How to Lead & Follow in Salsa Dancing

Video Transcript

Before we move on, we want to talk a little about lead and follow. Again, the man is in charge. He's the one who's going to be leading everything. Ladies, it's our job to follow. In order to do that effectively, we need to talk about arm tension. If you have loosey goosey arms, we call them spaghetti arms, you're not going to be able to feel what the guys wants you to do. We're going to give you an exercise that will help you figure out how to give the right arm tension. Both of you stand feet shoulder width apart. The pistol grip that we talked about earlier guys, you're going to give 2 pistol grips. Ladies, you're going to rest of your hands on top. We want to be with both of our elbows next to our body, meaning they're not out in front and they're not behind. That's the correct distance. When both of our elbows are next to our body, they create a right angle here like an L, and our hands can touch. That's the perfect distance. We don't want to be our here or in like this. This is the correct distance. The rules are number 1: you have to keep your elbows next to your body. They can't come in front. They can't go behind. Rule number 2:no thumbs. Guys, don't squeeze the girls hands with your thumbs. Just rest them. What we're going to do is both just press in toward each other together like this pushing and pulling. Notice, we're not doing this and that. We're keeping our arms still. We're just leaning into each other and pulling away. This establishes the proper arm tension. Here's the rule. Girls, when the guy pushes, you push back. When he pulls, you pull away. That's the foundation of lead and follow. If you just react to what he's doing, you'll be fine.

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