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Hip to Side

Head and upper body are erect, arms relaxed to the side, feet should be together, weight on one foot whose knee is relaxed. The other foot knee is flexed and bent towards the foot carrying the body's weight. The upper body movement should be responsible for the transfer of body's weight from one foot to the other.

This is a part of the natural body movement. It occurs naturally or else one can not walk. Also when waiting in a queue for cinema tickets, or for a bus or such other examples, many tend to stand on one foot and let the hip settle to one side in a relaxed manner.

Single movement
Stand with feet together, keeping the back erect and the arms and the legs are relaxed. Although the whole foot is kept flat on the floor, one should experience about 80 percent of one's weight on the ball of the foot. This will result in the body being slightly tilted forward.

Now transfer full body's weight on to the left foot, and allow the hip to relax in this position. Thus the hip shifts more to the left.

Next is to relax the knee and ankle of the right foot. Thus the toes of the right foot remain in contact with the floor and the right heel is lifted up. Without turning the foot pull the flexed right knee more inwards to the left foot.

This relaxing of the right foot will swing the hip further to the left.

As the hip is swinging to the left just exert a slight force, so as to feel the hip swing like elastic, only slightly beyond the normal resting position for the hip.

Soon after the force relax and let the hip swing beyond the normal resting position. Once the hip has reached its maximum the natural body reaction would pull the hip back. It is very important to feel this particular feeling, as this reaction is to be made use of to move the hip to the other side.

In addition to this slightly tightening of the left buttock muscles, and a slight flick from the right knee to the right, will help in moving the hip to the right effortlessly.

This exercise needs to be done very consciously to feel the reaction from the body due to elasticity. Making use of such reactions will give the effect of smooth pendulum like effect, especially when reaching one extreme and then changing the direction thereafter.

The navel will follow the semicircular path when performing this exercise. When the hip is to one extreme the navel is at the lowest height. When the hip is in the centre the navel is at the greatest height. And as the hip moves towards the other side the navel starts coming down from the maximum height.

Similarly repeat the hip movement to the other side.

Also note that the body weight should be only on one foot. And when transferring weight from one foot to the other, the weight is first taken on the ball of the foot, and the same foot heel is lowered slowly.

The counts for this exercise are when the hip is at one extreme. Thus the counts would be 1, 2, 3, 4... And so on.

This is one more animated and self-explanatory picture is added should you have difficulty in the exercise given above. Start with feet apart, keeping a comfortable gap between the feet, and try the exercise as shown in the picture. The head and the shoulders more or less remain in the centre.

Shoulder Movement for Single Movement
Stand square to a reference wall, with the arms stretched to the sides. The elbows remain in the same plane as the shoulders. Flex the forearms from the elbows such that the out stretched fingers are in line with the forearm. The fingers are a few inches, two to three, from the chest. When turning the shoulders, care should be taken of avoid the fingers from folding and the arms should remain in the same plane as the two shoulders. The fingers and the thumb are kept together and are closest to the body when the shoulders are turned maximum, to one side. This gap increases gradually as the shoulders turn to normal position. The gap between the fingers and the chest is largest when the shoulders are square to the reference wall. Also the gap between the left and the right hand should remain constant through out the exercise.

The Turning of the shoulders should always precede the hip movement.

Head turning is also essential. For this look at a point at eye level, and trace this point all around one's self in the same plane. The eyes should always look straight ahead. The head turns in advance of the shoulder movements. Thus the head starts to turn first into position to the side, followed by the shoulders, and immediately next the hips start to move.

Now there are two variations for this exercise. For the forward movement, the shoulders and the head are turned in the same direction of the hip movement. For the backwards movement where the shoulders and the head turn in the opposite direction of the hip movement.

This exercise is a spot-exercise. However the tendency to progressively move steadily forward or backward subconsciously could be there, with respect to whether the exercise is meant for the forward or backward movement.

The last part here is to practice the above exercise, with a stool or a chair balanced lightly on the fingers of the two hands.

Double Movement
Here the hip is moved to one extreme, then using the reaction it is brought slightly to the centre and the relaxed. This will move the hip back to the same side. Once this is effected the hip is then moved to the other side. Thus the hip will oscillate twice to the same side.

The counts here to be used are "1, &, 2" which is pronounced as "1, and, 2". Thus for "1" the hip is to one extreme side, for "and" the hip is somewhere near the centre, and for "2" it is in the same position as for "1". The counts of "1, &, 2" could be replaced with "3, &, 4" when performing the exercise to the other side. Therefore for a complete cycle the counts would be "1, &, 2 -- 3, &, 4". After the counts of "2" and "4" give a small pause. Thus the counts could sound as "one and two ooo" and "three and fooo-our"

Similarly the counts of "2, &, 3" and "4, &, 1" could be used to get used to such a count especially for the dances like the Rumba and Cha Cha Cha.

Similarly hip can be moved four times to the side, to help in a figure called "Volta" in the dance Samba. The counts here would be "1, &, 2, &, 3, & 4" and "5, &, 6, &, 7, &, 8".

More the area of colour, more is the time duration for a step. Yellow is for the first step, White for the "&" step, and Grey for the last step.

Chasse
Chasse is a French word, which means that one-foot chasing the other. The feet are moved such that it appears that one foot is chasing the other.

Take the starting position with weight on one foot, in this case the left foot for the purpose of this exercise.

To start, move the right foot to the side with a big but comfortable gap, which we will call as distance 1. Immediately bring the left foot to the right foot and take weight on the left foot. In this position the feet are together and the right foot is free. Next move the right foot to the side; the gap here should be lesser than half that of distance 1.

It is repeated to the other side, now starting with the left foot.

It is important to move the hips like it's mentioned above, and one should positively experience this hip movement as the main movement that actually moves the feet.

Thus the chasse would be a set of three steps to one side and then to the other. The counts for this could be either (a) "1, &, 2" and "3, &, 4" or (b) "2, &, 3" and "4, &, 1".

Generally speaking the first count takes three fourth time of the first beat and the count of "&" takes one fourth of the remaining time of the first beat, and the last count on one side takes one complete beat. Thus a chasse of three steps takes two beats.

In Pairs
Here two dancers stand square to one another, balancing a notebook between them, between the hip and the lower part of the ribcage. Both exert a forward force just enough to get a feel of the body movement and to maintain a steady and a comfortable contact. In this case it may not be possible to fully lower the entire foot that is suppose to carry the body weight. But this doesn't hinder the essence of the exercise. Care should be taken to avoid kicking each other with the knees.