Story Time – What I Would Say To The Younger Dancer in Me

I wish someone would have told me that learning choreography in a class setting was completely different from copying my best friend’s moves at the club or dancing at a wedding. As a confident freestyle dancer, who always wanted to break into the world of choreography, I struggled in my first few classes for almost 2 years with learning set pieces of choreography. However, struggling was never going to stop me from taking a dance class and if I focused really hard I could figure out this new way of learning dance.  

Why did I struggle though? In reflection, now as an instructor for 2 decades, I know exactly what made me feel lost and/or sometimes out of place when I should have felt right at home. I struggled for a few reasons. First and foremost, I didn’t know how to count music or that all music was even written in an organized way. I only knew how music made me feel and I danced through that measure. All trained dancers who grew up in a dance studio know this. 

I also didn’t know how to track movement throughout my body without looking like I was trying to analyze a calculus problem as an instructor is demonstrating choreography. As someone who freely moves to music, I would always move to a specific song or how music made me feel. With absolute confidence, I knew it accurately represented what the song or music was telling me to do with my body. I never tried to remember a series of movements unless it was a popular move. There are many other reasons why I struggled, but the main reason I was having a hard time was because I was unaware of all the tools a dancer that trained for most of their childhood has.

I could have stopped taking classes and be content with where I was as a dancer but my goal was to learn choreography in a dance class and be good at it. I am writing this blog to share something with you that I wish someone shared with me in my first experience with choreography. 

If you are looking to take your 1st dance class, there are some things you don’t know yet. What if I told you there was a language that helps you remember everything without trying to use your brain. What if I told you that how music makes you feel correlates to understanding the language of movement. What if I told you that the more you let go of memorizing moves the faster you learn choreography and the faster you learn how to dance. 

The only thing is that it takes practice to get better at learning anything new. And if your plan is to learn how to dance in a choreography setting then you have to find instructors that will guide you through this secret language that I found out is necessary for you to feel confident about learning dance. Most dancers that give on dance when they first start, give up for this very reason. We do our best to combine this language seamlessly into how we teach dance but if you somewhat knew these skills beforehand you would fall in love with dance over and over again. 

This is why we created Choreography Breakdown, a session that allows you to learn about a language that will fast track learning how to dance. We recognized why new dancers were struggling and developed a 4 week session to teach them exactly how to use the skill that no one really talks about in a normal dance class. Why, because it’s assumed that you already know this. 

We really want you to succeed and Choreography Breakdown is the one thing that I wish I had when I first walked into dance class to learn a routine to ‘Blame it on the Alcohol.’ So if you are reading this and you want to learn choreography without struggling with memorizing moves or you want to rid yourself of some of the unknowns about taking your first dance class consider our 4 week session as a gift from a younger dancer that wants to see you be the best dancer you can be.   

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