dogpossum – Page 37

Teaching and joy

We’re doing some quite interesting classes on our Wednesday nights at the moment. They are all by-request, which means the topics are quite varied. We did a ‘big apple contest’ class open to everyone (most excellent fun), we’re doing a ‘Social dancer’s history of jazz’ class next week (open to everyone again), a ‘steals’ class the week after, and this week we’re doing a class on how to combine 6 and 8 count steps.

I’d ordinarily avoid a class on ‘steals’ because it feels like one of those gimmick classes. But as one of our other teachers said, “If we want to foster those lindy hop traditions like birthday jams, we have to teach them how to steal.” And because our classes are more like structured self-guided learning a lot of the time, it’s the perfect chance for people to experiment with the concept.
The more I thought about it, the more convinced I became. Especially when I thought about it as just another example of how to understand phrasing, and to read another dancer’s body and feels. So while we’ll be looking at how to get into a birthday jam and ‘steal’, we’ll be talking about how to prepare for the beginning of a phrase, how to read a couple’s dancing to see if it’s time to interrupt or not (eg don’t butt in on a big rhythm break), how to ‘cut in’ in a respectful, efficient way, etc etc. And it’s really just a dancing game that teaches us how to partner dance.

The one we’re doing this week is about combining 6 and 8 count moves. More specifically, a follow requested we look at how follows know whether a move is 6 or 8 count. I’m always a bit surprised by these questions, because I simply don’t think about it when I dance. When I lead, I am absolutely not thinking ‘Here is an 8 count move, now I’m doing a 6 count move.’ I just move through space responding to my partner and to the music. If a triple step is nice here, I put it in. If I need to turn or move quickly, I use a triple step. If I’m hitting a break, I might add in a bit of rhythmic flourish. I leave it to the follow to decide whether they need to triple step or kick ball change or step or kick or whatever. This isn’t 2003: I don’t micro-lead. As if I ever did.
But then I thought about what I do when I’m following. Again, I don’t think ‘6’ or ‘8’ as I’m moving through steps. But what I do do, is use the steps that get me through the shapes most efficiently (or most pleasingly). So I might use a triple step to move quickly through a turn (I rarely spin), I might use a kick/bounce combination to get through a pivot. And so on. Again, I use what gets me through the space I need to cover. I’m moving through the music (ie through time) at the rate my partner asks. And a 6 count move is just moving through a shape 2 beats faster than in an 8 count.

What it made me realise was that perhaps we’d over-emphasised the ‘basic rhythm’ as an 8 count. Perhaps we’d given the impression that an ‘8 count move’ has to be a particular rhythm. When we all know that a move can be any count, and we regularly use 2, 4, 6, 8, and 10 count steps in our lindy hop. So there may be a couple of issues here that we need to address.
First, that the steps you dance (ie the rhythm ‘blocks’ – triple steps, steps, etc) are really whatever gets you through the shape most efficiently (or pleasingly). As a follow, your lead begins the move, suggesting a speed at which to move through the move. Because the connection is a two-way thing, the lead can ‘ask’ you to maintain that particular speed throughout the move, particularly if they hear something in the music and have something planned. But a good lead is listening to the follow, and a good following listening to the lead, so you’re paying attention to the connection. And if the lead asks you to maintain that initial speed and direction (or intensity!) it’s nice to do that. Because lindy hop is a partnership. But as a follow, you get to finish the move, and if that means you take 2 more counts than they’d suggested, that’s ok. So long as you keep to the ‘spirit’ of the move, or the vibe the lead is setting down.

[NB Ramona talked about this in classes the other week: the lead begins the move, the follow finishes it. So leads need to let follows finish the move.]

[Other NB I’m beginning to be convinced that leading and following are very different things. It’s not just the same issues of biomechanics applied differently. Leads have a different timing to follows; leads are closer to the beat, a little ahead, the follows a little behind. So to me, the lead is the cab of a semi trailer, and the follow the long trailer. So as a lead, you need to account for that delay when you lead – the follow will get there a tiny bit later than you. I’ve also discovered that it’s this that I find really, really difficult to change when I swap between roles. I’m beginning to think I need to specialise in just one role to really improve. And you have to be as good as Ramona to do both really well.]

I think this is where the real problem comes for a lot of our follows who go social dancing with leads who work in other paradigms. Those leads think ‘ok, I’m doing move X’ and then they set it in motion, but are already thinking about or moving on to the next move before the follow has completed the first move. They don’t allow for the follow’s slight delay in addition to the ‘time’ it’ll take to do the move. In other words, they can’t think beyond their own experience of time during a song.
This means that you get a lot of leads who rush follows through (for example), the final triple step of a swing out, so the follow starts rushing in on 1, instead of really using that last triple step to get momentum into their body. Even more upsettingly, you get a swing out that stops and starts in hard breaks at 8 and 1. And of course the ‘swing’ falls out completely, as everyone rushes rushes rushes to get through the move.

Secondly, the rhythm blocks you use are both functional and creative. So a triple step is great for moving through space quickly (eg on the turn of a swing out), but also wonderful because it’s a syncopated, swinging rhythm that works so nicely with swinging jazz. It’s not like a cha-cha-cha rhythm. Triiii ple-step. Or tri-PLE-step. Varying the accent on a triple step is super fun, and understanding the difference between a triple step and step-stomp-off is also super fun.

Thirdly, this ‘8 count’ structure is something dancers enforce on the 4/4 timing of jazz. The musicians don’t think in 8s. The 2, 4, 6, 8 is a structure that we either build into the song, or we force on top of it. I think it’s better to build it in. So we listen to the music, and find ways to emphasise what’s going on in the song, using our different rhythm blocks, combined over particular lengths of time. And we use even numbers/counts because that’s where the emphasis is in swing. I prefer to think about a song as one long series of beats in time. Some of the beats are emphasised. Some groups of beats are emphasised. Some musicians only play some of the beats. And so on.

So the most important part of dancing is that you carry that consistent beat within your body all the time. All your movements must come from this, both in a creative sense, but also in terms of biomechanics. You use the ‘bounce’ or engagement of core muscles to make a pivoting kick work. You use the ‘groove’ to connect with your partner and the music.

Anyhoo, because I find it so difficult to understand why people have trouble distinguishing between 6 and 8 (or want to distinguish), I’m really looking forward to the session. We have some fun exercises set up, and that group has lots of opinions, so I’m really keen to learning more about how they’re thinking about music.

Teaching. Could anything be better? No.

Not all ballrooms…

A dance band playing at the Jack Keating dance studio c1930. Look at those decorations on the wall. Such beauty.

vinyl

more about safety

I’ve been fussing over what to put on a paper version of our code of conduct to have at all our classes and parties. Until I realised I could just use the ‘back’ of the Jazz with Ramona program I developed.

SORTED.

When I get more time I’ll break up the text a bit or add some amusing line drawings or something.

btw, I’m fine with people using the content from this document.
BUT it is far more important to develop your own, so:

It reflects the culture of your organisation,
You actually understand and really believe everything in the document (ie haven’t just cut and pasted something out of obligation).
It works well as part of your broader safety strategies – how does it relate to your online policy document/page? Do all your staff understand it, and have they been trained in (and know how to) apply it? Do YOU know how to use it when you have to actually ban/warn/press charges against offenders?

It’s a gloriously light-touch way of teaching

This is the most important thing I’ve learnt about teaching dance:

As Jane Williams-Siegfredsen, the author of a book on Danish forest kindergartens, puts it: “There’s this thing where the pedagogue needs to stand back sometimes and not always jump in and help the child. They need to let the child overcome problems themselves. We learn so much more from doing that.” (Kids Gone Wild 23 Feb 2016)

I really enjoy this approach to teaching. You give the students a task (use your rhythm to move around the room), and then you let them do it. You don’t interrupt them to ‘fix’ things, you just let them do it, and fix it themselves. They learn so much from this approach.
After you do the exercise, you get together in the group and say “Ok, what did you observe? What was hard? Easy?” You take questions, and you tell them things you saw that you really liked. “I liked the way X and Y stopped and grooved on the spot a bit when they got out of time. I didn’t get run into once, because you’re all being very safe and keeping your feet under your body – I loved that.” And when they ask questions (they will), they say things like, “How do you know when the lead is going to start moving?” and then you add more info about how to be in closed position and how to give and receive information through your body to your partner. After you give that new information, they must dance on it immediately. And you must only say one thing – to the leads, and to the follows.

It’s a gloriously light-touch way of teaching, and I adore it. You don’t see ‘perfect’ dancing right away, but you see people learn to communicate, to lead and follow, and to social dance to music. Most importantly, they keep their own individual style and you can see their personalities come out. It’s also nice because it teaches them to see difficult stuff not as a ‘problem’ or ‘getting it wrong’, but something to figure out and explore with a partner. To me, this is most excellent learning and teaching: you’re helping people figure out that they have the skills they need to learn, and you’re with them as they get started on the lovely long process of dancing.

Fucking harden up, blokes, and get your shit together.

A very nice male friend posted this on facebook tonight:

It occurs to me that I have never ever had to consider the fact that at some point in my life I may be raped. It’s just so improbable that it would ever happen to me that it’s not worth considering.
The fact that around half the planet are confronted with that very real possibility blows my fucking mind.

I commented there (though I should have just gone straight here to my blog):

I sometimes think the only possible response is deep, dark depression, crippling anxiety, or manslaughter. I remember reading in Adam Gussow’s book ‘Seems like murder here’ a story about the song Crazy Blues. In the south, lynching and violence were so common, black lives so curtailed and repressed, that ‘going crazy’ was sometimes the only response – a young man or women would ‘go crazy’ and talk back, hit back to a white assailant, triggering a horrific violence for themselves and family. Because they just couldn’t stand it any more.

When I think about the awful shit that that men do to women and children every single day, I get so angry. I get so angry I can’t even move. Because if I didn’t get that angry, I’d fall into a pit of depression and never get out.

I think that this is the truly unbelievable thing: that women deal with the constant threat of violence, the constant sexual harassment and bullying, the absolute curtailment of our careers, our physical liberty, our creative lives, and we just continue on. When you think of this, eating disorders and self-harm seem the only real way to gain control of your own body and life. The other amazing thing is that women don’t end up hating men. But of course we don’t, we’re trained to blame ourselves and hate ourselves instead. So maybe it’s even more amazing that feminists don’t just hate all men.

This is why men don’t need more male role models to improve their behaviour. They need to look at the women who do get up every day and go to work or become leaders or raise families, and think “I want to be like her, because she did all this despite the daily threat of rape and violence.” They need to look at women in our lindy hop scene, and think, ‘Holy fuck. She’s standing up there on stage DJing, singing, judging, teaching, organising, drawing attention and making herself visible, and she knows there are men out there in the crowd who are thinking about raping her, and she does it anyway, because fuck. A life lived in fear is a fucking waste and fuck that shit.’

Me, especially now I’m older, I’m both burning with rage, and also deeply patient and prepared to do most anything to fix shit. This is why I don’t give second chances to sexual harassers in my lindy hop scene, this is why I call out fuckwit men who make sexist jokes, this is why I am prepared to stand up and call BULLSHIT on event organisers who don’t have sexual harassment policies and don’t hire women DJs, this is why I have no fucking patience for whingey arse men who sook about not getting their own way in the lindy hop world. Compared to the way I worry about my own safety every day in my own home, some arsehole man giving me shit on the internet is nothing. NOTHING. I’m here to make things harder for them, and easier for women. Straight up: I am a pain in the patriarchy’s arse. Because I am so fucking done with this shit.

What I don’t understand is how a man can like a woman (any woman!) just even a little bit, and not step up and do whatever he can to make her life better for her. Why don’t men tell men around them to quit groping women, to stop the stupid sexist jokes? If I can do this, with that fear of violence, how fucking slack are the men in our world, that they can’t overcome the inertia of their own privilege to speak up for me and for other women and girls? What the actual fuck are they doing with their time?
I’m still really angry and disappointed in my male friends that I have to confront a man to tell him to stop groping women. I have to risk him threatening me in public. I have to risk him coming after me when I’m alone. I have to choose to look over my shoulder at dance events forever. When the men who would be risking so much less won’t even come and stand next to me when I confront him because they are ‘too scared’!

One of the things I’ve learnt about stepping up is that I’m actually fucking brave and fucking fierce. Sure, I’m more visible, and I may be increasing my risks. I sure as fuck risk my professional reputation, because stepping up actually loses me teaching and DJing gigs. But FUCK it. I’m really tired of being careful. I’ve decided to be a pain in the arse. Because yolo. I’m a middle class white woman, and I have a degree of power. It’s my responsibility to use it. And it makes me fucking strong, and fucking fierce. I have to remember that the next time a scary guy tries to touch me on the train. I can fuck his shit up if I need to.

It’s at moments like this that I get far, far angrier at the men I know who don’t assault women, but are also NOT taking half the risks women take every day, to stand up, and get fucking useful. Wearing a stupid white ribbon on your shirt doesn’t make a man a useful ally against violence. Standing up and getting in the way makes a man a useful ally. Speaking up and interrupting yet another sexist joke makes a man an ally. Learning to follow makes a man an ally. Shutting up and letting a woman speak makes a man an ally.

Jesus christ. It’s not that hard. Fucking harden up, blokes, and get your shit together.

Women MCs

Is it different for women? – Lucinda Holdforth (2/23/2016)

I’ve been thinking about the role of MCs in the dance world, lately, and why so few of the best known (and paid) MCs are women. Basically, the reason is SEXISM on the part of organisers. If you haven’t hired a woman MC, you’re buying into patriarchy. That’s just the deal. Excuses like ‘He’s just so funny’ or ‘People know him’ or ‘I just can’t find any women MCs’ will NOT fly. Teaching at an international level requires good speaking skills, so if you’re hiring a woman teacher, you’ve got the beginnings of good women MCs.
This is my favourite bit of this article (of course):

Know that the rules are there, and that they are stupid. And chuck them. Overcome them. Overturn them. If we all stopped playing by the rules, then the rules would quickly crumble. Make your jokes, admit your weaknesses, boast about your accomplishments, wear whatever-the-hell you like, don’t give a damn about a few extra kilos, take up a lot of space, and generally act like you own the joint.

Sydney events – a quick note

Just a quick post while I’m thinking about it.

Sydney currently has one million dance events on in a given year. Weirdly, they’re almost all clustered in February this year. No doubt we’ll all change it next year and cluster in another part of the year. Note to self: dancing in February is total bullshit because it is so hot; no more solo jazz in February.

This year we have:

Jazz with Ramona: 4-5 Feb (solo)
Attune to Blues: 19-21 Feb (blues/fusion)
For dancers only: 27-29 Feb (lindy,bal, etc)
Sydney Blues: 29 Feb-1 May (blues/fusion)
Little Big Weekend: 13-15 May (lindy hop)
Sydney Swing Festival: 11-13 June (lindy, etc)
Sydney Lindy Exchange: 11-13 Sep (lindy)

Not a single all-social exchange there, which sucks.

There’s also a weird-arse westy/lindy cross over event run by westies which I strongly recommend NOT going to. Great teachers, worst organisation ever. Of all time. And so expensive, with no bands.

There are also a fair few random workshop days in there.
All of these are run by different groups, except Jazz with Ramona and LBW, which I run. I also have Jazz BANG (solo jazz …. or perhaps all social?) in the back of my mind again for next year.

One of the interesting things about all this is that each event tends to pitch smaller – limited class sizes and parties – and to be really focussed on a particular style of music and/or dancing. The quality of music, teaching, and planning varies between events (some need some help, some are excellent, most are in the middle somewhere). Talk about hipster boutique bespoke artisanal dance events. This makes it possible for dancers to have quite varied tastes. I have also noticed that it means our lindy hop generally is weaker, because people don’t focus on it as much as they should. But it’s also interesting – we have dancers who only do bal or blues. Because there are weekly balboa and blues parties and classes, as well as regular weekend events. And we see a fairly wide range of bands at events.

I’d like to see one big weekend exchange (all social), with great music, but I’m not sure our disparate scene and organisers can manage that. But is it such a shame? We don’t attract many out of towners with our small events, but we do have a more diverse, interesting scene. Me, I’d quite like a very good, throw-down hardcore lindy hop weekend. Nothing but solid lindy hop with a good teacher line up, streamed classes, and top shelf bands playing in appropriate venues. I want good wooden floors, I want a few teacher couples, I want really good bands playing really good jazz.

Ellington in the 1950s. Live.

Though I have a STACK of Ellington, I’m late come to Ellington playing live in the 50s, and it’s such a joy to discover him now. DJ Ryan Swift put me onto ‘The Private Collection, Vol. 2: Dance Concerts, California, 1958’ and vol 6 of the same series.

This tip was part of a long, interesting discussion (fansquee?) between some very big Ellington fans and jazz nerds on the facey, when I was chasing a song called ‘Wailing Interval’ that I didn’t know the name of.
I’m a big New Testament Basie fan, and have stacks of live Basie from the 50s. It’s a joy to compare Ellington from this same period, and to think about the role of the Newport Jazz Festival in these band leaders’ lives.
Anyhoo, this album is quite wonderful. I intend to play it every single time I DJ until the mp3s explode. You can pick it up on itunes as I did, but you’ll miss out on the liner notes, which I have. And as we all know, you don’t learn much about jazz if you don’t know who’s in the band.

What are we actually doing about sexual harassment?

We at Swing Dance Sydney have developed a several-prong approach to this issue over the past few years. Everyone we know has been asked for advice or suggestions, and it’s definitely a collaborative project. It takes time, thought, and research. I looked up other organisations’ codes of conduct, and govt bodies’ s.h. prevention strategies. including the human rights commission’s definitions of s.h.

Each step has kind of developed from the one before. And we keep going back and revising and improving things.

For example:

We developed a code of conduct, referring to lots of other examples.
Then we needed definitions of sexual harassment for that code, so we all knew what we were talking about.
Then we had to give students FAQs for making complaints, knowing their boundaries, etc.
Then we had to be available for students to talk to us, and we had to follow up on our hunches and ask students about things we’d seen. Which meant we needed casual social spaces and opportunities for talking with our students – like non-dancing parties.
Then we had to just get rid of horrible harassers.
Then we had to have consequences for banned people.
Then we had to have processes for enforcing bans.
Then we had to tell our door people what to do if banned people turned up.
Then I told other organisers in our city that we’d banned X, and I keep them updated each time I get another complaint about anyone.
Then we had to find out what our legal rights were.
Then we had to practice doing this ourselves.
Now I’m asking myself ‘how long is a ban? if it’s forever, how do we maintain it if the personnel and staff change?’

And of course, this has to be an interactive design process: you have to keep getting feedback on the process, and changing and improving things. Soz, but it’s never done.
My current project: a report log, and way of keeping track of issues.

This is my experience:
As a woman, it is scary as fuck to tell a big, imposing bully of a man he is banned from your event. Or to warn one. So I had to develop the bravery to do it, and contingency plans to make sure I was safe (eg I told my male friends – don’t leave me on my own for the next hour or two; I don’t want to seem vulnerable if he gets nasty). I also practiced giving warnings and bans – I wrote little scripts and then practiced them with my buddies. And I told my buddies when I was going to do it, and what their job was.

So you need to skill yourself up, look after yourself, work with other women, and develop strategies, and PRACTICE. It’s hard to overcome a lifetime of training which tells women to avoid conflict because they’re vulnerable. You have to teach yourself that you are tough. It’s helpful to think of people like Norma Miller, who was a black woman running a dance troupe in the 50s. You have to truly believe that you are the best person for this job, and that you are RIGHT.

I’m glad I do this, as I’ve had men get nasty with me in public at events (I particularly enjoyed that one time a man I’d warned earlier about non-consensual aerials trying to shout at me while I was DJing. NOT).

Documents (ie rules):
1. We have a code of conduct on our site. But I’m pretty sure no one reads it.

So I made an abridged, paper version which is now available at the door to events on the back of a paper program (and everyone picks up a paper program, and gets one in their rego packs), which I talk about when I’m MCing at every party and workshop day at an event. I actually say it explicitly: “Have a read of this code. There’s info here about what to do if you get injured, if you feel unsafe, or if someone’s hassling you.” And I’ve actually turned to one of the (big blokey male) band members and said, “X and I were talking about this earlier, and now X knows what to do if he feels unsafe.” And we all loled, but it was very effective – no awkward shyness or silliness. I just added it to the talk about where the first aid kit is and how to get a drink of water.
The online version has actual descriptions of what counts as sexual harassment. That part is THE most important.

2. We have a parties FAQ which explains what to do if you get harassed.

3. You have to tell people you have docs – don’t hide them away on your website. And just be very casual and matter of fact about it – of course we have a code of conduct, don’t you?

Processes:
1. I warn people who break the rules if they seem to be a bit clueless (eg air steps on the social floor, boob swiping, etc.) I encourage other people to warn other people (especially men! Men are 90% of the problem, so they should be 90% of the solution – it’s not a ‘women’s issue’!)

2. I ban people who are serial offenders, and tell them so to their face, making it clear that they cannot attend any of my events (I name them all), and if they turn up I’ll call the police. I don’t engage in discussions or conversations – I just tell them straight up. And I do it at public events in public places because my own safety is important. And I put on my invisible ‘I am an arse kicking fierce superhero’ cloak. I literally pretend that I am as tall and strong and immovable and implacable as Wonder Woman.

3. Once they’re banned, I put their name and description (and photo if I have it) on the door at our events, and circulate it to volunteers who’ll be working at events.

4. I explain the process to volunteers should these banned people turn up: Say “hello, Sam would like to speak with you, please wait a minute while I find her.” then find me and i’ll deal with it. They all work the door in pairs, so one is left at the door waiting. They’re to do some ‘important paper work’ while they wait, and not engage the bloke. Then I come and call the police immediately. No arguments or engagement.

-> I tell everyone about all these documents and processes. Since I started telling people I ban offenders, and since our volunteers started learning the process, I’ve had a scary number of people make complaints about the people I’ve banned/warned: knowing you’ll deal with this shit gives people the guts to speak up. I keep all complaints anonymous and confidential. None of this ‘right of reply’ bullshit.

Cultural change:
Of course we use gender-neutral language, stamp on homophobia, etc etc. Because we are adults, and this shit is necessary. And we don’t tolerate any of that stuff in our classes or at our parties. You simply CANNOT address these issues if you, for example, always refer to leads as ‘he’ or ‘gentlemen’. It’s a shitty barrier to fixing things up.

1. How we teach beginners. We talk about how to ‘make connection’ with a partner (eg in closed) not in terms of ‘your hand always go here’ but in terms of ‘you want to find the middle of their back, so ask them ‘is this right?’ Then we get them to practice this little conversation. Boom. Winners – it teaches them that each partner is a different size and shape, and you need to adapt to that. As opposed to having rules for ‘correct’ connection, we make it clear that ‘connection’ is about working with another human. There’s lots of this sort of thing – from talk about making confident mistakes to saying ‘start when you feel ready’ instead of counting them in.

2. We only have women teachers atm, so we start classes with “I’m Sam, and I’m leading tonight,” and “I’m X and I’m following tonight” and then we demonstrate what that means. Then we say “Choose whether you want to lead or follow. You could change next week, but please stick with one role for this class.” Then we let them choose whether they’re leading or following, then we send them to find a partner.

3. When we ask them to partner up, we say “Introduce yourself first; don’t touch anyone if you don’t know their name” and we act out asking someone to dance, shaking hands, and introducing ourselves. BOOM. They just do this themselves all the rest of the class.
-> etc etc etc

4. We give the follows specific information about what they’re doing in class, and we phrase it in a way which is about agency, self-determination, and power. eg I say to follows “You are the BOSS of your own body. Don’t compromise your posture or timing or rhythm for the lead’s. This is a class, so you should be both talking to each other, resolving these issues verbally.” I often to say to follows and leads “Both of you have a responsibility to keep time and maintain a rhythm. So if you’re stressing, listen to your partner’s body and let them help you find the beat again.” And then we explain how connection is a two-way line of communication, talking about how follows send info to leads and vice versa. Using very simple things like “Check in with yourself – is your hand a tight claw of fear? What does this say to your partner?” etc etc etc.

5. Women DJs, Women teachers, women MCs, women solo dancing, women leads, women follows, male follows, male leads, male DJs. We have them. We just do this shit ourselves – you have to be the change you want to see. And we just treat it as normal. None of this bullshit “Traditionally, men did X in lindy hop” talk because that’s untrue, made up bullshit. We just DO this stuff.

6. Actively supporting new DJs, dancers, organisers, etc. In all sorts of ways. Whether they are men or women – we just step up and be useful, even if that means coming along and being a punter. A culture of creative support and curiosity is good for a community, and it undoes patriarchal cultures which are particularly obstructive for women.

7. Be ambitious and motivated. Aim to be really fucking good at all this. If you’re a woman lead, aim to be really GOOD at it. If you’re running an event, run the BEST event. And just see undoing patriarchy (which is what fighting sexual harassment is) as part of being really fucking good at what you do. So be good at it.

I have to repeat: you can’t do this on your own. Everyone has to play a part in looking after everyone else. Me, other teachers, the students in class, your dance partners, other event organisers, volunteers at events, DJs, band members, sound engineers. If you talk to each of these people individually, involving them in the process somehow, making their role clear (eg the volunteers working on the door), then they will be invested and will do their bit. Or you get to leverage the guilt – because only a cockface would argue that this stuff isn’t important :D