having been around Scriv. for many yrs (lessons , lectures etc. )this is what you may deduce.

Altho. written in very simple terms, one had to understand the sometimes more complex nature, of incorporating many of his theories, to practice .

Len always dealt with the more advanced students and Nellie worked with the beginners, hence one finds his writings pointed in that direction.

If I remember correctly, the ISTD got the bounce description back to front in their 2000 re-issue of the samba manual and had to publish an errata sheet.

I think it is a misreading of Laird's diagrammatic presentation of the bounce action to say that the wavy line is headed "Beats": it isn't. My edition (6th, 2003) has one line headed "beats" across the top of the diagram, with arrows pointing to the compressed/straightened knees position over 1/2 beats, and another line at the bottom headed "timing" with & 1 & 2 & 1 etc. The wavy line printed between those two lines goes up and down, just as the body might with the flexing of the ankles and knees. I flex my knees, and my body goes down - I straighten them, and it rises again. That's just what I see on the Bounce Action clip on this site: (and not, BTW, heels rising and falling to compensate for the knee movement, so that the head remains still - they don't, and Laird doesn't even mention the concept of such a movement).

The thing that continues to trouble me is that what Laird describes is the opposite of what I see - and I can't physically do it, if I try.

Is it just a misprint, with the diagram screwed up?

CliveHarrison. If you can understand the descriptions of the Samba Basic action from the writtings on page 52 by Wally Laird you'd be a marvel. He is probably correct in the way he wrote, he was a very clever man. But it goes right over my head.The person I go to was taught by Wally and the first step of a Volta is down onto a bent knee. The second step is up with the heel off the floor staying at the height it started with. Having said that if on the first step if my knee bends it must have been straight to start with. We could argue for ever is the knee up or is it down on step one.
One of the big mistakes that has since been corrected is that on a Reverse Basic the second step now has no weight on it. The reason it has been altered is that to do it the old way was encouraging people believe there was a hip movement sideways when the hips are supposed to be forward and backwards, not sideways. I have been told to remember that throughout the Samba the solid beat one or two is down.The (a) is up.All this without putting your head through the ceiling.
Even on a Beginners tape with David Sycamore which is all of 18 years old. He suggests that we lower and raise our knees like a bouncing a ball. One is down, (a) is up. That hasn't changed.Good Luck. In the Samba you'll need it, in this the hardest dance of them all..

It goes right over mine too. I just don't get it.

Like you, I agree that Samba technique is the hardest of all the latin dances, but for myself, I have never had any trouble with the bounce action: I have a very strong sense of rhythm (I'm a trained musician, and a percussionist, at that), and the "down" on the first step of a volta fits perfectly with dancing Laird's technique reversed. Hell, it's what EVERYONE does - why should I worry about it?

I do worry about you claiming that "a" is up: the beats "1", "2" may be down (sorry, Wally), but "a" comes exactly BETWEEN & and 1 or 2 - and it is the "&" which is "up". The "a" step is right in the middle of the flexing/straightening movement, so actully coming "down" too. That is why we have to overlay the 1&2&1&2& bounce with the 1 a 2 1 a 2 step pattern, so that we get, in combination, 1&a2&a1&a2.

The beats go 1/2 /12 1/2 1/2, but the steps 3/4 1/4 1 3/4 1/4 1 - unless of course we have a QQS - and we ALL know what that means, don't we?

"what Laird describes is the opposite of what I see"

It's probably not really. There is a lot happening in samba. There's too much for us to see and say at the same time so we use shortcuts. We say what we feel, then the brain pulls what we say into time with a rhythm, but we may not be doing what we think we are when we think we are.

We are conditioned to think of voltas as DOWN up DOWN up DOWN up DOWN, so we associate the first step as being on the first beat with a compressed knee.

It is interesting that in latin we use the terms Up and Down where we might use Rise and Lower in standard ballroom. Up and Down are positions but we are using them as actions which can cause confusion.

When we place the foot we are Up from the previous step and the knee is 'straightened' which matches Laird's description. We immediately compress the knee so that we are Down for the '&' count before rising again to neutral for
'a' and continuing up so that the knee is again briefly straightened for the next step on 2, then immediately compressed again.

When we demonstrate or practice the steps to our own count we tend to spread the vocalisation of "one" to cover the timing of 1& so we feel as if the step is Down.

SocialDancer. Reading that book will drive a person insane. Especially when we get to the part where the timing is given under Samba Boubce Action page 52 as &1&a2&1&a2...etc and yet not mentioned in the descriptions. I'm sure there are many adjudicators out there who don't know what they are looking at either.
To start another argument. To have a count of (a) in front of a movement is Technicaly and mathematicaly not correct. The (a) comes from the beat that is now in the past and cannot be part of the future. It has a new beginning . But we will continue to do so anyway won't we.