Viennese Ball 2026

Another ball came and went.  I've lost count of how many I've been to at this point, but the last post is here, to keep the chain going, I guess.

Apparently last year I wrote that the ball went by quicker than I expected, and that I needed to rest a lot after participating in the cross-step waltz contest.  That seems to be becoming more the norm, somehow.  I feel like a big part of the ball this year was doing one contest, being really tired, resting while watching another one, then doing a third one.  It's crazy how much energy I can expend in these things.

I think I'm getting a healthier and healthier attitude toward them in general, also.  Practice makes perfect, I guess?  After doing things enough times, they just don't really seem like they are as big of a deal anymore.  In most cases, for how I like to live life, that's a good thing.  Honestly, I'm just glad I survived the night; thanks to trying really hard in the contests and then also probably partly due to my suspenders being a bit too tight, I was really really sore and tired after it all, like more than normal.  One of my dance partners was also at limited physical capacity due to other extenuating circumstances, so I'm just glad everyone just made it through alright.

I'm also happy that the waltz contests had some great showings!  Thinking back to the days where I felt like we were completely showed up by what went down in the swing room, I am happy that the waltz crowd is showing up and stepping up as best they can.  As a more vernacular form of dance we will perhaps never have the infrastructure and history that the other dances have, but there is a reason it is still always my "home dance" even despite all that.

It was nice to have a buddy to go to the ball with!  Something that I feel like has really not been part of my regular experience before, and it makes a big difference, as you might expect.  Life's moments are usually nicer when they are shared, especially when it's events and such like these.

It felt like I had more people this year come up to me and talk to me about appreciating my performances this year.  Or maybe my memory of the past years is just foggy, but it really did feel like more (random) people came up to me this year.  That was a nice feeling!  It really validated why I keep participating in these things in the first place (and why I keep saying no when I'm asked to judge them).

I think there have been times in the past when I have been more stuck-up about my dancing, and had some sort of weird superiority complex where I really thought I was "all that".  To be fair, I'm sure with the number of years I've been to these things, there were =some= years where maybe that was true.  But I think I've had enough time to know that my dancing has weaknesses and pitfalls, too.  I don't just mean the fact that I don't lead dips, lifts, or aerials either, there are concrete things about my lines, my form, my control, even my stage presence, that are not really on par with the rest of my dancing.  Some of that has been stuff that I've thought about at times, others of them I have not really tried to even work on much, but most of doesn't really come naturally to me, so progress is always slow.  It was easier to focus on what I understood best, what I prioritized as being most important in my own dancing.  The things that I point out to people when I give them private lessons -- leading and following technique, continuity in patterns.  I guess musicality too, but that one is rarely covered in lessons, heh.

There are many things that I would consider "fundamental principles" that aren't really followed by people who don't know better.  When we think about the principles of connection and movement in West Coast Swing, there is a lot of emphasis on linear or lateral inertia, momentum, and tension and compression.  There are analogues to all of those things in a rotational dance as well.  There are proper ways to facilitate a change in rotation, much the same as there are proper ways to do a change of direction.  There is not only such thing as rotational inertia but also rotational elasticity.

That all said, I think part of what draws me to admire solo dancers is that their skillset epouses things that I lack in my own dancing, but put forth in a way that's, frankly, really awesome.  That is not to say that these things like posture, form, line, and body control are not important in partner dancing, but you can, to a large extent, be a successful partner dancing while neglecting a few, or even most of these things.  That is a reason that I'm always keen at observing people who come from a following background and then learn to lead -- not just because they are predominantly women and I think girls who lead are cool, but because experienced follows on some level gain experience (whether through intentional practice or intuition) about how to utilize their free arm, how to develop a curve, how to maintain a certain poise and balance that is required for all of the figures they move through.  As a leader you can certainly utilize a free arm in so far as it benefits the mechanics of your motion, but so rarely is it the focus of our attention.  Of course, different disciplines treat this kind of thing differently; ballroom dance for example puts more of an emphasis on this sort of thing.

Well, things to aspire to, I guess, or perhaps not.  There is only so much time I am willing to spend on betterment of my dancing.  These days I have almost zero improvement momentum in partner dance, and of course I'd probably rather see improvements in my solo dancing anyways.  Form, shape, and line.  I guess these are things that I ought to spend some minutes on every time I go out dancing.