Bullet to the Ankle

As anyone following this blog can see, the weekly entries faded out awhile back. It looks like my experiment of writing without an outline or an agenda will end with a whimper instead of a bang.

I started in September 2004 saying I would blog about my experiences as a beginning tap dancer until the June 2005 recital. Three things have gotten in the way of that plan.

First, because I have been writing about real people and Annette's business, from the start I told her that she could censor any entries or comments that could harm her business or hurt her students. She has been quite reasonable. But what I didn't foresee is that when the juicy entertaining stuff starts happening, such as petty spats between individuals or someone really making an ass of themselves (that is, besides me!), there is never a situation where it's OK to write about it here. Through hard experience, Annette and I have learned that when you put something in writing, you have to assume that sooner or later the one person you hope will never see it, will see it. We both firmly believe that. But it really sucks the fun out of writing when you have to avoid all dramatic conflict.

Second, in December, Annette decided there would be no Spring recital. While her adolescent students have always been jazzed about the recitals, her adult students didn't think it was worth much effort. Leading up to the Christmas recitals, half the dancers missed half the rehearsals, for reasons ranging from compelling to totally feeble. The owner of the dance studio, trying to recoup the expense of renting a large theater for the recital, added a mandate that anyone who wanted to be in the next recital had to purchase at least six tickets for the "privilege" of getting to perform. Annette knew that idea was a non-starter with the barely-motivated adults. So. no recital. I hung in there, thinking she'd change here mind. But it is now April and she hasn't altered her conclusion one molecule; it is now too late to rehearse a Spring recital. So now my big story has no finale.

Third: To an unprecedented extent, the tap class is petering out. Readers of my early entries will remember my introducing dancers, such as Bembebe, Valerie, Joan, the Giggling Girlies, and others. I expected that, as in years past, this class would more or less stick together through the months and we would get to track these people's lives. But they've all faded away – some for health reasons; some for business reasons; and some for reasons we'll never know. In January, the class was rejuvenated when four of my friends from work, including my boss, joined. Then I was really in a quandary: they all know about the blog, and the last thing I'm gonna do is make fun of my boss in public. Even two of them have lost interest over the weeks. Tonight's class had only myself and a 13-year-old girl in attendance. This kind of decline has never happened to Annette before, and we can't explain why it has happened. But it doesn't leave a heck of a lot to write about.

So, you won't see me writing here very much. But I am not officially giving the blog a bullet to the head. It's more like a bullet to the ankle. If the classes revive or something comes up worth writing about, I'll write. But the commitment to dependably, regularly add material here has ended.

Thanks to all my readers, and especially those who chose to comment, for fantastic encouragement and for sharing the joy of discovery with me. I hope you had enough fun reading that you'll join me for future experiments that might arise. (For example, lately I've been crewing on independent films shot around the Seattle area. There is plenty to write about there!) Meanwhile, if you start your own blog, be sure to email me so I can help balance the blogosphere by reading yours. I'll spell the address out, so spambots don't harvest it: lingo dot slinger at verizon dot net. Until later, mind your Face, and don't let the Shucking Fuffles get you down. ##

Chug, Kill the Bug

more from mark Knowles' Tap Dance Dictionary. These are some of the steps and terms learned in Annette's Tap 1 class so far. After a day at work writing techno-babble like "integrated solution with zero-day protection and intelligent layered security," I always dig the simple, colorful names assigned to tap steps.

Chug: A movement in which the heel of the foot is forced to the floor with emphasis, while simultaneously sliding on the foot with a hopping motion causing it to move forward approximately three inches. The name is derived from the "chug-chug" sound of a train. Also called a Buck, Heel Thump, Scoot, Skid, or Flea Hop.

Flash: Acrobatic and exciting dance movements. These were often used to finish a dance number.

Paddle Turn: A turn which involves pivoting around on one foot while pushing with the other foot. The body leans towards the pivoting foot and the effect is almost as if one is limping. This turn is often used in Soft Shoe dancing. Also called a Buzz Step. The turn can be embellished by using Flaps instead of Steps. Also called a Tea for Two.

Stamp: Transfer the weight onto the whole foot, usually done with emphasis, as compared to just stepping. Also called a Down, Flat, Flat Step, Step, or Stomp. See Stomp.

Stomp: Strike the floor with the whole foot without transferring the weight. ... The whole foot strikes the floor and is then rebounded back up into the air with a quick jerk, as if stepping onto something hot. Also called Hot Stove or Kill the Bug. ##

Ready to Go

usually, a thrill of anticipation runs through me when theater lights dim and stage lights come up. But I've learned to squelch all positive expectations when attending a dance recital. Because of Annette's job as choreographer and dance instructor, I've attended innumerable recitals, each of them featuring the same interchangeable parts: a diapered chorus line, wobbly ballerinas, arrhythmic tap dancers, and a soulless token hip-hop number. Sitting through yet another recital seems easy, if compared to rats eating your face off.

Even though I sit in the second-to-last row in a large auditorium, I can hear tiny whoops, titters, and lots of shushing coming from backstage. I roll my eyes and slump in my seat. Such noises rarely precede great theater.

Meanwhile, on stage, the lights have just come up to reveal five or six high-school girls dressed in brown earth tones, standing in a circle. The proscenium and the cyclorama dwarf their little circle, isolated in the center of the huge convention center stage. The program lists them as members of Gotta Dance!

"Yeah!" shouts a lady behind me. "Woo!" Nothing has happened yet. She has suspicious amounts of enthusiasm. She must be related to Gotta Dance! somehow, so I sit up and tell Face to behave.

From a superb sound system, steel-string guitar strums fill the theater. This improves my mood immediately. Local dance recitals traditionally begin with a panoply of sound system mishaps, ranging from "is this mike on?" (no), to "lobe-shattering feedback." This system sounds clean and rich, comfortably loud, and I recognize the opening bars of Republica's hit, "Ready to Go." Any self-respecting music critic would agree this song has the historical significance of a paper plate. Even so, its hooky chorus can seriously burrow into your head like an ear worm.

The six dancers launch into an energetic routine, limbs and ponytails flying in all directions. The style is more jazz than tap, but they are good and the choreography is fresh. My spirits pick up.

Soon another six girls in outfits of the same tan, rust, and brown join the first group. Some wear skirts, some wear dresses, some pants, but they all coordinate. A good choreographer can create a lot of shapes, movement, and kinetic energy with a dozen girls, and these young ladies have a great choreographer behind them (and, as it turns out, behind me). I wish I knew the terminology to describe what they are doing. I don't. All I know is, by the time the full rhythm section of electric guitar, bass, and drums drives the song into its first poppy chorus -- "From the rooftops, shout it out, baby I'm ready to go!" -- I am no longer anticipating boredom at the Dance Masters of America benefit. I am rocking in my seat and having a great time.

The verse starts again, the point at which any routine can start to drag due to repetition. But suddenly the Musical Theater Junior Army storms onto the stage, and their sheer numbers electrify the routine. I count as fast as I can: twenty more boys and girls, all wearing coordinated earth tones and tap shoes. The older kids fade into the back row and let the twenty younger kids stamp in chorus. They're not perfect, but they're moving together and it looks impressive.

As the song pounds on in pop rock glory, I find I'm viscerally connecting to the dancers as never before. It is irrational, especially when I have practiced dance on my own a mere two times, but that doesn't stop my heart from singing, I am part of this! I get this! I do this, too! I bounce in my seat like a kid on too much Mountain Dew Code Red.

The Musical Theater Junior Army finishes its 16 bars and fades upstage. Another huge group of dancers runs out. My jaw drops. The audience bursts into whoops and cheers. I know how hard Annette works to get a dozen adults to a class, yet here are a miraculous fifty kids all in one number. And they are not merely going through the motions. They are killing, and they sense it. The dancers have generated some ineffable excitement, and the crowd has locked into it, and together the dancers and crowd pass it back and forth, making it grow.

The song soars on. More platoons of young dancers storm the stage, each joining the pattern of rhythm and movement while raising the energy level. The sound of tapping feet swells until the floorboards shudder like thunder, and the shouts from the audience grow to match it. More kids. More energy. More sound. And the kids' dancing fills Republica's vague anthem with exuberance: From the rooftops, shout it out!

My disbelieving eyes count again. There are literally one hundred kids on stage. Moving in interweaving patterns, they look like a million kids, all dancing their hearts out. It's like being confronted by the zealous might of a Tap Dance Nation.

The music cuts off. The grrl vocals end with a final a cappella phrase: "Baby, I'm ready to go!" The dancers freeze in a carefully structured mob, some prone, some kneeling, taller ones standing in the back, all hundred faces visible and beaming.

The crowd of parents, friends, dance aficionados, and Dance Masters goes nuts. It sounds like The Beatles at the Ed Sullivan Theater, except the adults are just as far gone as the youngsters.

I forget to clap and cheer, because I am all tears.

This completely embarrasses me. When I freelanced as a music reviewer in the 80s, almost nothing moved me. I was so hard on records that my editor finally asked me to lighten up a little. Now here I am, cool guy critic, acting just like those sentimental overweight women with out-dated hairstyles blubbering at a Neil Diamond concert. I am really going to miss mocking them.

I can sit like a stone through any speech, sermon, or demagoguery, on guard against anyone manipulating my thoughts. Talk is made of words and reason, against which I have built formidable barricades. But dance slips past my defenses because it is neither logical nor illogical, but alogical. It simply is. The kids perform, my mind fills with longing for an entire civilization dancing in joy, and the vision catches me totally off guard. My cynicism crumples as promptly as that scimitar warrior that Indiana Jones shot. The sense that I have relationship with that dancing civilization, however tenuous, enchants me. I glimpsed something wonderful, and it glimpsed me back and whispered, "You're included!"

Shut up, man. Just shut up.

That was merely the first four minutes of the recital. I can't believe how efficiently Dance took me apart. Thank the gods of dignity that I have plenty of time before the intermission to hide in the dark and reconstruct my pleasantly unimpressed façade. Ironically, I am now rooting for the rest of the recital not to be so good.

But even after I get it together, behind those dry eyes, I'll be changed. I glimpsed the Dancing Planet. Just tell me what I do to get there, and baby, I'm ready to go. ##

Caught Perrididdling

"i need a step," I tell Annette one night in the kitchen. "If someone says, 'You tap? Show me a little step,' I can't."

"You know lots of steps," Annette says, rinsing off a dinner plate. "Flap, Heel, Shuffle, Truck, Chug --"

"But I can't put them together. I need something, I dunno, self-contained. Like a riff."

"You mean like a time step?"

"Yeah!" Pioneers of tap used the time step as a two-bar intro to show their live accompaniment what tempo to play. The time step has endless variations. I have the tap dance dictionary to prove it. "Uh … is a time step too hard for me?"

Annette gives me her assessing look. She shoves a stray curl behind her ear, and ventures, "I could show you a Perrididdle."

"Cool!" All I know is that drummers do them, too. "What's that?"

Annette tosses her dish towel onto the counter and turns so we face the same direction. She lifts her left foot slightly, then straightens her knee so that her heel strikes the floor, but her toes do not. The rubber sole makes a dull thud. "That's called a Dig," she says. Then she whaps her toes down while jerking her foot back and up, as if the floor were red hot. "Spank," she explains. Then she touches just the toes back to the floor. "Step." She drops her heel with a nice solid thud. "Heel." Her brown eyes check to see if I get it.

"Okay," I say.

She shifts her weight to free up her right foot. "Then you do it on the other side, like this. Dig. Spank. Step. Heel. Then you just alternate." She shows me. Even without her taps on, each foot fires off its four beats evenly and rapidly, the other foot picking up the beat so it all sounds like one continuous tattoo.

"Got it," I say. I mean conceptually. I try a solitary Dig. Mugs hanging from a decorative stand clink together. On the Spank, the toe of my hiking boot sticks to the ground. I pick it up and do a retarded Step, looking like Jerry Lewis learning to tip-toe. On the Heel, spatulas and spoons hanging on the wall tremble.

Irrationally shy about practicing in front of Annette, I say brightly, "I'll work on it! Thanks!"

She shrugs and resumes cleaning the kitchen.

The next night, while she is out teaching classes too advanced for me, I have the house to myself. With my tap shoes on, I blap into the kitchen. Out the sliding glass door, I see the house behind ours with its lit bedroom, kitchen, and TV room glowing golden in the black night. My neighbor to the rear has a TV measuring at least 50 inches, and from my kitchen I can easily recognize what video game he or his son is playing. And if I can see them, they can see me. I seriously consider practicing with the kitchen lights off. Finally, I decide that my lunging and hopping and staggering in the dark would look creepier to the neighbors than just dancing badly in the light.

I warm up with the Shucking Fuffles, and don't totally suck. I hit a few Air Shuffles partway through, but at least I don't scramble for balance like I used to. When Ella finishes singing, I sigh. No more putting it off. Time to Perrididdle.

On the counter next to the Kaboom Box, I find a CD labeled Dirty Vegas. This name evokes slinky grindy lounge music, but when I put it on, it is the kind of cool Brit electronica that sells Mitsubishi Eclipses. I find a mid-tempo song and launch into the Perrididdles.

I watch the ghostly reflection of myself in the sliding glass door. Perhaps when I get good, the ghost dancer will become solid. As I watch my feet cycle through the Perrididdles, for the first time ever, I look like a tap dancer. The faded linoleum yields a satisfying snap even though I am working little. I sound like a tap dancer, too.

Suddenly I love Perrididdles. Like, I can do them! And they go with the music! And they look kinda cool, not like dork tap. I must Make Them My Own.

The song ends and a slightly faster one begins. When I hear the tempo, I catch my breath in dismay. Then I dig in. Hey! I can keep up! Dig Spank Step Heel, Dig Spank Step Heel.

I get rid of Dirty Vegas and throw in another CD at random. It turns out to be James Taylor's October Sky. Song after song, I can Perrididdle to anything in 4/4 time. I test my control by emphasizing different beats: dig Spank Step Heel, dig Spank Step Heel, Dig spank Step Heel, Dig spank Step Heel...

Your average adult contemporary song (think Clapton, Sting, Bonnie Raitt) puts the snare on the third beat of each measure. When I try Dig Spank step Heel, Dig Spank step Heel, the snap! of my Step locks in with the ka! of the snare. I am merely faking my way along, but suddenly it sounds choreographed and professional. A thrill shoots through me. I am da tap dancin' man! Just listen to me!

I discover I can travel the Perrididdles in tiny steps. I groove my way down our long skinny kitchen, tapping a victory lap toward the refrigerator while J. T. lays on the bluesy sax. As I draw near, the refrigerator and the stove jostle together, as if trying to keep straight faces while elbowing one another. Unfazed, I turn and groove my way back to the kitchen table in funky abandon.

That's when I notice the guy in the house behind mine staring out his second-story bedroom window, across my black lawn, to where my kitchen spotlights me. He has the same first name I do, and for a moment he seems like the old me, peering at the dancing me, mystified. I feel so exhilarated, I don't care. Mere mortal concerns fade now that I can dance like the wind. OK, actually, I dance more like Extreme Slow-Motion Hail, but now is not the time to get picky. Now is the time to celebrate. Live to Perrididdle! Perrididdle to live! For tonight, I have my first toe-hold on Tap. ##

B. S. Chorus

It turns out that Annette has a tap dance dictionary. This amuses me endlessly, since describing a tap step in words alone seems like it wouldn't work any better than the reverse -- say, explaining the definition of a chemistry term through interpretive dance alone.

I find I can't stop paging through the thing, even though I don't yet understand the notation defining each step.

First, it seems authoritative. It was written by a guy named Mark Knowles, who learned the steps from his teacher Louis DaPron, who learned the steps from Fred Astaire and Bill Robinson (familiar to more people under his stage name, Mr. Bojangles). Wow!

Second, it gives the oddest glimpses into a time and culture that seems wholly separate from our own, yet still exerts a startling amount of cultural influence. When I tap dance each week with a room full of white-collar professionals, it never occurs to me that we are struggling to learn an art form invented by plantation slaves.

From here forward, I'll occasionally drop a random entry from The Tap Dance Dictionary, by Mark Knowles, into this blog. Here are a couple to get us started. Mr. Knowles authored all the remaining text in this entry.

B.S. Chorus: A traditional vaudeville routine performed by a chorus which combined tap and non-tap and was generally used as a background for tap soloists. The dance earned its name from the relative simplicity of the steps, although naive chorines were told the letters B.S. stood for Boy Scout. Created for a very specific purpose -- to facilitate the use of local talent when vaudeville headliners wanted to add dancers to their acts -- the B.S. Chorus was learned by dancers all over the United States in the 1920s and 1930s. It was kept fairly simple so that chorines could at least fake it, even if they were not terribly accomplished as tap dancers. The dance was made up of the standard thirty-two bars and divided into four sections with eight bars apiece. These four sections generally consisted of:

1. Eight bars of the Time-Step.
2. Eight bars of the Crossover.
3. Eight bars of the Buck and Wing.
4. Four bars of Over the Top and four of Through the Trenches, and a finish.

Cut His Mouth Out: In a dance competition, to "best" someone so completely that he or she is left speechless in defeat.

Jim Crow: The stage name of Thomas Dartmouth Rice, also known as Daddy "Jim Crow" Rice. A minstrel performer, Rice gained enormous popularity by introducing a parody dance into his act in Louisville, Kentucky, in the early 1800s. Performing in black-face, and dancing to an African-American work song, he mimicked the movements of a crippled slave named Jim Crow whom he had seen working in the livery stable behind the theater. The dance, which consisted of limping, shuffling and jigging movements, ended with a little jump at the end of each refrain. When Rice first introduced the dance, it was wildly received and brought him twenty curtain calls. The dance and accompanying song turned Rice into the highest paid minstrel performer around, and soon he was presenting the dance internationally with similar success. The song that accompanied the dance was even translated into Hindu. The dance became known as the Jumping Jim Crow, and grew into a popular social dance and a national dance craze of the early 1800s. One particular movement in the dance, which consisted of swaying the hips with one arm waving and wagging the finger, is thought to have later developed into the social dance Truckin'.

The mimicking of African-American dances and the use of African-American music as source material not only had a profound influence on the development of minstrel entertainment and tap dancing, but also had a lasting influence on the development of music and theater in general. Stephen Foster saw Rice perform this dance and was said to have been greatly influenced by it in the writing of his songs "Camptown Races" and "Old Folks at Home." The dance's popularity also meant that Rice's particular caricature was also extremely influential in establishing the way that African-Americans were subsequently presented in theater pieces. The cliche of the "dancing darkey" grinning from ear to ear became a fixture of both nineteenth century literature and popular entertainments, creating powerful negative stereotypes that were not challenged until the advent of such dancers as Bill Robinson and John Bubbles. ##

Shucking Fuffles

Because I began tap dancing as a joke, I felt no obligation to practice between classes. Now, with poetic justice, I'm caught in my own prank: I care about getting good. After ten lessons, it vexes me that I still can't get through that opening Shuffle exercise without stopping to catch my balance. And I'm intrigued to see if working little will solve the problem. In my fourth month of taking tap dance lessons, I finally break down and do the previously unthinkable: I practice on my Own Time.

One Thursday night, with Annette at the studio teaching advanced tappers, I find myself alone at home. I push the unwashed dinner dishes out of the way and haul the Kaboom Box to the kitchen counter. I sit at a table spilling over with junk mail, and change into my tap shoes. Expecting this will not be pretty, I steel myself to the task, even if it means I will murder Tap. I possess both the motive and the opportunity, like a rejected suspect from Clue: Colonel Fat Man, in the kitchen, with a pair of shoes.

In the big glass sliding door leading to the night-shrouded backyard, I can see a ghostly reflection of myself. I throw "Hard Hearted Hannah" into the Kaboom Box and ready myself: toes turned out, knees bent slightly, shoulders leaning forward, eyes fastened on the ghost feet in the reflection. There's the cue, and I launch into the seven opening Shuffles with ease. On the eighth beat comes the Step and the shift of weight, so I can repeat the Shuffles with my other foot, and -- dammit! My ever-retarded left foot taps the floor on the way out but misses on the way back. Annette calls these "Air Shuffles." I can't believe I messed up this early in the exercise. I stop the music. I start over.

As the intro plays out, I coach myself by recalling the night I danced better by being mad at the floor. I remind myself to work little. Shrink those Shuffles! Go! I make it through the seven opening Shuffles, as I usually do; Step on the eighth beat, shift weight, and perform the seven left-foot Shuffles flawlessly. I make it through all the forward Shuffles and halfway through the side Shuffles before I teeter and have to miss a couple of beats while I catch my balance. OK, this is an improvement. I have all night. I can do this. Keep going.

In the middle of the song, I hear Ella wail, "...Is like travelin' through Alaska in your BVDs." Hey, what is this song about, anyway? Every time it comes on, I get busy throwing my weight around -- literally. I've heard the songs a dozen times now, but I haven't absorbed a single lyric. I finish the Shuffle exercise. Then I sit on a kitchen stool and play the song again, just listening to the words. Minutes later I snap out of it, realizing I'm indulging in classic avoidance behavior. C'mon, no distractions! We are going to master those Shuffles!

I start the song again, and immediately misfire three Air Shuffles. Stop. Focus. It's the landlord's floor, scuff it all you want. As Annette says so dramatically, lay down some steel!

Begin again. This time I make it through all the forward Shuffles, all the side Shuffles, and the first seven back Shuffles before I get lost. Cool! Working little really helps!

I make it through "Hard Hearted Hannah" a third time. I might have all night, but my legs don't. When I stand on either foot, the weight-bearing leg trembles. My outside thigh muscles burn, right under my hip bones, presumably from the effort of keeping my bouncing baby belly in check. By the end of the third run-through, I am sweating, panting, and quivering. I collapse onto the stool and gulp water.

"Hard Hearted Hannah" is a short song. I have been dancing less than ten minutes. Cor blimey, all this just from those shucking Fuffles?

All right. So I won't master the Shuffles tonight. I made good progress. Now that I know about this wizardly secret called "practicing," it's just a matter of time. You win this round, Shuffles, but you haven't seen the last of me!

I start chuckling. My empty threat aimed at Shuffles reminds me of a crude moment from Sealab 2021. In Episode 7, "Little Orphan Angry," a cute orphan boy feigns a terminal illness so he can visit Sealab's underwater base as his "dying wish." He relentlessly guilts Sealab's crew into serving his every selfish whim, because he's "dying." When Captain Murphy discovers that it's all a scam, he jumps into a golf cart and chases the fleeing orphan down Sealab's steel corridors. Murphy finally runs over the orphan. Stops. Backs the golf cart over the orphan. Stops. Runs over the orphan. Stops. Backs over the orphan. Stops. Runs over ... This repeats endlessly while gratuitous gallons of cartoon blood splash up from the bottom of the screen. Eventually, in his Oliver Twist accent, the mangled orphan begins (from under the golf cart wheels), "All right, you win this round, old man--" Murphy interrupts, "Well duh!"

Somehow, I don't think the Shuffles are afraid of me. Swearing vengeance on an enemy who doesn't know you exist is certainly quixotic. But then again, so is taking up a ridiculous hobby and moving from ironic detachment to personal investment.

The bad news: I am an existential joke. The other news: At least I write my own material. ##

The Shuffle Exercise

(In video game terminology: a mini-boss)

Hard Hearted Hannah

(Bates - Bigelow - Yellen - Ager)
As sung by Ella Fitzgerald

In old Savannah, I said Savannah,
The weather there is nice and warm!
The climate's of a Southern brand,
But here's what I don't understand:
They got a gal there, a pretty gal there,
Who's colder than an Arctic storm,
Got a heart just like a stone,
Even ice men leave her alone!

They call her Hard Hearted Hannah,
The vamp of Savannah,
The meanest gal in town;
Leather is tough, but Hannah's heart is tougher,
She's a gal who loves to see men suffer!
To tease 'em, and thrill 'em, to torture and kill 'em,
Is her delight, they say,
I saw her at the seashore with a great big pan,
There was Hannah pouring water on a drowndin' man!
She's Hard Hearted Hannah, the vamp of Savannah, GA!

They call her Hard Hearted Hannah,
The vamp of Savannah,
The meanest gal in town;
Talk of your cold, refrigeratin' mamas,
Brother, she's a polar bear's pajamas!
To tease 'em and thrill 'em, to torture and kill 'em,
Is her delight, they say,
An evening spent with Hannah sittin' on your knees,
Is like travelin' through Alaska in your BVDs.
She's Hard Hearted Hannah, the vamp of Savannah, GA!

Can you imagine a woman as cold as Hannah
She's got the right name, The vamp of Savannah
Any time a woman can take a great big pan
And start pouring water on a drowndin' man
She's hard hearted Hannah
The Vamp of Savannah GA

[spoken] Ooh, she's sweet as sour milk

The Steps:

Right

7 Shuffles, Step

Even beats  On 8



Left

7 Shuffles, Step

Even beats  On 8



Right

Shuffle Shuffle Shuffle Step

  +  1   +   2   +   3   4



Left

Shuffle Shuffle Shuffle Step

 +   1   +   2   +   3   4



Right        Left

Shuffle Step Shuffle Step

 +   1   2    +   3   4



Right        Left

Shuffle Step Shuffle Stamp

 +   1   2    +   3   4 



All steps above are Forward Shuffles

Repeat all as Side Shuffles

Repeat all as Back Shuffles

Begin again and proceed until music ends