CHAPTER 3

The Beat of the Music

Football isn't a contact sport; it's a

collision sport. Dancing is a contact sport.

Vince Lombardi

Find the beat. Cool dance patterns that are off the beat look bad; simple moves on the beat look cool. Don’t be that goofball on the floor who knows billions of patterns yet dances off the beat.

Okay, I admit that, in the past, occasionally, I was that goofball! Sometimes I couldn’t hear the beat, but sometimes, I swear it wasn’t my fault. In my defense, and in defense of all the beat-challenged guys who have ever stumbled through a dance, I’d like to explain how circumstances beyond my control conspired to dislodge me from the beat:

•There was the distraction of flirting with my partner.

•There was the distraction of not screwing-up the step pattern I was executing.

•There was the distraction of choreographing the next step pattern or two in my head.

•There was the confusion of songs with an elusive beat (including the challenge of up-tempo songs––just too darn fast to stay on the beat)

•Often there was the anxiety of being self-conscious—the weird distraction of watching others to see if they were watching me.

My “beatless” years were odd. For a long time I was not connected to the beat but thought I was. Looking back, I now realize that I often guessed at the beat and, like a broken clock being right twice a day, I was often correct. This gave me the illusion that I knew the beat—and it let my ego exceeded my ability, which is dangerous—but it took very little to dislodge my feet from the beat. Fortunately, through good teachers and persistence, I eventually embraced the beat and learned to take distractions in stride. Fear-not, ‘O Humble Goofball, all beat–challenged people can get better, and, at least, be great in their own minds.

The beat is the regular “thump thump” or “tap tap” that marks time, like the ticking of a clock. Also called the underlying beat, it’s the pulse of the music.

Tempo is the speed of the music, relatively stated as slow, medium or fast. But be aware that labels, like slow and medium, are subjective—what’s slow for me may be medium to you. Tempo is more precisely noted as beats per minute or BPM. Up-tempo refers to faster music.

Caution: I found tempo a bit of a demon. Many times I’d get good at doing a pattern in class and that ability would mysteriously vanish at a club. I now know that up-tempo music, which is harder to dance to, was one of the major culprits. Be aware that a teacher might play slower music to teach than you would typically find at a real dance.

The beat is important because most steps for the basic patterns of every dance occur on the beat; if you’re dancing slightly ahead or slightly behind the beat of the music, it’s considered off time and it will feel uncomfortable to your partner. Of all the faux pas you could commit on the floor—short of injuring your partner—being off time will do the most harm. I don’t care if you know every dance pattern in the solar system, if you’re not stepping on the beat your partner will deem you…well, unless you’re a hunky, biceptually-endowed GQ model, someone to keep at a distance. On the bright side, even if you don’t know any patterns, just stepping on the beat as you attempt to fake it will be appreciated and make her think, “Hey, this guy’s okay, he’s got some rhythm.”

You’ll have to learn the beat on your own as this is not something you will be taught in a beginner’s class in fox trot or waltz or tango at a studio. For me, classes were helpful only to the extent that after they ended I’d confess to the teachers that I wasn’t sure of the beat and had them help me tap it out for 30 seconds to the practice music. I also bugged a lot of innocent bystanders, on and off the dance floor, strangers included, seeking correction and guidance—although I don’t think they were really bugged because dancers like to show off.

For me, hearing the beat was a two-part process. First, finding the beat—just being able to stand on the sidelines and tap my foot to the beat. Second, holding the beat in my body through all the distractions of dancing so that when I took a step, I stepped on the beat. While finding the beat was hard at times, it was part two, staying on the beat, that was the real problem.

I had a regular partner, a very good dancer, who would often tell me I was off the beat. Impossible! You’re crazy! How could I be off the beat if I hear it? Eventually I noticed a pattern. I’d start a dance with good concentration and I’d be fine. But then my ego would kick in and I’d want to do more (read: showoff). My dance ability was limited so, choosing the next best thing, I desperately wanted to talk—to dazzle her with my irrepressible wit—and dance at the same time. Ironically, I usually lost the beat the moment I opened my mouth. The day I could finally talk and dance at the same time was a huge milestone for me.

I believe both issues, hearing the beat and staying on the beat, were part of a bigger problem: What little grasp of the beat I had was only auditory or intellectual and not visceral or intuitive—maybe I could hear the beat if I had no distractions, but I couldn’t feel the beat in my body. Intuitively feeling the beat, an automatic and thoughtless process, would have allowed me both to hear the beat more readily as well as feel it, even through the distractions.

The process was hard because I thought I knew the beat and I had no sense of what it was like to know it at this deeper, intuitive level. I was in a bit of a denial about being rhythmically challenged so it felt like I was going nowhere trying to correct a nonexistent problem. People told me that I’d eventually get it, and I would think: get what?

My breakthrough in hearing the beat (I use hearing the beat synonymously with feeling the beat unless the context suggests otherwise) came when I was able to hear that not all beats are equal, that some beats hit the ear differently than others. Some beats are accented, that is, they stand out and the degree and type of emphasis can vary. Typically, accented beats are just louder, with more oomph, as if instruments or vocals are hitting the note on that beat harder. But some beats sound different because they identify beginning points, like the start of a melody or a chorus. To my untrained ear I didn’t always know why a beat sounded different but, regardless of the reason, just hearing that not all beats sound the same, is what I found to be important.

The neat thing about these different beats is that, if you listen carefully, they create simple, regularly occurring sequences. Yes, it was subtle, but in the background these different beats created patterns. Once I began to hear these arrangements, the beats began to show some distinction. They came alive! 

I wish I could tell you that learning to hear the beat is simple: have someone help you tap your foot to the beat and then, on your own, just tap your foot to a variety of music. Done. Unfortunately, as dance educator Skippy Blair always warns, “practice makes perfect” is not true;  “practice makes permanent” is true. Only “perfect practice makes perfect” is true. So, unless you’re certain you’re on the beat, tapping your foot won’t help. Before you can effectively practice the beat, you must first acquire the tools to help you hear the beat and then, as you practice, get confirmation from others. When you do practice the beat, marching in place, doing a weight change on every beat of music, is the best way to practice.

There are two patterns of beats that can be heard in virtually all dance music that will help you learn the beat of the music. The first pattern, sets of 8, discussed in the next chapter, defines the beat, which will help you find it and help confirm that you’re on it. The second pattern, downbeat and upbeat, discussed in Chapter 5, will help you stay on the beat. The next two chapters reveal the secrets to mastering the beat.

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