r/ballroom

In your dance, you can focus on:

1. Making the moves precise, working on your technique

2. Or you try with your movements to express the music, be artistic.

Now ideally you do (1)+(2) together, but that's challenging, and takes time to do well.

For those who are learning, which of (1),(2) would you put first, and recommend to focus on?

Say, if I focus on (1), then what I do is limited, and it can feel that I only care about the execution of movements rather than trying to feel the dance.

Whereas if I focus on (2), then not everything will look good visually.

Any thoughts?

I’ve been doing competitive Latin dance for about seven months now. I had danced before as well, but back then I treated it more as a hobby and didn’t compete, so I was mostly focused on learning the choreography rather than really working on my technique.

Now that I’ve started competing, things have obviously changed. Dance has become more demanding, as I need to work on my technique, my timing, and also deliver a strong performance.

My first competition was three months ago, and although I did well, I feel like I dance terribly. Unfortunately, it’s not just in my head. I’ve watched videos, and I look stiff, I often lose my balance, and so on. I feel like after so many months I should be more stable and my technique should be better, but instead I feel like I’ve hit a plateau.

I would really like to hear from other Latin dancers, how long did it take you to notice a real improvement in your dancing and start feeling satisfied with your performance?

Bought a pair of ballroom shoes with 5cm heels online. The first pair was actually too big, it had some allowance when I tried them on and walked and danced with them. It kept slipping off and I kept stumbling(?)/rolling over the heels. Got another pair, 2 sizes down. It fits, it doesnt slip off the foot... but I have no idea if the tightness around the foot is good? My toes dont hurt but a little cramped against the toe end of the shoe... Unsure if this is safe and worth it to break in for a performance. ://

Hello! I'm looking to buy standard shoes for competitions and was wondering how acceptable it would be to get a lower heel, maybe 1.5" like in the picture below. I have 2.5" heels right now and they're a pain, and I'm also 5'11" so a big heel can make me tower over my partner. Ik the norm is 2 inches at the lowest, but would something like this be super unusual?

https://preview.redd.it/b7itn9mbf0xg1.png?width=500&format=png&auto=webp&s=4512d9e14b72b1dac57544470675eb452324e9f1

Hi I am attending the Concordia Ball solo next month in Vienna. Always a bit scary to go alone so I was wondering if anyone else is going, would like to meet up at the ball? :)