CHAPTER 6

Dance Rhythms and Rhythm Patterns

We're fools whether we dance or not, so we might as well dance.

Japanese Proverb

Forget what you know about the word rhythm. Forget the dictionary definitions too. Forget, especially, what you think you know about rhythm in relation to music; that’s a different book, a book on music. Enter the world of dance rhythms and rhythm patterns.

For me, grasping the concepts of dance rhythms and rhythm patterns was profound. Finally, I was in control. The dance floor, once a morass that held me at bay, now seduced me. But I couldn’t have discovered the splendor of rhythms without time spent stumbling through some steps. It’s a process. Stumble on.

While there’s a long list of items that must come together to perform a new move, for the beginner, the two most important are rhythm pattern and direction. I don’t think I’m sticking my neck out if I say that when learning step patterns teachers focus on direction, which is where your feet go. You put your left foot here…you put your right foot there…and so on.

Yeah, yeah, all those twists, tucks and turns are smart looking, but I believe the rhythm pattern, which tells your feet when to go, when to make weight changes, is what beginners should focus on first. After an eternity of missteps, stumbles and stomping on toes, I came to realize that when first learning a dance and, especially, for gaining an understanding of dance in general, the rhythm pattern (when to step) is more important than the direction (where to step) because it’s what connects you to the music. But the direction is important too so all I’m really saying is this: nail down the rhythm pattern to a new step first before you wear yourself out moving around the floor.

Before you can grasp rhythm patterns, you need to be briefed on dance rhythms. (Yeah, it’s a little confusing because dance rhythm sounds very close to rhythm pattern.) Dance rhythms are the foundation of rhythm patterns and are the most important concept in this book. In the world of dance, dance rhythms are right up there with gravity and the world is round.

When dancing, some beats of music receive a weight change and some don’t. When talking about weight changes, wouldn’t it be neat if there were a concise language to identify, discuss and remember different patterns? For example, wouldn’t it be nice if there were simple words to describe the difference between these three, 8-beat patterns:

Note: a TOUCH represents a beat of music with no weight change.

Pattern 1    STEP        STEP          STEP         STEP        STEP         STEP        STEP       STEP

Pattern 2    STEP      TOUCH        STEP      TOUCH      STEP       TOUCH      STEP     TOUCH

Pattern 3    STEP        STEP          STEP       TOUCH      STEP         STEP        STEP     TOUCH

Thanks to dance educator Skippy Blair, there is. Although most step patterns are six or eight beats long, Skippy discovered that it’s easiest to learn a new dance step if you break it into two-beat increments called dance rhythms. You learned in Chapter 5 that dance beats come in pairs, a downbeat followed by an upbeat, so the notion of two-beat increments should already make some sense. Dance rhythms give structure to dance; just as words are the building blocks of sentences, two-beat dance rhythms are the building blocks of longer rhythm patterns. Imagine how difficult it would be to read a sentence ifyoudidnotseperatethewords. Worse, imagine how difficult it would be ify ousepe ratedt hewo rdsint hewro ngpla ces.

A dance rhythm is the number of weight changes in two beats of music (except waltz, see Chapter 18). To identify the basic dance rhythms, simply ask, how many steps are taken in two beats of music? If one step is taken it’s called single rhythm. If two steps are taken it’s double rhythm. And, no surprise, three weight changes in two beats of music is triple rhythm. I love single, double and triple rhythm because they’re so darn logical. Look at the three patterns above broken into two-beat dance rhythms:

Pattern 1                        STEP   STEP          STEP  STEP          STEP  STEP           STEP   STEP

Rhythm pattern                   double               double                  double                 double

Pattern 2                  STEP   TOUCH      STEP  TOUCH        STEP  TOUCH       STEP   TOUCH

Rhythm pattern                    single                  single                     single                    single

Pattern 3                   STEP    STEP         STEP   TOUCH       STEP    STEP          STEP   TOUCH

Rhythm pattern              double                  single                   double                  single

Identifying dance rhythms makes learning and remembering any new step pattern easy. Not only can the sequence of weight changes be easily communicated and remembered, such as, double—double—double—double for Pattern 1, or double—single—double—single for Pattern 2; but if a teacher in class said the rhythm pattern to a new move is double—single—single, or double—triple—triple, you’d have a head start in learning the pattern.

For me, dance rhythm was the key that unlocked the door to dance. I believe the secret to understanding dance, which I learned from Skippy, is this: almost every basic step pattern of a dance is some combination of single, double and triple rhythm. That’s right, almost any new step you learn in a beginners class, if broken into 2-beat increments, will be a combination of these three simple dance rhythms.

As a beginner, and for basic survival on the dance floor, you’ll mostly use just single and double rhythm. In fact, the foundation of improvising dance, including slow dancing, is simply the ability to mix single and double rhythm. Triple rhythm, which involves a step between two beats of music, is more advanced, but it’s good to know because it’s common in the swing dances. We’ll dig a little into each dance rhythm in a moment but, first, a word on how teachers communicate to students using a verbal call.

When you learn a step pattern in class, teachers will describe the pattern by using words or numbers, spoken over the music, as you dance. Most often, these verbal calls are establishing the timing for an action, like when to step. Be prepared: Teachers have numerous ways—some logical and some not—to call a dance. Some teachers follow this school of dance, some follow that school of dance and some follow their own school of dance. And be prepared for teachers to use a combination of methods to describe the same pattern. Skippy Blair says, “A variety of verbal calls can work for calling the same pattern. We can call by counting, by direction, by accent or whatever the teacher wants to emphasize at that moment.” Caution: I found some calls downright confusing. In particular, numbers perplexed me for a long time. Chapter 9, Counting Step Patterns, will set the record straight on using numbers as a verbal call.

Single rhythm is the first basic dance rhythm, which is one weight change in two beats of music. You take a step on the first beat (the downbeat), but you do not step on the second beat (the upbeat). For now, to label the upbeat we’ll use the word TOUCH, which is an action without a weight change. So, for the moment, we’ll verbally call single rhythm STEP TOUCH, but there will be other ways to call it that depend upon the specific actions and the teacher.

For example, in addition to STEP, other common words you might hear to describe a weight change include WALK, CHECK, BREAK, LEFT, RIGHT, FORWARD, BACK and SIDE. The list could be endless; it’s whatever a teacher wants to use. In addition to TOUCH, other examples of actions without a weight change include POINT, KICK, SWEEP, DRAG, TAP, HOLD and FREEZE. To stay connected to the beat, when there’s no weight change on a beat of music you still have to put in an action word, even if it doesn’t seem like an action, such as HOLD or FREEZE. The word SLOW, a common call for single rhythm, is an example of a call that does not account for the second beat of music.

Let’s look at the eight-beat rhythm pattern that repeats single rhythm, single—single—single—single. I’m including the musical count too because you need to get used to seeing numbers. It looks like this:

Musical Count               1         2           3         4             5        6               7          8

Verbal Call                STEP   TOUCH     STEP  TOUCH     STEP  TOUCH       STEP   TOUCH

Rhythm pattern                 single                single                 single                    single

People who can’t dance often appear to be doing single rhythm, but if they’re not connected to the music (i.e., if they’re not stepping on the beat), they just end up slowly rocking back-and-forth, off-time. Nonetheless, people attempt single rhythm when they can’t dance because it involves the least amount of steps yet still has some semblance of being a dance. Dancing single rhythm is something every beginner should be comfortable doing. If this rhythm pattern is new to you, the box on page XX, Dancing Single Rhythm, will get you started. There’s more on using single rhythm to survive on the dance floor in Chapter 21, Survival Dancing.

Double rhythm is two weight changes in two beats of music. You take a step on the first beat and another step on the second beat. One way to verbally call double rhythm is, STEP STEP, although there are many ways to call double rhythm depending upon the teacher. Let’s look at the eight-beat rhythm pattern that repeats double rhythm, double—double—double—double:

Musical Count              1      2             3       4             5      6            7        8

Verbal Call              STEP  STEP        STEP  STEP        STEP  STEP      STEP   STEP

Rhythm pattern             double              double             double            double

Dancing double rhythm is another rhythm pattern you should be comfortable doing. This rhythm pattern is sometimes used when improvising steps to unfamiliar music, particularly slower tempos, because it’s the familiar rhythm pattern used in walking. It’s sometimes referred to as a walking rhythm or a marching rhythm, although it won’t necessarily look like a walk when danced. There is one popular dance that uses this sequence, the meringue, one of the Latin dances, but most dancing departs from the metronome-like pattern created by the underlying beat. “Fancy footwork” is part of the skill and thrill of dancing.

Triple rhythm is three weight changes in two beats of music. So far, all steps have been made on a beat of music; triple rhythm, in a simple but exciting way, departs from this protocol. In addition to a step on each of two beats, a downbeat and an upbeat, there’s a step between those two beats of music on what’s known as the & or, as it’s more conveniently labeled, the &-count. The freedom to step between beats, on that little &-count, creates many new possibilities known as syncopations. When danced, some common verbal calls for triple rhythm include: STEP-THREE-TIMES and TRI-PLE-STEP. There’s more on the &-count, a concept I struggled with, in Chapter 9.

In addition to defining the look of swing, there are several dances that are composed entirely of triple rhythm: samba, nightclub two-step and polka. Let’s look at the eight-beat rhythm pattern that repeats triple rhythm, triple—triple—triple—triple:

Mucical Count             1      &       2           3              4           5              6           7               8

Verbal Call               STEP-THREE-TIMES     STEP-THREE-TIMES    STEP-THREE-TIMES     STEP-THREE-TIMES

Rhythm pattern                  triple                       triple                      triple                    triples

Triple rhythm is difficult compared to single and double rhythm. Here are three reasons why triple rhythms eluded me for a long time: 1) I had a hard time grasping the concept of stepping between two beats of music because I had trouble finding the beat. 2) I didn’t realize that dancing a triple (three steps), takes the same amount of time (two beats of music) as dancing a double (two steps), so it requires your feet to move faster. Part of the problem was, in class, I didn’t grasp the pace that my teachers mouthed the verbal calls; I didn’t realize that when I heard the call of a triple rhythm, STEP-THREE-TIMES, that the words were coming out faster than the call of the double rhythm, STEP STEP. 3) Finally, triples require more technique than singles and doubles. Unlike singles and doubles, the body movement to execute a triple is not a natural walking step. See the box in Chapter 8, “Technique for the Triple Rhythm.”

Advanced Info Alert  There’s a fourth basic dance rhythm, blank rhythm, which is no weight changes in two beats of music. It sounds odd—I mean, how can you dance if you don’t move? Even though the feet aren’t changing weight, which means at least one foot is stationary, the other foot and body parts can still be moving to the music. This is not something you do for an entire song, just a few beats of music. Depending upon the specific actions, you’ll hear different ways to verbally call blank rhythm. For example, DRAG TAP is sometimes used in tango (both DRAG and TAP are actions that do not use a weight change). Probably the only time a beginner will see a blank rhythm is the American tango (Chapter 18). In addition to the basic rhythms (single, double, triple, blank), Skippy has discovered over 25 additional dance rhythms that are the building blocks for all the patterns of every social dance, but most are more advanced syncopations that involve stepping between beats of music.

Once you grasp the logic behind single, double and triple rhythm, I bet all this rock-step-triple-step-kick-ball-change jargon will begin to make more sense. For most people, and especially for the struggling beginner, focusing on rhythms is a powerful tool. When first learning a new step pattern, if the teacher doesn’t identify the rhythm pattern, try these three steps:

1) Listen for the sets of 8 in the music and connect to the beat

2) Observe where the weight changes are and identify the individual 2-beat dance rhythms

3) String the dance rhythms together to identify the rhythm pattern

Then take that rhythm pattern and practice like heck—at home, alone. Practicing just the rhythm pattern is much easier than trying to do the entire step pattern (rhythm pattern and direction) all at once. Behold the beauty of practicing just the rhythm pattern: there aren’t many body parts to move so it’s relatively effortless; you can do it by yourself so there’s no partner to step on and annoy; and you can do it away from the dance floor, anywhere you’ve got music. Once you know the rhythm pattern to a new step and are free from that demand, laying on the other elements, like the direction, the lead and follow and the styling, will be easier.

Getting familiar with different rhythms patterns, on my own, is what allowed me to overcome my clumsiness and anxiety on the floor. I spent endless hours burning rhythm patterns into my brain and muscles, whether I was sitting a dance out, at the gym, in my car, on line at the post office, waiting for a web page to load or drifting off to sleep at night. Chapter 8, “Marking Rhythm Patterns”, is devoted to practicing rhythm patterns.

While developing muscle memory for different rhythm patterns takes time, there are only a few the beginner needs to know. We’ll look some of the most common rhythm patterns in the next chapter, “Common Rhythm Patterns”.

Don your dancing shoes…and away we go.

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