One of the first things a new dancer learns is that Shoes Are Important. You blithely arrive for your first dance wearing the street shoes you intend to dance in, and watch as dancer after dancer arrives and immediately heads for a chair to change their shoes. And the shoes they’re changing into, well, they’re odd. People who seem to have gone to a lot of time and effort to put together very swanky, vintage outfits are pulling out… tennis shoes? Really? Or men’s dress shoes with that cute little dress? Are you serious? And they are. Deadly serious. There is nothing a dancer takes more seriously than shoes.
You start to realize that these are special shoes. They have brand names like Aris Allens and Bleyers, or they’ve been specially modified at shoe stores. They have soles made from suede or leather which must never, never, never get wet! Ever! Other dancers are happy to talk at length about their preferences in shoes, debating suede soles vs. hard leather vs. soft leather. You start to think that maybe you ought to get your own pair of these special shoes. It’s a watershed in a young dancer’s life when they buy their first pair of real dance shoes, or take a pair of shoes to a cobbler to get them resoled with suede. It signifies a certain amount of commitment. It says, “I’m serious about this. Serious enough to buy the shoes.”
Sometime about the time the dancer buys the shoes, or maybe a bit before, the dancer’s clothing starts to change. This is particularly apparent in girls. When girls start dancing, they usually dress like a cross between their idea of glamorous 1940s vintage and what they’ve seen of ballroom dancers. There’s a lot of full skirts, party dresses accessorized to appear more “vintage,” and sometimes low cut/strapless looks with a lot of black and white color schemes. They want to look pretty! And cute! And vintage! If they keep with it long enough they start to realize that dancing is hard work. It’s exercise, and it’s not very fun exercising in a strapless dress. They start dressing down more. Jeans and workout pants begin to make their appearance. They might still wear skirts, but they’re shorter, less full. They do twirl tests, making sure that if the skirt flares, it doesn’t flare too high. They start wearing more t-shirts, and less cute little vintage-y blouses. Somewhere down the line they start attending dancing weekends and workshops, and start collecting event t-shirts. They start to realize that when you exercise, you sweat, and begin to steer their color choices towards those which don’t show sweat stains. They start to bring extra shirts to change into after they’ve sweated through the shirt they’re wearing. Utility and comfort begin to be more important than vintage, although cute is still always a priority (it is, after all, social dance).
By this time the dancer has been dancing a few years, they look totally different. The long skirts and high heels are gone. Instead they’re wearing the Swing Dancer Uniform: jeans or other comfortable pants or skirt, t-shirt (preferably wearing the logo of a Lindy Exchange) or other breathable top, comfortable shoes with slick soles, no-fuss hair. They’ve come to dance, and it shows.
Recently I’ve come to realize that beyond the requirements of good dancing clothes, there are also good teaching clothes. I would say that learning to dance is 30% watching your instructors, 60% trying to do it yourself, and 10% hearing the teachers explain. This means that students have to be able to actually see what the instructor is doing with his or her body. For me that means not wearing any skirt longer than knee-length, and, well, added attention to the cute factor. Wanting to be a better dancer often begins with wanting to look like your instructor. So I try to look like someone they might want to emulate. I’m still pretty new to teaching, so I don’t have this part all figured out. Who knows? Maybe in a year or two I’ll be writing a post on How To Dress Like A Teacher…
October 2, 2008 at 6:29 pm
Man, that Yehoodi thread is a riot. I need to start hanging out there again.
My favourite sweat story was from the Saturday latenight at DCLX 07. There was an impromptu sweatiest guy competition, which was to be judged quantitatively by “number of paper towel squares soaked.”
Well, in the end it was a tie, but the prize was awarded to Kelly Arsenault, for having soaked the same number of towels with a significantly reduced overall surface area.
October 2, 2008 at 6:47 pm
For some reason I used to assume that I, as a girl, never got *that* sweaty. Then I saw a picture of myself taken at the end of a long Bal night held in a slightly overheated room. Yuck. That was when I started investing in powder on top of deodorant, and paying attention to the color of my shirts…
December 12, 2008 at 1:47 am
Bernadette, you haven’t posted in over two months!
Shame, shame, shame!
May 30, 2009 at 1:04 am
Hi I was reading your article and I’m sad to say some of the things you’re saying about dancers arent true. i’ve been dancing for 10 and a half years now. and guess what. i’m twelve!! so yeah we dont wear vintage shoes. I will tell you though most of us wear sweatpants and t-shirts. I didnt bother reading the rest.
June 10, 2009 at 4:06 pm
Hey, I enjoy your blog. Do you have an RSS feed?
September 2, 2009 at 9:31 pm
jhordanne: You might want to read an entire blog post before you comment. Just a thought.
David: Thank you! I’m pretty sure it’s curlygrrl.wordpress.com/rss
December 10, 2009 at 1:43 pm
Interesting blogpost, I didn’t thought reading this would be so interesting when I read the title with link!!
December 24, 2009 at 7:51 pm
I get scolded by my dance teachers if we wear jeans to class. And if we wear street shoes, then we have to take them off and dance in our socks ( that is why I always bring my dancing shoes!).