I see in a instructional video that the Curl and Spiral in Rumba is much the same. So I'm very confused. Could any one tell me the difference? Thanks.

Waltz2u

They are similar figures. The primary difference is the starting positions. A plain Spiral is done from closed facing using a Natural Opening Out as the lead-in. The man leads the lady sort of forward across his body on the third step and leads her into a spiral turn, then they proceed to a fan ending. A Curl starts from open facing position. The lady will take her third step forward towards the man at which point he leads her into a spiral turn and they proceed to a fan ending. I suppose I can pull out the technique book later if you want more specific details, but that's the main difference between the Spiral and Curl syllabus figures -- the Spiral is done from closed facing and the Curl is done from open facing.

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James Marshall
marshall@astro.umd.edu
http://www.astro.umd.edu/~marshall

Well, my new ISTD latin books are at home. I only have the old one with me right now. For the spiral in rumba the man's footwork is listed as ball flat throughout and the lady's as ball flat except on step 3 where it's ball flat RF, toe of LF. Cha cha looks like the same footwork, ball flat throughout for both except the lady's step 5 which is the same as rumba's step 3. The steps themselves are relatively easy, especially for the man, the trick is leading the lady's spiral turn. It seems like a lot of figures where the lead is the hard part give the man pretty simple steps so he doesn't have to think about them and can concentrate on getting the lead right. HaOanhTranThanh offered a brief description of the steps. I think right and left foot are switched though -- in syllabus Spirals and Curls, the lady should be making the spiral turn on her RF, not her LF.

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James Marshall
marshall@astro.umd.edu
http://www.astro.umd.edu/~marshall

As James says, a curl is just a type of spiral turn taken from open facing position. It therefore has less turn than a standard spiral and as a result, the left foot ends up crossed more loosely in front of the right than in a spiral.


Howard