www.jazzydanceco.com

Are you enticed by the idea of performing or competing?

For some people, the idea of dancing in front of a captive audience is comparable to being tortured by a criminal organization in a foreign country. Not quite the idea of fun that performing should bring to mind. Yet there are some of us who were born to perform, to entertain; those souls who have an eagerness for being center stage and who actually thrive when the opportunity presents itself to show the best of themselves in public. (And I don’t mean indecent exposure.) I think I am one of those souls, for there is no greater thrill and no greater fear known to me than that of performing. Whether you are interested in performing or competing (really, two heads of the same monster), you are in for a long and hopefully rewarding road ahead. Becoming a performing dancer in Salsa is a mult-layered endeavor that will demand of you more dedication, determination, and discipline than you ever thought was necessary. Indeed performing artists of any kind, be it musicians, painters, dancers, singers, etc., work incredibly hard at perfecting their craft and they do it simply because they love it.

It was March 2004 and the Texas Salsa Open was only a month away. I had never performed a Salsa routine before but I really thought that if my dance partner and I worked hard enough, we could make it happen in a month, just in time to compete in the Amateur division of the Texas Salsa Open. We got to our first private lesson (ever), and were ready to conquer the world and get as much choreography down as it was humanly possible in one short hour. Three weeks later we’re still only half way through the choreo which just doesn’t gel together and my mind keeps calculating the many ways we can freestyle through the rest of the song during the competition. Taletha, our dance instructor, was kind enough not to question our utterly unrealistic expectations of this dance adventure I was dragging ourselves through. I mean seriously, what were we thinking showing up to a competition without outfits (what’s wrong with jeans?), performing experience, or let’s not forget, a finished choreography? There must be a God up there wise enough to have deterred us from such madness and infinite ridicule because in the end, we decided not to compete. When I did finally set foot onstage, I was ready. We had professional outfits, a complete and rehearsed choreography, and a few performances under our belt. That year we won the Texas Salsa Open in our first competition ever. It was May 2005.

I tell this story not to scare you away from performing or competing. On the contrary, I hope that you fuel your desire to do so with preparation, enthusiasm, and a great coach.
Give yourself the time to get good at your craft before you get on stage. Allow your body  and your mind to feel comfortable dancing for and in front of an audience. And do not underestimate the importance of a great choreography. If you’ve never choreographed, this is not the time to start, not with your first performance anyway. Hire someone to do it for you and learn from the experience. Learn from those who have done it and are good at it and who are willing to teach you. 

Most important of all, be easy on yourself. We can be incredibly hard on ourselves when it comes to analyzing the way we dance for the sake of improvement. I should know; for years I could not watch myself dance on video without tearing my dancing apart right on the spot. Remember that just like learning a new language, dancing at higher levels takes time, and becoming a great performer is no different. So we must celebrate the small improvements, the every day progress that will eventually lead to great achievements.