Hyperreal

Finally, here’s my blog about the BFG which happened two weeks ago!

I’m going to do general stuff first, then we’ll go through the whole weekend in more detail for anyone who is looking for an insomnia cure…

I had brilliant BFG. Best Ever! (out of two!)

I think the biggest difference was I wasn’t ill this time, so I had a much more enjoyable time. But also this time everything was more familiar and I was more relaxed – I wasn’t meeting so many new people this time, for instance.

I got the feeling that there were fewer folks there for the workshops and the Saturday party than last year, but that may simply be a side-effect of me feeling more relaxed… That said, it was good to see some familiar faces from down south (and over the sea) that I hadn’t seen for a while. But the main thing was that there were just so many great dancers there from all over.

A weekend entirely in the company of fellow dancers, spending every moment thinking, talking, learning or just simply taking part in dancing – this must be one of the best ways possible of spending 60 hours…

Highlights for me were the “Feeling Good” performance; seeing all the hats – and dancing in mine; some really great dances with too many folks to list; dancing in the latin room; the WCS, dips, and connection workshops; and the company of friends through the weekend.

Low-lights – only two … having to miss the class and awards ceremony on the Saturday night as we were getting ready for our performance; and missing out of dancing with so many folks – too many great dancers I missed dancing with!

Before I go into more detail (and people stop reading) I want to thank simply everybody…

Big thanks to all my friends (old and new) who made it so much fun, to everyone I danced with (and those I missed – sorry,) and just to everyone who gave the whole place a great atmosphere.

Special thanks to my Feeling Good partner (I can’t thank you enough) and to my guest for the weekend who kept me company and made me a lovely meal on Sunday too – you’ll always be welcome. It was a real pleasure.

Extra big thanks to Franck and Sheena, their helpers and the teachers and DJs for giving us a great weekend.

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OK, so now I’m going to go through the weekend, and let’s see if anything interesting can be said. (Hope so!)

Friday Party

I found myself here before I was ready. That is, the whole of the BFG just crept up on me while I wasn’t looking… Last year I was preparing for a week in advance. This time I was rushing to get myself ready on Friday afternoon. Had to find a hat, tidy my house and get myself prepared for the weekend in almost no time at all, and the last bit – getting myself prepared – had to be abbreviated.

The planned hair-cut, new clothes, etc… didn’t happen… And I found myself arriving at the party late, but still not in the right frame of mind for it all… So, I hope you’ll excuse me if I looked a bit dazed every time I bumped into someone I hadn’t seen for a while (or before) even though I should have known to expect you…

There were lots of people there, and I was soon dancing and enjoying myself… Though it didn’t really last. After a day’s work and all the rushing around getting things together I was exhausted by the back of 11, and my dancing suffered. The change of DJ brought music I was less familiar with, and so it took me out of the comfort zone I needed just then.

Apparently there was a rather high proportion of women over the weekend parties, but especially on Friday, and so I actually had to hide once or twice just to get a bit of a rest.

I had a great time though.

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Saturday

After staying up quite late, I maybe only got 4-5 hours sleep… Not a good way to start a long day of workshops and dancing…

Got up quite early, but had to get out quite early to get food and get to the GUU early… Don’t think I was fully awake until about half way through the first workshop…

On arrival, we all got a “Saturday Pass” sticker with our names on them… It’d had been nice if the stickers had our forum names on them too… And with changes of clothes quite often, the stickers didn’t last long on some folks. I stuck mine on the plastic “delegate-badge” thing I had, which already had my forum name from the stickers FilthyCute made us for the Scottish competition last year. Shame it’s falling apart now…

Anyway, there just enough time for a few quick hellos to folks before the first session of workshops started…

Emma Sabin: Funky Jive

I must confess I don’t remember that much about the moves we were taught. Besides the incidentals, what I do remember was that the workshop was primarily just about teaching us some “funky” moves. While I didn’t regret going to this workshop as I did have fun, I’m beginning to think that workshops based around moves are not for me when I can’t remember them an hour later… This realisation affected my choice of activity later in the weekend too.

Robert Mitchell-Thain: Introduction to Musicality

Robert is better known to some folks as “CJ”, he DJs regularly at the GUU at classes and parties, but is also a musician in a band. The point is that he can bring a musician’s, DJ’s and dancer’s perspective to this subject, rather than just a dancer’s…

That said, again I don’t think I got much out of this workshop… There wasn’t much that was new to me, but it was interesting to hear Robert’s perspective nevertheless.

If I am at all musical (and I think I am – though certainly not a master) it comes more from instinct, rather than from consciously listening to music (counting even) to pick out signs of impending breaks or changes in dynamic.

Graham Fox: West Coast Swing

After lunch I went to the WCS taster… As I’ve written elsewhere, I’ve had some experience of WCS before, but I had decided that this class would be “make or break” – if I enjoyed it I’d get myself to Graham’s classes and see if I can learn this dance properly.

Well I did enjoy it. My previous experience helped my confidence and I was delighted by so many positive comments from partners as they were moved round.

The format of the class was much as you would expect… It had to be all things to all people, in that there were some absolute beginners, along with some folks who had done a fair amount of WCS, and would want something new to take away with them. So, we started with simple moves – sugar pushes, passes, turns, tuck-turns, but later on it got a little more advanced to stretch those that could do it, and give the rest us an idea of what is possible in WCS.

The class finished with a short practice time where as well as repeating the practiced routine, I did a bit of freestyle – mixed up the moves a little – and felt rather pleased with myself to have got through my first “freestyle” WCS dance ever.

I then got my second ever when I went downstairs and popped-in to see the start of the Tea Dance before my next class.

I’m amazed at how well I did, but then the previous classes I had, plus a good year and a bit of MJ dancing seems to have prepared me quite well for this new challenge.

Graham Fox: Styling for Men

A lot of this workshop seemed to be taking some of the ideas of what makes a stylish WCS dancer, and applying it to Modern Jive. This isn’t a bad thing as often a MJ dancer will never have bothered to pick up or may never even have been taught any style. If there’s a good dance to steal style from it’s WCS, as it is smooth, connected and rather elegant.

Not much of what was said though was new to me – I’d either heard it in WCS classes, or even in Ceroc classes and workshops when I’ve been paying attention…

So there was stuff about how to walk, kicks and steps to add style, timing turns to face your partner at they turn, “flash-lighting”, stuff like that.

Again, an interesting perspective on stuff I’d mostly already heard before. (Of course, just because I’ve heard it one more time doesn’t mean I’m applying all these style points… But every time I get told how to walk, it must make a little bit of a difference…)

Steve Lampert: Spectacular Dips

Another move-based workshop, and this one doing moves which you wouldn’t necessarily want to try out on random unsuspecting partners on a typical dance floor, so of limited practical use, but lots of fun anyway…

I only chose to do this workshop as I had managed to secure a good fixed partner who I knew was a good enough dancer not to injure me, who was small enough that I knew (or at least hoped!) that I would be able to hold her weight without dropping her…

Of the 4 moves, the one I liked the most was a back-breaker-type move, rather dramatic, and good fun. The last move was a one-handed drop that we didn’t really like the look of… Too much potential for it to go wrong if, for example, the strange one-to-two hands hold failed. It also looked a bit rough on the girl’s back…

Anyway, like I said, good fun. And thanks to my partner for this class who’d come all the way from Australia just to do this class with me. (Just kidding! )

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And that was that for Saturday day-time. Except it wasn’t… We had a Feeling Good rehearsal to go to – the first time we’d all been there for a try out “on location”. Apart from a bashed chin and almost dropping my partner on one of the drops (oops!) it went well. We had a few spectators, one of whom is a teacher and was a judge at the recent Ceroc Champs on London. He had a couple of comments for us. First he told us to stop looking at the floor when we’re dancing (guilty!) but he also said that with a bit of extra polish our simple we routine could well have won the team event at Hammersmith. I, personally, thought it lacked the “team” thing (it’s really only a bunch of couples all doing the same things at the same times), but perhaps changing that would be some of the extra polish he envisaged…

Anyway, after that it was off to eat (pizza at Di Maggio’s!) with some others, then back to mine to get ready for the party. Small logistical problem as as well as me and my guest, there was my partner, plus another friend, all looking for time in the shower…

Bit of a rush in the end, but we all got to the party for just after 9 – only a little after we were supposed to be there to get ready (though because we came in costume, I figured it wasn’t going to be a problem.)

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Saturday party

So we got there, checked in, changed our shoes… I had brought my camera for one of the side angles of the recording of the FG routine, so had to get that sorted. (Thanks for doing that Caroline!)

Because of this, we missed the class, but we got a chance for a quick run-though upstairs and a wee pep-talk from Mel and Steve before going back done and getting ready for our entrance… Missed most of the forum awards as a result. (Though heard later on the forum I was in third place for Forum King! Woo!!!)

Then it was our turn…

Trouped out into the positions… Music swelled… We were Feeling Good.

When you get the DVD, keen spotters might notice a couple of mistakes in my (and me partner’s) rendition of the routine - my fault, as it was my lead. They were minor though, and I’m not going to worry about them. I’m happy with how we did.

We got lots of cheers and clapping – it made such a difference. During the routine I suddenly noticed all the positive noise and it really put a big smile on my face for the rest of the dance. I had felt a big nervous, but not half as much as I expected. I had just put everything else out of my mind, but I had to let some of that positivity in – and that’s really what made it different to every other time we’ve danced through to that music.

After the adrenaline buzz of all that, I needed some time out to back back on the level ground, so though the routine finishes about half-9 (??) I only had a couple of dances before 11, but got into the swing of things over the next hour or so, and was dancing pretty much constantly up to the end over the last hour.

A word about hats… As I said, I had got myself a hat on Friday to wear for tonight’s party. I bought a trilby – which when worn with the rest of my “Feeling Good” costume really looked the part – very Franck Sinatra style. But the night was more about mad hats, and there were some really mad ones there…

I really loved Little Monkey and Sheepman’s hats (a product of the same design studio I presume) though I don’t know how I’d have managed to dance with LM with a palm tree on her head… I missed most of the hats though by missing the start of the party and the class – after that most of the hats got put away, though I had to wear mine for a bit and have a go dancing in it. Wasn’t so bad – it didn’t sit very high above my head – so must of my usual arm-over-head moves went fine. The double-handed travelling turn was a bit tricky, though as I already have to duck a bit for that one, I just had to remember to duck further!

But the thing that really knocked hat-wearing on the head for me is the heat – it just gets too hot to dance in a hat!

Back to talking about the rest of the night… A little while after our performance, the two upstairs rooms opened. When I went on a wee tour of the rooms (while I still wasn’t much in a mood for dancing) I found the latin room pretty empty, with some fairly fast music playing – I didn’t didn’t stick around. The swing & blues room was pretty much what you’d expect… Much busier than the latin room, but not playing much music to my taste (at least, not at that point…)

Later on I did another wee tour and had a dance in the blues room, but found that the latin room had changed and was playing much more tangoesque that was more my thing. Shame the room was still pretty empty – at one point I had to go find people from elsewhere to dance with me to the excellent music on offer…

There were probably more people in the swing and blues room at its lowest as the latin room at its highest. Such a shame considering the space the latin room had – and the bluesy nature of a lot of the latin music on offer.

So I danced mostly in the main room – lots of good music, lots of good dancers. In fact lots of good dancers in all the rooms – I don’t think I had a bad dance all night.

The other aspect of the Saturday night party is the social side… There’s lots of dancers who couldn’t make the rest of the weekend but turn out for the Saturday party. I was really pleased to see so many folks, and to catch up with and dance with some of my favourite followers.

Afterwards, there’s loads of hugs and good-byes, plus offers of going to an “after-party”, but we chose to just head back to my flat, exhausted, and straight to our beds, ready for another long day on Sunday…

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Sunday

On Saturday I’d found it difficult to choose what workshops to do, and Sunday was no different…

Melanie Boyle: Footwork and Body Movement

Not sure if that’s the correct title for this workshop, as it was in place of another workshop with Emma Sabin who wasn’t well (hope she’s feeling better by now.) Melanie’s workshop on Saturday had apparently taught a simple solo dance routine to some set music, a bit like how James Mclaughlin had done in his line-dancing classes at the Dance Fever events, and this was more of the same… I wonder if she had to make this up on the spot, or had it already prepared…

It wasn’t what I was expecting, but it was a lot of fun anyway. Melanie’s such a great dancer she made the routine look so good, though I’m sure for a lot of us (me at least), I’m sure when she watched us it was a totally different kind of “wow!” going through her head…

Franck Pauly: Playing with the connection

For me, this was the best workshop of the weekend. It wasn’t trying to teach me any new moves, but just how to do the moves I already know better – and make it a better dance for my partner.

The first thing was to ensure you had a constant connection with your partner. Without a connection you can’t lead, and the follower can only go by instinct or anticipation what to do next… So we did an interesting exercise that was new to me, to test our connection and see how continuous it was… The way it worked was to abandon the normal handhold and instead lead the lady from a connection of your hand on top of the back of her hand, pressing down (with the girl pressing back up to match.) From this connection almost all moves are still possible, but if the connection is lost your hands will separate.

I was surprised how many different moves I could lead with this style of connection – even managing to lead my partner into turns and such – sometimes having to switch to a conventional hold for a moment before returning to the hand-on-hand connection.

I’d like to try a whole dance in this style – it’s obviously a good technique to use to avoid over-eager partners with “death-grips”, but the couple of times I’ve tried to use it in a class, the girl has switched us straight back to a conventional hold. I could imagine the same thing happening in freestyle…

Once we’d done that, there was matters of switching the lead between hands to allow non-leading things to be done with the other hand. It’s amazing how quickly you can switch from leading a in-and-out, to combs with either hand, while the other hand controls the connection.

We also did a bit of hand-to-body leading (typically on the lady’s back), and even some leg-to-leg leading (e.g. using the inside of your knee to lead the girl out from a close hold.)

Some of the this stuff I’d already seen in Franck’s “Focus On…” series, but there was lots new, and even the stuff I’d done before worked better this time… In particular the non-physical lead…

This was about making a connection through the eyes and through your presence… There was only one girl there that I managed to make a really strong connection with when every step I made was read perfectly, but times when I had tried this before, I didn’t really find it working at all…

Definitely a workshop worth attending.

Since then I have practised a little of what I call “negative connection”. I sometimes like to do moves which ends up in a first-move open type of position, with the lead through my arm and on the girl’s back… Now if you have your hand high on the girl’s back you have a strong connection with the girl’s arm on yours, you can easily lead the girl to step forward or back and she can’t easily step out of that hold… But if you have your hand lower on the girl’s back, the arm-to-arm connection disappears (though there could still be a connection between your shoulder and the girl’s hand.) From here it’s easy to lead the girl to step forward, but if the girl is following right, and I’m leading right, if I remove some of the pressure I’m applying on her back, she should step backwards. And it works! Some of the time… I think it’s a good test though of the level of connection you have established with your partner…

Back to the BFG though… And after that workshop, it was time for lunch… (And for some folks, a “conga-massage”!)

Sunday Tea-Dance

After lunch I couldn’t quite decide what workshops to do… I didn’t fancy either explicitly routine-based workshops, but I though that Gordon’s “Fancy Footwork” workshop might be good… I went along to have a look, but from the demo, it looked like just another class teaching us a routine – sure, there was some fancy footwork involved, but not enough that looked interesting enough for me to stay – not when I was already quite tired and just fancied some simple, uncomplicated, no-thinking-required dances downstairs – with tea and cakes!

Later I had thought about having a look at Bill’s “Slow it down!” workshop, but the time eased past and I don’t know if I noticed that it was due to start…

The tea dance was a very relaxed affair… Some nice pleasant tunes, a fair selection of dancers, some tea, some cakes, some company… Who could ask for anything more?

And so we danced to the end of the day – with a full stop marked by dancing to “Ich Will” by Ramstein. It’s not every day you get to dance to a wee bit of Tango music, followed up with some German Industrial Metal shortly after…

Oh, I had a fun dance with one of our visitors from down south… I put in one of my back-to-back moves that I know some of my favourite partners like and got a cool sexy look as a reward… So I did another and got another sexy look. I was then cautioned by my partner that that was all the sexy looks she could manage at that point in the weekend. I don’t think I could manage any by that point…

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And that was it for day-time Sunday… Just a few more farewells then back home for dinner – made for me! Must try to get more guests to stay if they are all going to make me food!

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Sunday Party

This was it – the end of the weekend… We didn’t rush to get there early… I think we might have made it for about half-past 9…

The party was a bit like the tea-dance – part 2! Except there were more people… And no cake! But it really was just a continuation of what had come before… Some lovely music, some lovely dancers, some lovely moments in dance…

Unfortunately the weekend had taken its toll on many of us… Quite a few people drifted away early, and quite a few others, myself included, weren’t dancing much by the end… There’s only so much my legs and feet can do before they give up on me…

When the end came, there were so many final farewells, but I confess I just wanted to home to my bed… I had had a brilliant time, but needed my rest.

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Monday morning… I was up early, but at least I didn’t need to go to work! In fact, after breakfast, and after my guest had left, I went back to my bed and slept for most of the rest of the day.

Despite feeling tired, I was surprised that I didn’t feel sore from the exertions of the weekend… Totally different story on Tuesday though – I could hardly walk!

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And that’s all I have to say… I know I’ve forgotten things I wanted to mention. Sorry if that included mentioning you. The memory is still with me – maybe buried under two week’s of other memories, but it’s in there somewhere!

If you have read this far – without skipping! – thanks for reading. Now you get to write a comment that I have to read… Knock yourself out!

Thanks again to everyone!!