Below is a short review and recap of Ani’s house dance class (beginner/intermediate) that takes place in London every Tuesday night at 6:00pm over at Pineapple Studio. Though I enjoy taking this class every Tuesday, this instance of the class was special because my friend Will (from Seattle, who was visiting London) joined me and I felt so much joy to dance with a friend who I trained with back home.

Class Recap

• Warm up with foundational move (Jack) and other foundations
• Practice several combos that are part of larger choreography
• Freestyle Exercise (Rhythm based) with partner
• Choreography – Difficulty for me was 6.8 / 10

Freestyle Exercise

In terms of difficulty, I found this exercise 10/10. I struggled and fumbled hard, since its really one of the first times I was consciously trying to dance to a different, prescribed rhythm. Normally, whenever I freestyle, I just kind of go rogue and do whatever I feel like. Of course, sometimes that’s totally normal, especially in a social dance scene (e.g. clubbing). However, consciously dancing to a particular rhythm requires a totally different set of skills. This deliberate practice of dancing to a specific rhythm (see below) tripped me up and for the first few rounds and all I was sustain throughout the exercise was more or less stepping in place and even that in itself overwhelmed me.

The count itself was as follows:

1 2 – +4 5+ 6+ 7 8

Separately, as a result of the frustration I felt during the class, the next morning when I woke up, I ended downloading, installing, and learning Music Score to reproduce the rhythm (this in itself was good practice) and slapped my hands together (more on this in a different blog post).

Choreography

This section serves several purposes.

First, allows me to practice my mental recall. I’m about 4 months into taking choreography classes and my retention is slowly improving. When I took my first choreo class back in April, I fumbled and could barely retain anymore than 2 eight counts and I remembering feeling so frustrating during that first class and a level of resignation.

Second, when I want to refer back to this choreo and practice it, I can. Despite the written choreo below not being precise, I believe that I will be able to practice so as long as its accompanied with the video (below).

So be forewarned, the choreography is not completely accurate and fails to include the counts. That being said, here it is:

Shuffle variation (left side)
Pow wow to the front
Pow wow to the back
Shuffle variation (again) left side
Pow wow to the front – slight variation here and instead of kicking out right leg stick it to the ground and reduce the count
Tap the right foot
Drag – left leg around and hold for 2 counts
Step left foot out
Get into farmer position with right leg bent
Tilt the right hip out and forward – at the same time, shift body weight leftwards back
Return and neutral position
Step right leg back
Step left foot back and toe tap

Transition into squat position
Spin left
Land in pas de bourree position
Pas de bourree to the right but kick out with the left foot
Land and transition into loose leg
Loose leg with jump kick variation (right side)
Loose leg with variation (see new moves section below)
Loose leg with variation to the right
Continue pivoting on right foot for rest of the count
Jack for four bars (i.e. 2 eight counts)
Heel Toe right side
Heel Toe right side
Heel Toe left side (with head tilt)
Heel Toe left side

Areas I want to practice

• (Continue to) Increase Hip Extension mobility – I felt tight in this line, especially when kicking the leg behind me
• Spin move itself – When Ani was spinning, I noticed how her left leg (right leg was the base we were spinning on) was bent at a clean 90 degree angle and left knee cap was tucked behind her right knee cap
• Spin transitition into the pas de bourree position
• Heel Toe with head tilt – could not land this during class and could line up the counts
• Loose leg variation with pivoting on base leg – this was a variation I’ve never seen before and I really enjoyed the smoothness and aesthetic of it