footwork

Basic Poi Dancing Tutorial: Footwork in turns

Figured out basic turns but still finding they feel awkward? The problem might be in your feet! This is one of those problems that many of us who lack a movement background tend to encounter as we engage with poi spinning--our bodies aren't used to moving at all, let alone in a way that comes off as graceful. Compounding the problem, it feels as though our arms should be leading the way through our turns, but this seldom is good for us either aesthetically or physically.

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Experiments in body mechanics

I spent a good long time in my poi practice session today playing with the way my body shifts its weight as I spin. Teaching in a dance studio, I'll freely confess I have a bit of a chip on my shoulder due to the fact that poi sits so uncomfortably in the middle of dance, juggling, martial arts, and street performance that alas it seems to be none of these as well.

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More footwork vids!

So apparently a trend has begun of doing videos for poi footwork and now the godfather of poi, Nick Woolsey has posted one describing how he does his whirling dervish-style footwork. Special guest-stars include Burning Dan and Alien Jon!

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Video Tech Blog #37: Yuta stalls with floats, hybrids, cateyes, and more footwork

More fun with Yuta stalls! Specifically, it turns out that they work just as well with floats as they do with top and bottom stalls, opening the door to doing them in tandem with isolations, extensions, hybrids and cateyes. Also, some more footwork and danciness inspired by nightanddaydance's excellent response to my last blog. Had to trim a couple tricks out to keep it under 10 minutes, but they should be making an appearance in a later blog.

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Footwork in poi

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Video Tech Blog #36: Carolingian Cross, stall intensive, footwork

After seeing a Nick Woolsey instructional vid on how to do the triquetra the other day, I discovered a figure I really dug under the wikipedia entry for the word triquetra (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triquetra) called a Carolingian Cross, which essentially amounts to a compound interlacing triquetra. I've spent a good portion of the week dissecting the figure and trying to figure out how to render it with poi. Here are three of the options I've played with.

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