When I think our troupe once danced with candles and silk veils :shok:
:shok:!
WOT! Surely you didn't do anything crazy like LIGHT the candles...!!
I've heard both "weight in heels" and "weight equally distributed" from my teachers, but the majority have emphasized weight in the heels, so that is the dance stance that feels most natural to me -- in fact, more than a couple have said the weight should be far enough in your heels that you can wiggle your toes most of the time.
:shok:!
WOT! Surely you didn't do anything crazy like LIGHT the candles...!!
I must confess, I got up, did my dance stance, and realized that I too can wiggle my toes even with my weight evenly distributed between the ball of the foot and the heel. It never would have occurred to me to tell my students they need to be able to wiggle their toes, though. So long as they evenly distribute weight between the ball and heel most of the time, I'm satisfied.
Do you think teachers encourage toe wiggling to prevent the student from gripping the floor with the toes (like a bird's talons gripping a branch) which can lead to muscle strain and actually broken bones in the toes?
Do you think teachers encourage toe wiggling to prevent the student from gripping the floor with the toes (like a bird's talons gripping a branch) which can lead to muscle strain and actually broken bones in the toes? (Kind of like how trainers will make you wiggle your fingers when you're lifting weights) ?
One thing I have been noticing in my own dancing is that when my weight comes forward, I engage my thighs more to drive hip movements. This creates a very different look from the hip movements often taught in tribal fusion that come primarily from the abdominals (with the legs working but mostly just to make room for the pelvis to move).
Also, bringing my rib cage forward, rather than keeping it aligned with my feet, makes it much more tempting for me to release my pelvic tuck, but that could just be because I am used to the other stance.
What I often see beginner students doing is not so much clawing the floor with their toes as using the front part of the foot to drive hip movement, even to the extent of coming up on half toe, especially for figure 8s. This bad habit may give them something that "looks" right when they are standing still, but if they're using their toes to push the hip up, as soon as they start trying to walk with any kind of hip movement it turns into some very strange stuff
So maybe that's where the emphasis on "wiggling toes" has come from -- trying to keep beginner students from pushing with the front part of the foot?