A phenom dancer does not a fab instructor make. Aka, great dancer ≠ great teacher.
I don’t care how talented you are on the dance floor, if you’re teaching a class—TEACH, don’t just expect the entire class to thank their lucky stars that they’re breathing the same rarified air as you for an hour.
To be fair, the dance student also has responsibilities in the dance class. When I go into a class, I have a positive attitude, and most importantly, I’m open to whatever style the instructor is offering. My job for the hour is to do my best to master what the instructor is giving me. Like when I'm asked to channel Fred Astaire, when I'd prefer to mimic Gregory Hines.
As someone who has been both student and instructor, I’m amazed at the disparity in quality of dance instruction at just about every studio (most of them very reputable) I’ve ever been to from California to New York.
Should you ever find yourself pent up in Orange County, CA and aching to take dance classes, you may wind up at Jimmie DeFore Dance Center in Costa Mesa. Tonight I took at Tap 3 (Intermediate) level tap class with Pauline Hagino. As usual, I was running a few minutes late (got lost again), so I was surprised when I rushed into an ecclesiastically quiet studio 3. I had been expecting to jump into a warm-up of shuffles, thirds, etc. Instead, we spent the first 30 minutes of the class at the bar going through Pilates-esque stretches. That’s half the class. Half.
I spent the first 15 minutes intermittently wondering when we’d start the tap part of the tap class – not totally unreasonable of me since I’d just paid for what was advertised as a tap class (yeah, it bears repeating). I spent the second 15 minutes abandoning myself to the stretches. The open-to-anything part of me took over, and I decided to see what this teacher was all about. After all, I wasn’t opposed to Pilates; I’d spent a year in twice-weekly private sessions.
The third 15 minutes were spent in more typical exercises involving shuffles, touches, brushes, cramp-rolls, draw-backs, and stomps. P.Hagino didn’t give much explanation, but then again, I suppose the patterns didn’t really require them. So far, the class had been unconventional, then conventional.
Within the last 15 minutes, the instructor ran through several bars of choreography (more later on why I don’t know exactly how many) – about 8 bars at a time without pause and at tempo – then expected everyone to pick it up without any explanation. I did pick up the general gist of things by the third or fourth run-through (as did most of the class), but I shouldn’t have had to go it alone when there was an instructor in front of me.
To give credit where it’s due, the rhythms were fresh and swinging. I would have loved to know more about the choreography. I waited for the end of the class to ask the instructor to demonstrate the choreography so that I could videotape it, but she couldn’t be bothered. “No, actually, today, I have to run. Sorry,” she said, though she didn’t seem to mean it.
After spending a paltry 10 minutes or so sprinting through choreography, the least she could have done is demonstrated it on tape. Especially since a demo on tape would have been equivalent to her greatest level of instruction thus far. Aside from this, I left with an overall feeling of loss – had she not gone through the half hour of stretching, she might have actually taught some tap dancing. It’s a shame, too. She has plenty to offer, she just doesn’t know how to communicate it.
Notes on other classes:
Hip hop with Tim Stevenson (moatmusic.com) – Highly recommended. Every level he teaches (from beginning to advanced) is infused with his flavor. His more advanced dancers often go to his lower level classes because they can still get something out of it. This is the kind of class that shapes you into a better dancer. The first week was a little hard because I wasn’t used to his style (mad multi-limb organ coordination); the second week was much better. I loved this class.
Low-Intermediate Tap with C. Speer – She had an advanced tap student sub for her, so it’s difficult to comment. The sub spent most of the class asking permission to teach steps, or sharing private jokes with a friend she had in the class. Very unprofessional, and I didn’t get anything out of this class. Students were low level. Class was more like a very beginning level.
Low-Intermediate Tap with D. Dalpiaz – Not terrible, but also not as challenging as I was hoping for. The instructor has a kind demeanor, but I’m not sure her classes would prepare students for the next level. Students were low level. In NYC, this would also be a beginner’s class. I took Adv. Beginning/Low-Intermediate classes at DeFore to feel out the studio, but I found that overall, the actual dance levels are much lower than the equivalently named classes in New York.
I’ll have to keep in mind what I appreciate and critique in other instructors since I’ll be teaching dance in Shanghai next week!
