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Learn how to swing dance from dance champion Robert Royston in these free Howcast dance videos. It’s easy to learn top swing dance moves with these tutorials!
Transcript To spice up your West Coast Swing a little bit, we’re going to show you a turning basic with an inside turn to a dip – how to dip the ladies. So it looks like this: walk, walk, triple step, triple step, rock step, inside turn, dip the ladies, and when you’re ready come …
Transcript Hi. My name is Robert Royston. I’ve dance in film, on Broadway and in television. I do about 27 different styles of dance. But the style of dance that launched my career was swing dancing. In 1985 when I was just a teenager and some lady asked me if I knew how to swing …
Transcript The whip with a single outside turn. So remember, an inside turn, hand comes to the inside of the body. Outside turn, lead hand goes away from the body. We take our basic whip. And we go one, two, three and four. Keeping this hand very long and open, that arm, as I go …
Transcript The locked whip. Now a locked whip is a little bit different. It’s still eight counts. Walk walk triple. Walk walk triple. But the lady’s going to walk all the way forward, straight no turn, and then straight back. Now some places in the country, by the way, call this a basket whip. Locked …
Transcript The West Coast Swing Whip with an inside turn looks like this, one, two, three and four, five, six, seven and eight. So you take a basic whip where we have one, two, three, and, but as I cross on the three, as I cross on four, the left hand starts to come up …
Transcript The Texas Tommy, or whip with the hand change behind the back can happen from close position or open position. We’ll go ahead start it from close position as if it’s the back end of your swing out. It looks like this. One, two, three and four, five, six, seven, and eight. From here, …
Transcript The West Coast Swing Whip, which is our first 8-count timing in West Coast Swing. The whip is walk, walk, triple, walk, walk, triple. If we just did that in place, I go left, she goes right, walk, walk, triple step, walk, walk, triple step. That’s basic whip timing. What’s going to happen on …
Transcript The Swivels, or Lindy Swivels. Coming off of the swing out looks like this. One, two, three and four, five, six, seven, and eight. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. One, two, three and four, five, six, seven and eight. So what we’re doing with the Lindy Swivels off of a swing …
Transcript The West Coast Swing Sugar Push So remember that the West Coast Swing basic is walk, walk, triple step, triple step. East Coast Swing has a rock step, West Coast Swing has as walk walk. So, walk, walk, triple step, triple step. I start left, she starts right. The Sugar Push looks like this …
Transcript The turning basic for West Coast Swing. We start from the open position. I’m going to bring the ladies in. We’re going to go walk, walk. Just like we would for a whip, but from here I’m going to really circle this around. Triple step. Triple step. And she can rock step. Rock step. …
Transcript The West Coast Swing under arm turn, sometimes called the right side pass. We start from the open position. Nicola is going to take her two walking steps forward. Guys are going to step back and get out of the way. Let’s show it to you, like this. Walk, walk, triple step, triple step, …
Transcript The West Coast Swing Sugar Tuck. So it comes off of a sugar push where I would bring the ladies forward and then swing them back in the sugar push. The difference is going to be that my left hand comes up, walk, walk. Now you could do this as a touch step or …
Transcript Let’s go swing, left side pass. From here, open position. Ladies are gonna do the walk, triple, triple. Exact same footwork you would do in an underarm turn. Guys, yours is a little bit different. You’re actually gonna step completely out of the way on count one, moving out of the way so she …
Transcript The East Coast Swing under arm turn with a hand change comes from open position, looks like this. Triple step, triple step, rock step, triple step, triple step, rock step. So what we’ve done is a basic under arm turn from the open position. We’ve gone triple step, triple step, rock step. Same prep …
Transcript The Bowtie, or also known as the cross arm slide in East Coast Swing looks like this. Triple step, triple step, rock step, triple, triple step, rock step, triple step, triple step, rock step. So what you’re going to do is take your basic triple step, triple step, rock step. You’re going to lift …
Transcript The basic Lindy swing out. It’s an eight-count pattern that goes rock step, triple step, walk, walk, triple step. It looks like this. Rock step, triple step, walk, walk, triple step. Rock step, triple, triple, walk, walk, triple step. So what we’re going to do here, the swing out, we’re swinging her out to …
Transcript The east coast swing barrel role; It is going to come off of your underarm turn with a hand change. So, we are going to go, triple step, triple step, rock step. You are going to end up right to right. You are going to do some kind of underarm with a hand change, …
Transcript Getting lady to the sweetheart position in East Coast Swing. So we’re going to take this, you’re going to have to end up right to right. We’re going to take it from an under arm turn with a hand change, but somehow you’re going to have to get right to right. So as we …
Transcript The Tandem Charleston in Lindy Hop From close position, just like we would start for the swing out, we’re going to take the rock step and instead of doing a triple step, we’re going to do our Charleston step. So we’re going to go rock step, kick step, back, and a rock step, kick …
Transcript The wrap in, wrap out in East Coast Swing starts from an open position. What’s going to happen is your left hand is going to go up, your right hand is going to go down. So we’ll show it to you first. We’re going to go, triple, triple step, rock step, wrap her up, …
Transcript The elbow turn in East Coast Swing comes from a closed position. It looks like this. Triple step, triple step, rock step, grab the elbow, turn around, rock step, grab the elbow, turn around, rock step, and you’re back into closed position. What we’re doing here is a type of tuck turn. We’re going …
Transcript The left side pass in East Coast Swing. We call it a left side pass because she passes by my left side, but she does not go underneath an arm. You can do this from closed position or you can do it from open position. We’ll show you both, but first from open. We …
Transcript The triple step. One of the few common denominators done in all styles of swing. What you’re doing with the triple step is putting three steps into two beats of music, so if the rhythm was [snap , snap], those two beats, I’m going to do three steps, in that period of time. So …
Transcript The tuck turn with a free spin as done in East Coast Swing looks like this. Triple step, triple step, rock step, tuck, turn, rock step. So what we’re going to do is take our open basic position. You could do this as well from close, but we’ll take this from the open. We’re …
Transcript Double time swing. It’s step that we use if the music is a little too fast to do triple steps. Now there’s two different styles of double time swing depending on what you’re doing. In East Coast Swing or Lindy Hop there’s a particular type of double style swing that you do. In West …
Transcript The under arm turn in East Coast Swing. So, it looks like this. We’re going to start from what we call an open position. That’s a two hand hold. We’re going to go triple step, triple step, rock step, triple step, triple step, rock step. So what you’re going to do is take your …
Transcript The she-he turn, or she turns, he turns for East Coast Swing. We start from the open position, much like you would do for an under arm turn. We’re going to go triple step, triple step, same step on the rock step that you would do for the under arm turn, rock step. She …
Transcript East Coast Swing, one of the first styles of swing taught at ballroom studios here in America. What we’re going to start off with is your triple steps. I’m going to start left, Nicola is going to start right. We’re going to go step, together, step, then to the other side, step, together, step. …
Transcript Single time swing. Single time swing is a very fast rhythm for swing. It’s when the music is so fast that you can’t triple step and you can’t do the double time, so all you’re going to do is take a slow step. A slow step is one step for two beats of music, …
Transcript The Shorty George, one of the stable moves that you should have in your Lindy Hop, East Coast Swing, and West Coast Swing repertoire. Looks like this. We’re going to talk about how to do that. I’m going to turn my back to you for just a second, and you’re going to try it …
Transcript So what can you dance Swing to? What types of Swing music are there? Well, there’s Swing music like Big Band jazz, and the Swing rhythms that we think of when we think of, like. When we think of that really fast, upbeat. So a Lindy Hop might sound something like this. It’s fast, …
Transcript The best way to learn any dance is to practice the elements that make up that dance, much like practicing your scales on a piano. If you learn to read music and you learn your scales, you can play any song put in front of you. Same type of thing when it comes to …
Transcript There are many types of swing done throughout the world. It started here in America, but there are styles happening all over, in Germany, and England, and France, and Brazil, and Australi,a and New Zealand. But the main styles that are done here are styles like East Coast Swing, West Coast Swing, Lindy Hop, …
Transcript The Charleston step — One of the key elements to understanding swing. Most of us think of Charleston as this little back and forth, kind of underneath us, Charleston step. It’s similar to that for swing dancing, but it gets a little bit more athletic. We still do want to think that what’s going …
Transcript Swing dancing is one of the few forms of couple’s dances that started here in America in the late 1920s. The word swing comes from a style of jazz music that was being done in the late 20s where they took what was called a triplet, a triplet is where you take three beats …
