What am I looking at?
This is a video taken from the private waacking class I took with a girl named Jayshri. She is a well-known dancer in the street dance community. She is known for her freestyling, being the leader of Epsom Girls Grammar's Bring It On (a secondary school hiphop dance competition) as well as being in the dance crew, Sample. I knew that she had been training in waacking for a few months, with the OG's of waacking over in Los Angeles, so I asked if she could share her knowledge with me and my friend by teaching us the foundations of waacking because I have never learnt proper waacking foundations. Ive only ever seen it on Youtube or in dance sets. In this video, I recorded only segments of the waacking class. She also has alot of knowledge about the style and how it should be executed when dancing, so I got her to speak of what she knows about the style. We both asked her questions at the end of the class. The lady who lended me out the camera, gave me another snapshot camera and again, it couldnt hold more than 5 minutes worth of video. I was so disappointed because Jayshri spoke alot about the foundations of waacking and where it originated from before we started our class. I recorded it but later, had to delete in order to get footage of me actually participating in her class. I took a few notes which are on my phone though. Here are my notes:
This is a video taken from the private waacking class I took with a girl named Jayshri. She is a well-known dancer in the street dance community. She is known for her freestyling, being the leader of Epsom Girls Grammar's Bring It On (a secondary school hiphop dance competition) as well as being in the dance crew, Sample. I knew that she had been training in waacking for a few months, with the OG's of waacking over in Los Angeles, so I asked if she could share her knowledge with me and my friend by teaching us the foundations of waacking because I have never learnt proper waacking foundations. Ive only ever seen it on Youtube or in dance sets. In this video, I recorded only segments of the waacking class. She also has alot of knowledge about the style and how it should be executed when dancing, so I got her to speak of what she knows about the style. We both asked her questions at the end of the class. The lady who lended me out the camera, gave me another snapshot camera and again, it couldnt hold more than 5 minutes worth of video. I was so disappointed because Jayshri spoke alot about the foundations of waacking and where it originated from before we started our class. I recorded it but later, had to delete in order to get footage of me actually participating in her class. I took a few notes which are on my phone though. Here are my notes:
- Punking (another dance style) similar to waacking
- Waacking created out of black men imitating white women "beauty" in 70s
- Anna Sanchez: LA based, well-known waacker
- Dallas Zeliga: Youtube him. Well-known waacker
- Came out of an opression. Finding an escape. Expressing yourself.
-
Studios teach themselves how to move our own bodies: we should learn
how to move them ourselves. Practice practice practice!! Freestyles!!!
- Waacking = very theatrical: costumes, posing, character
What do I see?
In terms of the dance genre and body movement, Jayshri mentioned that I have good posture and the technique of the style on point. I didnt get enough footage of my self dancing and of Jayshri talking for me to fully analyse my body movements or how I did in the class. I was given another snapshot camera and it could only hold a maximum of 5 minutes worth of video so I was quite disappointed. But from what is on the footage, I noticed that my body movements when doing waacking is very flowy. Jayshri describes the style as showing off your femininity but still keeping it very high class. I need to use different drills, or different combinations of waacking moves together so Im not doing the same thing over and over.
How does it relate to my idea?
While taking this class, I noticed that I need to develop on my own style. This was my first time freestyling and it was completely out of my comfort zone. I am what Jayshri calls, "a choreo kid". A choreo kid is someone who does strictly choreography. They take dance classes, dance in groups, dance for gigs and competitions with set movements but it is someone who is not capable of freestyling. As a dancer, I think it is important to be able to know your own body and the limits it has and what you are able to do with it. Not being able to freestyle is a little disappointing for me as it is a way of expressing yourself through movement and it is something I want to be able to develop on. Freestyling is not something that can be learnt in a classroom though. If I want to develop on my freestyling, I need to spend time at home to work on it.
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