Concluding my extended celebration of the foxtrot's centennial year: more about the hop-turn!
A few years ago, I considered hopping in the 1910s foxtrot to be a relatively obscure practice -- I'd only ever found one sequence with a hop in it and had only a brief mention in a newspaper article to reassure me that it was not just a one-couple oddity. But looking through Edna Stuart Lee's Thirty Fox Trot Steps (New York, 1916), there are actually several sequences that include hops, including two that are strikingly similar to the previously described Bassett/Elliott hop-turn.
Here are two more ways to, in the words of the newspaper article, "make our turn with a quick, fast hop" while foxtrotting.
Lee often gives her sequences rather imaginative names, but our first sequence bears the uninspired title "The Hop Turn". Steps below are given for the gentleman, assumed to be facing line of dance. Lady dances backward on opposite feet.
The Hop Turn
1234 walk (left, right, left, right)
5& step out to right hip to right hip (left, right)
6 hop on the right foot, kicking the left leg back from the knee and making a quarter-turn clockwise
78 step left to complete the half-turn; step or close right
The dancers are left with the gentleman's back to line of dance.
It's not clear whether the final step closes the feet or is actually backward along line of dance. Either works; the close feels a little more elegant while the step back makes the weight shift clearer to the follower.
Though the setup and resolution differ and the Bassett-Elliott turn makes a full turn rather than a half-turn, this is clearly the same basic concept. Compare:
Bassett-Elliott Lee
two walks two walks
four trots two walks
step-out, HOP step-out, HOP (kick)
four trots two walks
Lee remarks that her half-turn version "serves well in corners", but I don't find that use much fun. The quarter-turns on the hop and the step left both become eighth-turns on a corner, which is just too little turn per count.
What does serve well on corners, and on straightways as well, is to make the final two steps pivot turns, covering the final three-quarters of a turn and leaving the dancers in the more usual situation of the gentleman facing line of dance, lady backing. This interpretation serves very well on corners, since the dancers need less rotation on the pivot steps. It serves so well that I have to wonder if Lee did not mis-write and really mean to say a full turn for this move, particularly in light of the second hop-turn she describes.
Lee's next variation makes the connection even more obvious. Once again, these are the gentleman's steps.
The Tanguay Turn
1234 walk (left, right, left, right)
5& step out to right hip to right hip (left, right)
6 hop on the right foot, kicking the left leg back from the knee and making a quarter-turn counter-clockwise
7&8& four trots moving counter-clockwise to finish the turn
While Lee does not make it explicit, this version must be a full turn. There is simply no way that one does four trotting steps for only a quarter-turn of movement. And that makes it identical to the Bassett-Elliott sequence other than in the preference for starting with four walks rather than two walks and four trots.
Here's a breakdown of the three hop-turns:
Preparation for the hop-turn
1. four walks (Lee)
2. two walks and four trots (Bassett/Elliott)
Core hop-turn
Step out to Yale (right hip to right hip) position and hop, kicking free foot back (quick-quick-slow rhythm)
Complete the turn
1. two walks for a half-turn (Lee)
2. two pivots for a full turn (Lee reinterpreted)
3. four trots for a full turn (Lee "Tanguay Turn" and Bassett/Elliott)
One can make a hop-turn very "trotty" by using the walk/trot preparation and the four-trot ending, or much more leisurely by using only walking steps or pivots. Or one can mix and match. The opening with the walk/trot gives a lot of exciting momentum going into the turn, and does make it slightly easier to lead the quick-quick-slow of the step out/hop, since the lady is already trotting. But experimentation proves that any of these combinations are quite leadable with a follower who is aware of the possibility of a hop.
Adapting hop-turns for the one-step
Lee specifically states that her basic hop-turn can be used unchanged in the one-step but that the Tanguay variation must have the four final trots slowed to walks. One-step music can handle the occasional quick-quick-slow sequence, as in the polka skip, but four quick steps in a row feels too rushed at one-step speed. Here's the one-step version of the Tanguay Turn:
1234 walk (left, right, left, right)
5& step out to right hip to right hip (left, right)
6 hop on the right foot, kicking the left leg back from the knee and making a quarter-turn counter-clockwise
78910 four walks moving counter-clockwise to finish the turn
If a ten-beat sequence feels annoying, chop off two walks at the beginning and it will be a more musical eight beats.
Special thanks to Nora for helping me test the turns and giving me follower-feedback on leadability!
Comments