaching, they immediately tried it out for themselves, and did passable jobs of it, with no duckbutting whatsoever. Bear in mind none of the students in my class have had any sort of movement training before, and are complete novices.

The same square versus round movement can be used to teach far more movements, of course. Any circular or figure 8 movement, whether with hip, arm, chest, abdomen, or head, can be broken down this way. And I think that if it's practiced in both squares and circles, that the dancer will be much more versatile for it.

Maybe it's not much of a revelation, but it opened a lot of horizons for me last night....

Comments

Nice technique

[graydancer.livejournal.com]

Teaching isolations is both the most fun and frustrating thing...I love that "What, I have muscles there?" look people get. If I were still teaching, I'd steal your technique, but as it is, I just tried it here at my desk and thought "Hmmmmm....looks like with some practice I can add undulations to my club repertoire!"

And Go You! on the pole dancing technique. Since I don't exactly expect that you're planning the usual career with it, I'll be interested to see you work it into some actual choreography...

I'm thinking of coming up there, actually, for the Fringe Festival. Any suggestions you had for good dance experiences would be greatly appreciated...

Re: Nice technique

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

I still have no idea what's going to happen with all this pole dancing. Maybe it'll just be a fun exercise, or maybe I will be able to incorporate it into performance, although I don't know where. It's not like anyplace other that strip clubs tend to be equipped with them, which I think is a bloody shame.

I also think it's a bloody shame that this isn't taught to kids. There's nothing inherently sexual about climbing or spinning on poles.

I'm afraid I know nothing about the Fringe Festival. When/where is it?

Re: Nice technique

[silverfae.livejournal.com]

I found tons of places online to buy/install your own pole.
Some seem to be better quality than others, and some are even "portable" so you can hide the apparatus as 'plant hooks' for deception.
Fun!!!

Re: Nice technique

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

The school where I learn it sells them. I'll likely get one some time this year.

Question...

[real-bethy.livejournal.com]

...what did you find helpful while treating your flu symptoms? I generally feel a lot of better, but I still have moments of dizziness and nausea. Did the magick yogurt cure you?

Re: Question...

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

The yoghourt helped with the roilings in my stomach. Regular yoghourt will help, too, as long as it has the magical ingredient acidopholus. As for the dizziness, I think that will just take more rest. I spent a LOT of time sleeping.

[water-of-fire.livejournal.com]

I sat here doing "square" abdominal isolations as you described them and then realized I was doing the upper back (release), upper abs (release), lower abs (release), upper back... Suhaila Salimpour up-to-down undulation. That's neat. :)

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

See? It works, but with a smaller explanation!

[sabdapranam.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I've been struggling with undulations for the last two months. I can roll the chest, but attempting to add a forward to back hip slide always wrecked my posture. This makes so much more sense.

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

Glad it helped!

[sarcasm-hime.livejournal.com]

That's funny; back when I was a baby Beginner at Arabesque I was taught undulations by putting my hands on my upper abs/ribs and lower abs, and then: push out upper, push out lower, pull in upper, pull in lower. Much later we also learned staccato undulations down and up, in Intermediate 2 I believe. So when Freyja was teaching us that I was like 'yeah, so what?'

I guess it just depends on how you learned and from whom. *shrug* I'm sure there are a bunch of things that are old hat for you that I've never even thought of. XD

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

I learned undulations the same way, with the hands and the pushing. It was pretty slow going for most of us. I find that Freyja's square undulation seems to be a more efficient way of breaking down the isolation, and that the subtleties emerge after the fact.

Floorwork is old hat for me! It was taught right from the first couple weeks of classes. I'll betcha there aren't many teachers who do that anymore. I know I don't teach floorwork from day one. I'm too afraid of people getting injured. My teacher just didn't consider that, I guess. But she was of the no pain, no gain school of dance. Ouchies.