Beginning Balboa

Beginning Balboa and Bal-Swing: Sylvia Sykes and Nick Williams


These disks about beginner Balboa and beginner Bal-Swing are done by two of the current best known Balboa teachers: Sylvia Sykes and Nick Williams. If you’ve taken a class from either of them on Balboa or Bal-Swing, these DVDs are very like those classes; they’re relaxed, long on description, and a bit short on things you can follow along with until they’re done talking. It seems they talk more than “do” – which is too bad because a beginner won’t know the difference between a digression and a really important point. The key to learning is repetition of simple things – not “extra” material.

Balboa is a simple dance with a skill set - like riding a bicycle - that takes more practice than theory. Nick and Sylvia make learning Balboa as easy as they can, but you have to do a lot more work than suggested here. Hint - get a dance buddy and do the basic a million times! And keep in mind they’ve been doing Balboa and Bal-Swing for decades – when you’ve been doing this for decades, you’ll be more relaxed too. And, you may get a little annoyed that they didn’t carefully edit out “flubs” and/or that it’s not always easy to figure out what they’re really talking about, but this is how they roll in real life.

There probably really isn’t much new to say about an 80-year old dance, nor many new ways to say it. What they do stress here is to keep the beat with your body at all times. Those wondering why Downholds can feel so weird in such a fast dance can find the answer here: they shouldn’t - keep pulsing through them. There’s also here an emphasis, on the Bal-Swing DVD, on the “Out and In” as critical to Bal-Swing. Of course it is… Understanding the “out and in” steps – and ten thousand practice steps - leads directly to a (now easy) “come around” move that’s the beating heart of most your Bal-Swing…

The moves on these DVDs aren’t the same moves in the same order that I’d have picked. For Balboa I’d have focused on closed embrace moves - moves you do in an extremely crowded spot – basic in place, paddles left and right, 1-2s and 5-6s forward and back, crab walks to the sides, and Zigzags. For Bal-Swing I’d have gone with the Come-around and a couple of guy and girl turns. Plenty for beginners - and a lot to build on...

Marcus Koch and Barbl Kaufer’s older Balboa disks, done with Steve and Denise and available at Danceflix too, have tons more “how to,” “moves,” and more history for all levels, but these DVDs are true to the style and focus of these two teachers who are currently teaching this same material for beginners around the world. Nothing wrong with checking either out and picking up what you can. It’s how the good get better.