It boils down to one thing. After a couple have set up their pose it is necessary to go behind them and make whatever adjustment is necessary for that particular couple. The roundness of both couples like having a hoop held at shoulder level as I saw in "Ballroom Bootcamp" on TV. Great idea probably from Russia.
At this point I would like to get to the five points of contact between the man and the lady. If you were taught as I was one of them is going to be wrong. One last thing. The man does not adjust. The lady adjusts to the frame of the man. International Style of Ballroom Dancing. If it were not so we would have the man present himself to the lady and after all that alter his shape. Why on earth would anyone present themselves and then alter. Sounds a bit senseless doesn't it. Happy Dancing

"The man does not adjust. The lady adjusts to the frame of the man."

Ouch! I sure I hope I never have to dance with you!

"If it were not so we would have the man present himself to the lady and after all that alter his shape."

Actually, we do. He presents some points of a pre-hold position, she walks in, and then they BOTH make adjustments to each other.

"Why on earth would anyone present themselves and then alter."

Because the pre-hold position cannot be the same as the hold position. With your partner in a different place (not yet in hold) the geometry must be different than with your partner in the usual place. Since some things have to change anyway, this is your opportunity to fine tune the position.

Let's not have any one-size-fits all presentations to imagined partners - you are going to have to make some adjustments for anyone you dance with. Now what should stay the same and what should adjust is a whole other question. but there will ALWAYS be adjustments to accomodate the particular partner. (And those from the elbow angle on to the fingertips are some of the most common and safest)

" So if someone were to say to me, "Keep your center toward your partner", I would ask them to clarify with a little more detail."

Indeed... as dancing is studied in more and more detail, it eventually becomes clear that each part of the body needs to be seperately treated with regard to three potential factors. Conceptually, one could make this decision for each cross section of the body from head to toe:

- alignement towards direction of movement
- alignment towards partner
- comparative alignment to body parts above and below.

If you look at the position at mid stride into step one of a top-quality natural turn for example, there are quite a buch of different alignments in use. Some body parts are quite square to the direction of movement. Others are turned almost sideways (feels like nearly backwards) to stay with the partner. Probably the arms are even turned sligly more than the shoulder/sternum.

But of course that is at a more advanced level - at the beginning we just worry about an initial orientation to the partner, and perhaps the proper orientation of the feet and leg swing when moving.

Anonymous. Go to the Learn the Dances on this site . Choose anyone you like. For a bigger picture click twice on the picture to bring it to full size. Then you tell me on the topline which part of the ladies right side is in contact with the man. Look at the about bust level.

"Anonymous. Go to the Learn the Dances on this site . Choose anyone you like. For a bigger picture click twice on the picture to bring it to full size. Then you tell me on the topline which part of the ladies right side is in contact with the man. Look at the about bust level."

Why? There is no mention in the post to which you respond of contact. Or any endorsement of the videos here either, for that matter.

Anonymous. There is if you look at the first thread. Hopefully that person is still reading will go and look for themselves. It's all here right on this site in the Learn the Dances..