Ballroom Dancing - Foxtrot Rise and Fall

Hi, I am Terry Dean from Terry Deans Dance Studio. Were teaching you the foxtrot. In the foxtrot were going to have a rise and fall action; this is kind of an up and down action that takes you down on your knees and up on your toes. So, the basic thing that you are going to have to learn to do is to rise in your toes so that your heels come up. Now what we call this is foot rise; so when my feet come up, thats foot rise, when my knees straighten, thats what we call body rise. Now in the foxtrot were going to mainly have foot rise; and so we are not going to get really, really high up, were just going to kind of lift up our heels as were doing it. And of course, the falling part of rise and fall is going to be the lowering of the knee and going down. So when were doing the basic steps, were still going to have some rise and fall. In the basic foxtrot, the first two steps are the walking steps, and they go down; and you stay down for both steps, then on the side steps were going to go up and then come back down at the end of the second one. So let me demonstrate this without a partner and then well do it back again. So I am going to do two forward steps, I am going to go down and will do walk, walk, then as I do my sidestep, I am going to go up on the toes, close my feet and lower - and then I am ready to go down on my walking step again. So again, it has walk, walk, down, then up in the toes for a side, together, and lower.

Again, Cindy and I will demonstrate. First action we do is go down and then we do walk, walk, then we go up, side together and come back down again. Walk, walk, side together and back down. So always important that when you come down, you come down softly, so you dont come down harsh. These are considered smooth dances, so its very important that you keep it nice and soft and nice and smooth. One more demonstration; walk, walk, up, down, down, down, up, down, thats the rise and fall in foxtrot.

The next thing were going to do is the Swing and the Sway.