Jive belongs to the Latin American dance styles and is normally thought as part of Latin-American dance program. Jive is a very fast, energy-consuming dance, originally developed from a dance called Jitterbug. The music and steps are similar to Rock’n’roll or the big band sound. These free online dance lessons will teach you some basic steps.
Jive basic steps video:
This dance is very similar to East Coast Swing. Because the music is faster so there is a higher knee lift in this dance. The pattern of the basic is a rock step, triple step and triple step for both partners.
Video Transcript:
Aaron: Hey guy’s, it’s Aaron.
Christina: And I’m Christina
Aaron: And we’re professional dance instructors here in New York City. And today we’re coming at you with a little dance we like to call the jive. So for starters let’s take a look at the basic footwork. So gentlemen, why don’t we take a look at our footwork first? We’re going to be starting, again, with our left leg and we’re going to start with that link step, or rock step behind us. Starting with – one, two, three and four, five and six. One, two, tri –ple-step, tri-ple –step, rock step. Now one thing you’ll notice here with the jive, a key characteristic of this, and in the music, is this percussive accent that we tend to highlight in our foot and leg action, where we accent with the knee, one, two, and three, and four, and five, and six, seven, eight. So as to differentiate between the swing and the jive itself, which are both members of the same family and come from that basic swing dance action. But again, as this music is a little bit faster and tends to have a percussive accent and rhythm – A-one, two, a-three, and four, a-five and six, seven, eight A-one, two, three, and four, five, six. Okay, so now let’s take a look at the ladies footwork as well.
Christina: Okay, so ladies again, everything that Aaron said, it’s related to the swing, there’s a little bit more knee action, but it starts the same way. So ladies we’re on our right foot, we’re going to take a rock step. Rock-step. And then side triple – tri-ple-step and tri-ple-step – One, two, and three, and four, and five, and six, seven, eight.
Aaron: Now let’s take a look at this action together. So, we have our closed position here that we’re staring from, and so as we don’t bump knew together, we’re actually going to rotate slightly outward on a little bit of an angle, here And one, two, and three, and four, and five, and six – One, two, and three, and four, and five, and six A-one, two, three, and four, and five, and six, and one, two. Now we’re also going to talk a little bit about the different handholds that we’re going to have within this dance.
Christina: So we have the traditional kind of swing-jive dance frame with the lower hand hold connection.
Aaron: And every now and then we’re going to take this handhold that we have here and change to a little bit of a palm-to-palm action which is going to help us get a little bit more leverage in some of our advanced techniques.
Christina: And then we also have a double handhold, and then we can have a single handhold, right-to-left, or the handshake hold, which is just what it says – you’re shaking hands. So those are some of the different handholds that we have in the jive. Now let’s try that to some music.