I notice that you cannot name any specific competitions.

Gee, I guess that "serious" dancing students such as yourself just know these things.

As I pointed out previously, you've already lost that round. You failed to provide the examples so stop whining.


Well, we cannot prevail in our original line of argument so we're going to distract and obfuscate. So now "interpersonal skills" are as important or more so than dancing skills, huh?

The only interpersonal "skill" needed to maintain a successful partnership is the ability to be completely honest with your partner.

So now you've abandoned your argument that pro/am competition can improve an amateurs dancing skills. You lose again.

I tell you what I'll do. I'll cut your own words about "thinking skills" and print them for these coaches to read.

I'll give you credit for consistency: you always refuse to deal in specifics.

Again, you ignore the question about your partnership status. It's obvious to me that you do so because you fear that sharing the truth about your situation will undermine the position of respect which you seem to think that you hold on this site.

And by the way, memorizing patterns and movements is not intellectual. Were it so then students could teach themselves to dance through tha application of rational principles.



jj

"I notice that you cannot name any specific competitions.:"

Of course I can - but the point is for you to discover the information for yourself.

"So now "interpersonal skills" are as important or more so than dancing skills, huh?"

You treat this as if it were a new argument, but you ignore that I've pointed that out at least once before during this discussion.

"So now you've abandoned your argument that pro/am competition can improve an amateurs dancing skills. You lose again."

The only thing that has been abandoned is your homework assignment to do some trivial research, which if completed would have educated you about the reality of what pro/am can accomplish in a case well suited to it.

"The only interpersonal "skill" needed to maintain a successful partnership is being completely honest with your partner."

Often it's best to keep your frustration to yourself, or at least dump it on someone other than your partner. Managing frustration is actually one of the most important skills to long term progress.

"And by the way, memorizing patterns and movements is not intellectual. Were it so then students could teach themselves to dance through tha application of rational principles."

Patterns and movements can indeed be learned by such means once the foundation experience to approach them is present, but patterns and movements are only a minor aspect of "dancing". As I've been saying all along, there is specific factual knowledge that is important, and then there is also a lot of "feeling" knowledge that is equally important.

One doesn't need to work very hard to do the research. The owner of this very website was a pro-am.

I think people are probably tiring of this conversation. Just give some examples or let's close the topic.

J

My example is a young lady who twice distinguished herself at the premier pro/am competition, then returned to the amateur world where she and her partner have placed well in one of the few important amateur competitions to be held so far this year, and have a good shot at the nationals final.

Those who are actually curious about what is going on in dance competition will be able to identify her quite quickly.

It would be also interesting to discover the backgrounds of other potential amateur finalists - which are former youth competitiors, which started dancing in college or potentially later, which were once professionals, etc. These things are well known within the competition community, but their lessons about how various paths work out is not so widely known outside of it.

I stress the idea of doing the research oneself both because of the incidental knowledge to be gained along the way, and also because I think it's in a way impolite to go plastering individual's names all over hotly debated threads.

Ah, c'mon. I just got popcorn! They were gonna take off their shirts next!

Edit: This got eaten when I mis-bracketed something:

No- really, it's a little stagnatey, but I fully understand the need to be "right, dammit!", so if this is a once-and-for-all, I say let 'em do it. Although, I'd bet money they wouldn't take it to a private email conversation, duke it out, and then issue a press release with the results. Dancing IS fundamentally exhibitionistic/voyeuristic, afterall, IMO.

LMAO !!!!!!!

I was hoping you'd pipe in! I happen to be another "example" of a pro/am who can "keep up" with my professional partner (thanks to patience, diligence, skill, and intelligence). There are many more.

Okay, so I pipe in...knowing full well the danger to my own life. LOL.

This is an experiential not a factual account of my dancing experience.

I had four flipping lousy, sucky terrible pros. In the middle of that I still advanced and made progress because it mattered to me, and I snuck in coachings with a great female dancer who reworked some of my bad habits. I was very concerned because the pro I was affiliated with after my first year was a trainer for studios in the area and so I ended up driving wherever he was teaching that day. SADLY the teachers at this chain thought I was a pro coming in to coach them. This did not increase my confidence about who the chain had hired for dancers.

I left mid-contract because I wasn't happy for a number of reasons, including the fact that I wasn't making progress.

I moved to an Independent after a ton of research and found my current pro. He has several women who are mediocre and they are dancing with him because they like to dance. I have no problem with that. When I started dancing with him I was the WORST person in the studio. I had no idea where to place my feet, I had bad everything, and my dancing was absolutely sloppy. After 8 months of drilling and feet that range from bruised to bloody after a lesson and more homework after that I would say I'm a good dancer. He refuses to lead something I can't do myself. If I can't keep my own balance or perform a skill we drill until it's in place.

He doesn't just use the mirrors, he KNOWS when my knee has flexed, when I'm on the wrong foot, when I haven't got my toes turned out and he's brutal. I have also under his training become a very good dancer, with sharp crisp turns, good lines, and a solid understanding of my steps and his steps. I put in a solid 3-5 hours of practice for every lesson I take with him, by myself because he has trained me to be able to perform without someone's steadying hand. If I don't practice, he knows and do you think he's pleasant about it?

Can a pro teach an amateur? Yes. Do most of them bother? Absolutely not.

To be honest under the pressure my pro puts on me, most women would quit. So its a matter of how many women who are doing pro/am really want the bother of learning and how many just want the company?

To learn to dance at a higher level than normal one must be willing to break down old ideas that are wrong and replace them with those that are right. I saw a program on cable about the late Margo Fontaine the British ballet star and at one time the worlds best. She was over 40 when she was finally satisfied with the way she did a certain move. Which made me feel a little better when I was told that on an Overturned Spin Turn which, I've been doing for more years than I care to remember, I was lowering the heel on the fourth step too early as well as not giving a clear space for the lady to step into to. Oh well. Back to the drawing board once again.

Hold on..I'm reading my post and I want to change something.

I said I was a good dancer. Yulia is a good dancer. I'm okay...with a lot to learn.

Okay...Yulia is a GREAT dancer. I'm not even on the same planet.

Just wanted to clarify that point because I sound like a narcissist and an ignorant idiot. I have an ocean yet to achieve and all of us know that even the most simple skills can take years to perfect.