The Birthday Waack

One friend of DS who definitely knows that life is always better when you know how to werk it, is @EleanorOfficial and Monday, being her birthday, she decided to come and share some of her fierceness and freshness with us. This proves two things (prove being used loosely of course as in the real scientific method nothing can ever be officially proven):

1. DS is clearly THE place to be all the time
2. We never turn down the chance to waack, especially when in training for Waack Date the 4th and @EleanorOfficial always brings something new (even if it's impossible, it's new). 

Starting with a quick funky warm-up we got right into it unpicking four types of footwork (must resist the urge to substitute werk for every use of the word work ... so difficult .... is becoming a Pavlovian response):

1. Digs
2. Step and Cross
3. Shimmy
4. Elvis Presley

Breaking the foundations down this way helped us figure out how to get from A to B in a freestyle whilst still looking fabulous and without falling over (we hope, at the very least 85% of the time). The problem is, that Elvis is also known as 'Elvis Pelvis' and so once again those of us who struggle to identify the exact location of our hips (seriously I am starting a petition to get it included in the lyrics of heads, shoulders, knees and toes before it becomes a national crisis) were a little challenged - but perhaps not as challenged as we were by the step and cross also known as the step and i-can't-work-out-which-foot-i'm-supposed-to-be-on-stumble. Never mind @EleanorOfficial's birthday-fuelled energy at least made it compelling to keep trying and we were soon digging and stepping and shimmying down the studio in a way DS only can. 

Following this, just to add to further confusion on the order of anatomy proposed by the song heads, shoulders, knees and toes, we went from feet to arms. 

It's always great to get inspiration from other waackers/teachers for new arm combinations as, especially when your limbs do what you want them to as infrequently as mine do, it is easy to become repetitive. @MissEleanor did not disappoint, bringing some FRESH new combos to the floor.

 The ability to carry them off whilst looking as if it's as easy as walking must, however, rely on the automated-neuron pathway as you certainly fry your brain (or at the very least in the words of Caitlin 'do yourself a mischief' by punching yourself repeatedly in the head (unintentionally), slapping yourself on the thigh (intentionally) or poking your eye out (unintentionally @Katymillslondon)) in the process of trying to master them. Not that this means you can't be fierce when throwing your arms around your head in multiple different directions whilst your feet do something entirely different, as @EleanorOfficial demonstrated, it just means that you look confierced (see DS Dictionary credit @Trixiecantswim) all the time. 

This all combined to mean that by the end of class we felt challenged fo sho but that the eventual outcomes were obtainable. Shame we thanked her with our abysmal singing - oh well at least there was cake!!! 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY! 

Who needs a wide vocabulary??

So at school they spend years telling you to read widely so as to develop a wide vocabulary. 

Undoubtedly this has its uses. You can sound intelligent, knowledgeable and well-read. All things that will get you far in life. 

However, in the DS studio you really don't need to be a particularly loquacious being ( ;D ), you only need to know one word: WERK! 

If you pretend that you have a very mild case of tourettes and that your only ticks are to: 1. occasionally (or actually pretty frequently) shout out the word werk; 2. wag your finger from side to side, then you will be pretty much set. 

In other words, you better WERK. 

Valentine is WAACK: an epic evening

The legacy of Walt Disney is wonderful in many ways. The music in the films we love to watch when we're little (and maybe sometimes when we're not so little) for one thing, is GREAT - obviously why we didn't get excited by the Disney playlist in valentines ballet at all. However, it also has A LOT to answer for. 

In the films:

1. Boy meets girl

2. They sing a song

3. Something bad happens

4. They sing a song 

5. The problem is resolved

6. They sing a song

7. They get married

8. They sing a song 

9. The film ends 

10. They sing a song 

But the thing is that in reality, life doesn't work out that way because, you know, there's not as much in-tune singing - a great (probably the greatest) majority of the population are in fact tone-deaf and animal singing, if cats are anything to go by, is horrendous. 

So when St. Valentine roles around and Cupid hasn't struck you with his bow, or you don't want to celebrate the holiday for whatever reason, then it must be concluded that valentine is wack. 

To make it pass by quicker, some people bury themselves in their work. 

This is a legitimate coping mechanism but it isn't really DS style, instead we have @MlleGinger to fall back on. 

With a little bit of help from: the Ginger one, Gloria (Gaynor that is) and some FABULOUS 80s fashion, we chose to bury ourselves in our werk instead. 

By employing this strategy, Valentine got a lot more FIERCE and went from being wack to WAACK. 

This is obviously an attitude that is a lot more satisfactory and a lot less damsel-in-distress (which quite frankly is so 14th century (when heels were only beginning to make their first appearance and there were definitely no stilettos in sight). 

Getting into character, because you really wouldn't expect anything else from us lot, our 'oh hell no' fierce-faces reflected the fact that us DS girls are a force to be reckoned with and NOBODY: no man, no woman, no thing (living or dead) should forget that- because if they do, we will choose to show them the music and make it abundantly clear that they should: "walk out the door" because they are most certainly "NOT WANTED ANYMORE!"

Thus by banging out some FRESH choreography in this fashion we went from sappy to sassy in one verse and one chorus, proving that we will most certainly not 'fall down and die' due to a lack of suitable dating candidates being available on the market (seriously scientists get a move on designer babies have been around for a while when you going to go up a gear?!?!?!) because when you have dance, drama, disco and the absolute best friends around, then who needs dinner and a movie - we even had a rose to show for the evening thanks to the gorgeous @LolaLola_B's secret admirer. 

Such was the high that this fierceness created that even the prospect of Raggatone was a lot less daunting than normal.

In fact a feeling of (almost) eagerness fell over me and was, for once, not rescinded as soon as class begun due to the return of ANTENNA - and a super-extended definitelychoreographed100percentvertically version at that!

This routine is great because the cheese factor is so large that when melted from the heat in the studio it covers the parts of the combination when we're close to the floor and I start looking like a frog that's just been hit by a car and can no longer (poor thing) work out how its legs are supposed to work in a coordinated fashion.

As a result we all left the studio buoyed up and feeling like true survivors - something that proved to be extremely beneficial at Throwdown where the highly romantic, 'totes emosh' Krumpers threatened to take out @MlleGinger, @CarleeBanks and @MissEleanorOfficial in their bid to be crowned last ever krumping champion - the chants of VALENTINE IS WAACK should be heard loud and clear(until next year when it won't be on a Thursday)as you accept the fact, embrace it and look out for the footage coming soon. 

And just for good measure: 

A fine line

It's no secret that us Dancer-Stationers are hard-core Raggatonians.

It's also no secret that I'm a different type of onian and have a love-hate relationship with Raggatone. 

The last couple of weeks it has been really balancing hard on that line due to the amount of isolating ability needed to do this combo with any form of competency. 

Watching those who paid attention in nursery when singing heads-shoulders-knees-and-toes and consequently know where all the individual parts of their musculoskeletal system are located, I came to the conclusion that it was one of my favourite combinations - @katymillslondon in particular was killing it - only helped in part by the fact that it was set to one of my favourite songs: 'If it's loving that you want' by Rihanna. 

However, others of us spent too much time trying to stay inside the lines in nursery and never really learned those other things. For those of us in this second camp, the reflection was not quite so flattering. 

Indeed, my pelvis is beginning to develop a persecution complex....only problem being, persecution complexes are generally completely unfounded in reality, and the reprimands that my pelvis gets from @MlleGinger etc. are, unfortunately, not exactly unfounded. Instead you may as well start calling me number 5 - the robot from the classic 'short circuit,' which comes to life after being hit by lightening- as this really is the only explanation i.e. I cannot locate my muscles or my skeleton as I in fact have neither - only electrical circuits that have gone wrong .... really, really, REALLY wrong - so wrong that the newest member's constant proclamations of 'Whaaaat?!?!?" were extremely appropriate.

The thing is that I can't stay mad at Raggatone forever, because the therapy I have received courtesy of RARC has helped me realise that  Rihanna really is very wise, and when she sings (and I sing along with her to distract from the fact that I look like a fish that's just become entangled in the tentacles of a Portuguese Man O' War) "I'll be your friend, I can be your homey" it is a highly accurate description of Dance Station. 

This is because, in a recent interview I was asked to convince a group of complete non-dancers to go take class at the weekend in 30 seconds.  I waffled on about it being fun, good for confidence and fitness....all of which is 100% true of course .... but what I should have said was: for friendship. There's no way I would willingly spend an hour every week making myself look WAY more awkward than enticing (and admittedly quietly loving it),  if it wasn't for the other people in the room.  

So whilst it may be that we are the supposed 'lost generation' as the media likes to call us, or it may be that we're not lost at all - we're simply in different spaces than we were before, having to fight a bit harder, but very much still here because we have each other to rely on.

So come to class, get yourself in shape so your legs will hold you up better, whilst at the same time finding some people who will catch you when the Reese's temptation becomes just a bit too much and you just have to give in! 

(P.S. how FIERCE is this video!?!?!)

Creepy Clowns

Ok so it might be the opinion of some that all clowns are creepy, Coulrophobia after all is rather common. 

In the context of Waacking, I will argue that there is a sliding scale of creepiness and a room full of people chanting (rather breathily at that) "ha. ha. ha. ha. haa haa" to keep in time with the music, does not a sexy dancer make, as Prince and @MlleGinger with her creative combination skills intended,  but rather a creepy sounding clown. 

Thankfully the track, "sexy dancer", itself is sick, in the cool sense, not the eww sense, so with the volume turned up and the focus on the limbs of the Waackers in the room, not their vocal chords, the effect of the combination was dramatically fierce rather than dramatically terrifying.    

Despite the trials and tribulations it had to overcome, the combination was a great one, incorporating all major aspects of waacking (arms, footwork, posing etc.) in one - like one great big 'dentistsworstnightmare' bag of pick and mix. This is something that is key to any freestyle and thus something that should be practiced....especially if you're like me and rather dyspraxic fantastic. 

This is because, if you are, as soon as you try and think of multiple parts of the body moving at speed simultaneously in ways that are not necessarily related to one another, the result is likely (100% likely in the example of me on Thursday night) to be a near-gauging incident where a two-armed reversed waack-attack very nearly became rather more gruesome than it was ever intended to be!!!

I guess that's why we evolved to have two eyes, not so that they could work together and create an averaged balanced image that helps with all sorts of useful things like depth-perception, but so you have a spare ... just in case waack happens.

http://www.myspace.com/prince/music/songs/sexy-dancer-39287574

(from around 1.30)

Just keep spinning, just keep spinning ....

So it turns out that Dory the fish was very wise, although she may have advised us to 'just keep swimming" in the pursuit of Nemo, her logic can be extrapolated and applied to ballet where we must keep spinning in the pursuit of the perfect pirouette. 

Even if I'm not convinced that this exists. 

This was certainly the case on Thursday with the return of the pirouette song: "Try Again" by Aliyah - always good for motivation! 

It might be something that at first seems like an insurmountable task, but with @MlleGinger on your side, it somehow becomes possible to do a complete 360 degree turn and not fall flat on your face (at least not every single time) 

It is, however, best to do this before you've attempted a grande battement exercise at the barre. This is because this exercise carries a particularly high risk of ballet-bullying by the Ginger one. This is a kind of necessary evil where your legs get put back in their place after slacking. The results of this are twofold:

1. An exponential increase in technique 
2. An exponential decrease in being able to stand, much less pirouette. 

You have been warned! 

Zumbalicious

The thing about Zumba, is that it is supposed to be easy to follow. You're not really intended to have to think too much. 

The problem is that this doesn't factor in the fact that at DS we specialise in not being able to tell directions. So if @KleioBows goes left, we'll go right and so on. Occasionally this works, because it adds in an extra bit of shimmy, but at other times it can kind of just make us look a little bit nutty, even more so than usual that is. 

And there you were thinking that wasn't possible!!!!!!!

It's almost like freestyle Zumba really. We start with changing the directions, and then when you get really advanced (like @trixiecantswim for example) you can start changing the order of the movements ... and maybe sometimes even the moves themselves. 

Darling it's better, down where it's wetter ...

.... take it from me, sometimes when you are free-styling it helps to have a story to inspire your moves. 

In general this is really good advice and it can lead to some of the most inspired free-styles. However, the problem is that at Dance Station, we have a tendency to take this concept a little bit too literally. This doesn't just apply in waacking or hip hop either (although 'thrift shopping' inspiration apparently equates to walking around the studio with a shopping trolley), but also Jazz apparently.   

The problems that this can cause were illustrated on Sunday when we were supposed to be free styling during the introduction to Rihanna and decided that the most appropriate way to represent the music was to pretend to be under the Sea and move around as Seaweed and crabs ..... as you do ... much to the despair of @KleioBows. 

If you've never free-styled like seaweed before, it involves a lot of swaying, and walking like a crab is exactly that, with an apparently obligatory french accent ..... I don't know why that's just the rules!!!