Whether you are a student or a teacher, we're discussing ALL things Ballroom Dance related. There are so many ways to accomplish patterns & techniques in this industry, & we are here to assist in your understanding of these concepts. So let us know your questions...we want to hear from you.
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Interview With Monica Shifflet from Virginia Beach VA
Épisode 7
dimanche 14 février 2021 • Durée 52:10
Todd & Taras chat with a student from Virginia Beach VA about her journey in dancing.
This is out first student to be on the show. Monica is an amazing student and just great woman to get to know. Learn more about Monica and how/why she got into0 ballroom dancing. From her 'day-job' in the cockpit of a fighter jet to going Mach 3 on the dance-floor. We loved chatting with Monica Shifflet.
We're also sorry that we've been slack on getting out content. We're back in the studio to record some more All About Ballroom Dancing for you :)
Are you afraid of failure? Sometimes failure means different things: Rejection - disapproval - The Unknown
Don’t like getting out of your comfort zone. Be brave & get out of your comfort zone. Outside your comfort zone will quickly become inside your comfort zone = more confidence - (Use growing muscles analogy)
New Dancers:
Looking Stupid
Not being talented enough, coordinated enough,
The perfectionist - Self Criticism - You excel in your profession and other hobbies that starting something new like dancing will make you see all the flaws
No Partner
Distance from Studio - (more of an excuse)
Intermediate Dancers:
Wanting to learn too fast is actually holding yourself back: Talk about people wanting to go up the levels too quickly
Wanting to learn too slow...over analyzing every step. Paralysis Thru Analysis
Advanced Dancers:
Afraid to go all out, pull the trigger and go for it. When you over train and are afraid of making a mistake.
Want to perfect things before the next routine or event -
You expect perfection from yourself -
Quotes:
“I don’t believe in holding back...you know, life isn’t a dress rehearsal!” - Kate Winslet
“Courage comes by being brave; fear comes by holding back” - Publious Syrus
What areas are you holding back? Now that you realize where you are holding yourself back what are the next steps you plan on taking?
Please write in and let us know. It helps other dancers to know the struggles others go through because sometimes they think “It’s just my problem”...not realizing thousands of people have had the same issue.
We look forward to our next episode of AABD.
And until then...we’ll see YOU on the dance floor
Bob Powers On Standardizing Professional American Rhythm
mercredi 27 mai 2020 • Durée 57:55
Bob Powers Standardizing Professional American Rhythm Todd Combs & Taras Denysenko episode 005
Julia & Bob are creators & owners of the Latin Dance Fitness Program “Core Rhythms”
_________________________________________________
What exactly is this project you are doing? Is it like a “rule book”, or a guideline manual? Please let us know what it is.
Bob Powers: The group is called Rhythm Champions and our mission is to promote American Style Rhythm dancing worldwide. The American Smooth has had great success lately and we have discovered that the reason the Rhythm has lagged behind is the fact that there’s a belief that there are too many differences in the techniques. So one of the goals of the group is to come to a consensus on each dance. We are in the process of developing a technique book, not a syllabus but strictly body, hip, leg and foot action description. So if you can imagine 15 former US Champions coming together to agree on a specific technique and how it should be expressed verbally.
Julia Gorchakova On Dance Dresses - Clothing - Dance Exercise Core Rhythms - How To Become A Better Dancer
vendredi 22 mai 2020 • Durée 01:21:04
Julia Gorchakova Todd Combs & Taras Denysenko episode 004
Creator of the Fitness Exercise Program called Core Rhythms
Owner of Artistry In Motion - DanceSport Clothing
Ballroom Dance Questions:
What dance do you think challenges most students (as a whole or fem/male/cpl) and Pro competitors?
What dance do you think has evolved the most since you’ve been dancing?
What can any student do right now to improve their dancing? (Develop stronger foot/ankle usage, general balance, stronger core, or specific muscle group awareness...are some examples)
Artistry In Motion Questions:
How did you get started?
Who needs “Dance Cloths”? (Everyone...every sport has their own “gear”)
What should Men get, & when?
What Should Women have, & when?
What or who is your biggest design influence?
Core Rhythm Questions:
How did Core Rhythms come about?
Listener Questions:
Trishia Weger: What kind of diet do you have? Are you really strict about it? How do you stay in shape?
You once shared with Tricia ie Todd. How you first started making your beautiful competition dance costumes with your mom, and that in the early years you had to make the flashy embellishments from raw materials. Can you tell us more about that, and how that differs today?
She and her mom used to hammer out homemade sequins from small discs in Her home country in the early days. I was fascinated by that. I am sure there is much more to the story!
Why Do People Like Ballroom Dancing
mercredi 6 mai 2020 • Durée 01:08:14
So Why Do People Like Ballroom Dancing You Ask? Today Todd Combs and Taras Denysenko we'll be discussing why people love ballroom dancing so much, and why ballroom dancing could improve your life in ways you couldn't imagine. Ballroom dancing could benefit you in ways so many ways you probably don't think need improvement. Who doesn't want to improve their life? Who doesn't want more self confidence, stress relief, or just to improve their relationship with their significant other or spouse? Who out there thinks everything in their life is so perfect that nothing can be done to enhance what they have right now? I hope none of our listeners out there have this mentality because we can always, always improve ourselves and our environment!
In this episode we get to the core reasons why you should start either taking ballroom dance lessons or why you should continue taking your ballroom dance lessons.
Do I Need A Partner To Learn To Ballroom Dance?
lundi 20 avril 2020 • Durée 31:21
episode - 002 Todd Combs & Taras Denysenko
Episode Transcripts:
Todd Combs 0:07 All right, everybody. This is the second episode of all about ballroom dancing and have one I am one of your hosts, Todd Combs and I on the other one harass Dennis sanko. In today's topic is a hot topic It is called Do I need a partner to ballroom dance?
Taras Denysenko 0:35 And what an interesting topic this is, and it seems appropriate for the current times. But boy, we get a lot of phone calls and inquiries about people asking, Hey, I want to learn how to ballroom dance. Do I need a dance partner? Yeah, I would say normally who asked this question sort of the ladies, the single ladies that they call in and you know, for dance lessons. So I'd say in a week that's a that's a good percentage of people.
Todd Combs 1:00 Call and ask that question constantly. Yeah. And that's a good question do you need? Do you need a partner to ballroom dance? And that is that is the focus of us answering this question. I mean, it's an easy answer, but we'll tell you why. It's an easy answer. But but maybe before we talk about and just give them an answer, I'm going to give the example of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. So Maslow proposed that healthy human beings have a certain number of needs and that those needs are arranged in the hierarchy, right? A lot of people might know the Maslow's pyramid. And this is done by five, a five level pyramid with the higher needs coming into focus only once after the lower needs have been met. So let's the first two needs we don't even they don't really pertain to us. The first need is the physiological need. And that is air water, food, shelter, sleep, clothing. The second one is safety needs personal security, employment resources, health, things like that. So I think people who are calling into dance have probably met those needs. And they already have those needs, right? And then, and then the third name, you can talk about the third need.
Taras Denysenko 2:17 Well, 30 talking about love and belonging, where people are looking for friendship, a little bit more intimacy, family sense of connection.
Todd Combs 2:27 Right? And then the, the fourth one would be esteem. So that's, you know, they want they want respect, they want self esteem, they want status, recognition, they want strength, freedom, things like that. Yeah. And then the final one is the self actualization, the desire to become the most that one can be. Right, and I think I think that's true. You could look at that pyramid and say, there's all kinds of things you can see yourself and all those levels. Everyone has those levels. Yep. And yeah, People come in and in dancing is not something everyone did when they grew up. I mean, I will I shouldn't say that some sometimes ladies come in and they did cheerleading ballet tap jazz, but guys never really did a lot of that not many. Right? So, yes, this is something new, you know, for promote for most people but even when women come in they were dancing by themselves. And they were in control. And then they come in and yeah, ballroom dance and they the guys lead. They hate it. Yeah. That's very true. They, they hate it. Yeah. But they they learn to like it. So so then maybe now we can, let's discuss a few reasons why. You know, people call the studio, kind of inside of this pyramid. So, now we trust and I discussed that next episode we're going to have a have a more in depth discussion about the reasons why people call The studio why people come in what? What are the major reasons they want to take lessons? Right? Right. So that'll be the next episode. So today, we thought would be an appetizer. You know, we would go over some of these but not so much detail because the next episode we will Yeah, that's that's like it's a good one because that next that next topic that's a that's a big one. That's what helps people really want to develop their dancing to their utmost potential.
Todd Combs 0:01 So we are with our first episode of all about ballroom dancing and Taras and I were thinking what what should the first episode be? And we thought one question all of our students have is about music. Is it? Yeah, to know? Yeah. How to know when, what music goes with what and it’s and identifying music is a challenge. You can’t learn it here on just the podcast but understanding things. It’s a it’s the first step. Right? Right. So we thought we’d bring the man in. That’s right. The man
Taras Denysenko 0:33 the myth, the legend, the legend,
Todd Combs 0:35 the guy who writes if you’ve been to a ballroom dance competition, you have heard his music in your ears. And he does. I can tell you he’s so many events, ton of events. He goes from franchises in North America competitions, parties, their competitions, independent competitions, any kind of events that has music Brent is running it. I think he even went overseas Yeah, even they even let him in overseas was questionable for a little bit, but they let him in.
Brent Mills 1:04 I had to get a special passport. I know. Thank you so much.
Brent Mills 1:17 Well, thanks for having me. I appreciate I appreciate you having me there most. Most. Yeah, most want to talk about judges or technique or their feet. And in my brain, I keep thinking like, Well, you know, it’s, it’s the importance like the movement, it all is important. But like, if that tune is not there, then you look really funny.
Doing all that stuff
without any noise. Yep. And it’s not like people go out and be like, Oh, I move like this. And then a band says, Oh, look, they look like they’re doing a cha cha let’s do that.
Welcome To "All About Ballroom Dancing"
Saison 1
lundi 20 avril 2020 • Durée 05:09
Todd Combs & Taras Denysenko
Todd Combs 0:06 Welcome to the introduction to our new show All About Ballroom Dancing.
Taras Denysenko 0:13 And I’m tourist Dennis sanko. When I’ve been teaching since 1994.
Todd Combs 0:18 And I am Todd Combs I’ve been teaching since 1995. And not only are we teachers for so long, but we were also professional competitors for many, many
Taras Denysenko 0:30 years. And wait, that’s not all. We’re also ballroom dance studio owners.
Todd Combs 0:36 Yes, we own studios. We do it all. But we also a couple more things in our credentials in our in our little resume here. We are traveling consultants. We’ve gone through many, many exams, many tests, gone really far with this set of dancing and we get hired to go to studios all over the United States and out of the country to but mostly United States and we work in studios. Yeah, so we get hired, I’m sure if your students from other places you know that they bring in consultants to the studios you go to and that’s what
Taras Denysenko 1:08 we do also. And wait, that’s not all.
Because if you’re also competitive dancers, whether professionally or program or amateur, we’re also accredited ballroom dance judges. So we can do enforce our opinions on the dance floor and we can place you first or last. Don’t do it.
Todd Combs 1:35 Now on this show, we’re not going to focus on trying to teach you to ballroom dance via a podcast, an audio show that’s just it’s it’s insane. That’s too much for anyone to do. We could probably do it because we’re amazing, but it’s still probably tough. What what we’ll we’ll talk about things and dancing, talk about moves. We’ll talk about stuff but you know, it’s not going to be a learning to dance show. Yeah.
Taras Denysenko 2:01 So what we are and will be discussing on the show is some ideas surrounding ballroom dancing. Anything from anything?
Todd Combs 2:11 Yeah. things you can do to improve your dancing
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Découvrez des podcasts liées à All About Ballroom Dancing. Explorez des podcasts avec des thèmes, sujets, et formats similaires. Ces similarités sont calculées grâce à des données tangibles, pas d'extrapolations !
Bob Powers: We are all equally involved and contribute to the technique as well as promotion and online classes to promote it.
How did this come about?
Bob Powers: During the Coronavirus stay at home order one of the guys came up with the idea and asked who would be interested. We all responded.
What stage is this currently in?
Bob Powers: Definitely developmental. It's taken us 9 weeks to do the Rumba Box. But the great thing is it just keeps getting better. We have such an amazing group of great dancers, teachers and musically gifted individuals that it can’t help but be a success.
_________________________________________________
How does a short dancer adjust dance style to get favorable attention from judges?
Amber:
What is something you think students 1) Overthink, and 2) under-prepare for in getting ready for comps, or even while at comps
Is there any “OMG, not again” errors that you see people make? Dancing and Costume
Beatriz Holan:
I have one struggle (out of 150) I learn the school figures, I can follow with a partner but later, when I have to do it on my own, my brain goes blank! I don't remember much of the names. I feel like I've wasted a lesson and you know that is a limited supply
Miscellaneous Questions:
So tell us about your dogs
Any crazy four wheeling stories
Share with the listeners the time you and Bob went running with your friends dog (they had to carry the dog back)
If you were judging a couple dancing a side x side competition...AND that couple was Bob Powers & Julia Gorchakova. Who would you mark 1st?
Taras Denysenko 4:29 But yeah, yeah, there was some just general light stuff,
Todd Combs 4:33 some light stuff. So what would you say okay, you give them the first one. What's one reason why people call the studio in interested in taking dance lessons?
Taras Denysenko 4:40 You know, I think the biggest, biggest reason is that when people go out and they see people dancing, they look they're having a lot of fun and some music. That's the biggest one. They just want more fun, and just enjoy their socialize when they go out. That's a great one
Todd Combs 4:55 right now. And I would say I'll give, you can think of one, two. So I'll say We get people who, who, cuz I'm in Houston. I mean North Houston. So there's a big, I think it's one of the biggest Cruise Line ports here. So we get a lot of people that just came from a cruise. And guess what, there is a ton of dancing on a cruise. So all they did was watch people dance and they did not. And they felt like they were missing out. They were left out someone. Someone didn't invite them to the party, right? So people come in a lot of times because they were missing that enjoyment of social dancing on a cruise. That's when we get a lot of that. How about you?
Taras Denysenko 5:35 Yeah, we get a few of those but more. We're in Virginia Beach, Virginia, so we're right on the oceanfront, or we're right in the ocean. So we have a lot of people coming in for vacation. We have a lot of live bands playing at all sorts of different venues at the hotels. So there's a lot of opportunity for people to listen to really good music, and shags a really big thing in these parts down here and so there's a lot of Dancing, swing dancing, country dancing. So when people are out there, at the hotels at the ocean, they see people dancing. They're like, ah, we want to do that it looks like so much more fun. We can get so much more out of our vacation. Because there's so much good music. So that's a big one.
Todd Combs 6:18 Yeah, and then and then, since I'm in Houston, it's, it's now it's really hot in the summer, so people don't go out necessarily as much. You know, when it's when it's 300 degrees, but there's there we don't get that snow. So there's a lot of outdoor venues. Yeah, outdoor music. And when they're doing the outdoor concerts, they are playing dance music. I mean, it's it's tough. 40 6070s 80s so people are out there trying to dance which I applaud them. I'd rather someone try to dance than just sit down. Totally agree. Yeah, but people people see there's usually there's usually a couple good dancers and then everyone watches them. Now. Not everybody has Some people don't have the cojones to get up and try it. But they all i mean i guarantee they all wish they could and I know what I'm talking about is the guys who wish they could get up and do it. So yeah, but I think another another reason is specially right now and we are still in the middle of the Coronavirus lockdown and I think people are gaining calories, maybe
Taras Denysenko 7:25 think that's the thing.
Todd Combs 7:27 The belt buckle is is going to the next run, I think exercise and health benefits, things like that, that have to do with with dancing and because dancing is a great way to exercise and you don't realize you're exercising. That's not the gym and that's what people love about it.
Taras Denysenko 7:49 That is a really, really, really, really I'll say overtime. Really good point. Nine times out of 10 people are like, Man, I'm getting a workout and I don't even feel like I'm exercising. It's active, you're using your entire body and your brain to try to learn this skill. So when you're trying to learn a new skill or new type of movement, you definitely are working your body a bit more. So, yeah, that is that is true.
Todd Combs 8:21 Yeah. And you touched on the idea that it's so important that dance studios circulate these medical journals, articles, and things like that, that that, that how they link, dancing with brain activity, in a big way to cut down your risk of dementia and Alzheimer's. there's not as many things you can do that require you to listen to music, anticipate the timing, look ahead into either what you're about to lead for the man or being so actively, or being so actively mentally that you're waiting as a woman to work. respond to what his movement is and then know where he's going and be able to do and accomplish the the steps you're supposed to meet. Your brain is on overdrive constantly.
Taras Denysenko 9:10 Yep.
Todd Combs 9:10 So it is a big, big deal for brain health. And I can't even I can't even say enough. You know about brain health. We have so many I have one of my students whose whose sole purpose well who've you've worked with when when we bring to Ross and our studio, he works with Ann, and her mom was in this this old house, the old folks, I mean, it was in a care facility. And I think it was terrible that they had the buildings were were named 54321. So when you when as you progressed in the buildings, it meant you were getting worse. So I think they could have named it like the oak. You know, the oak building the pine Building are something nice, but it was literally like when you're in building five You're You're good. You're basically you know, you just got there for you need a little more care three need more and then two, you know you can have your own you have to have a nurse with you all the time one is like you're almost gone, right? It's like so terrible because it's like, but her mom was in building three and went to building two and no one you know, the thing was no one wanted to change to building two. So you could see that you were deteriorating. Yeah. And so and and biggest reason to take lessons and compete programming is that she does not want to go through what her mom did. So that is her biggest thing is brain health. She knows how big it is. So whenever she messes things up, I mess with her and go I'm gonna put you in building TWO
Taras Denysenko 10:53 it probably gets her back on focus real quick.
Todd Combs 10:55 It does and then yeah, she laughs And then she gets back in the in the in the saddle.
Taras Denysenko 11:00 Well, yeah, well, you know, to go along with that another another big reason people want to learn to dance is it's a great way. If they do have family members going through something, something to help them relieve some stress. I mean, stress relief. There's so much stress in the world right now. Yeah, especially now with the COVID 19 like people we did a virtual class today and we have some health care professionals that never miss our virtual group classes because they are just so stressed out and they need an escape and the studio physically going there to be around healthy fun environment people who are just so excited to dance, but they still not get get that same feeling virtually. But yeah, stress relief. That's that's another big one.
Todd Combs 11:50 Yeah, yeah. Right. And and even when we weren't in the COVID there were still people that you know, because oil and gas is So there's, you know, these people who, who sometimes we have women have come in and said, I make decisions all day long. I don't want to make one. I want someone to tell me what to do. I want to be the learn, you know, the learning, you know? Yeah, I want to I want to, I don't want to have to tell everybody and so, and sometimes the back, I'll just say, Hey, you know, what, what dance Do you want to warm up with today? And they're like, I hate you. I don't care. You just tell me like, even to that point. Yeah, I go. Yeah, I'm sorry. Okay. I'm trying. I tried to be nice to the students and give them some, you know, some options and things. But some, sometimes they don't want that. They just want to be, you know, the stress of their job. It's, you know, dancing definitely takes it away. And it's very hard to think about things outside when you're dancing. You know, I'm sorry, it's, you know, think about outside influences outside beings. You know, it's just dancing takes over. Yep. When you're in 100%. Yeah. So, no,
Taras Denysenko 12:56 wait, wait. Before we go. The next thing you try to do Be nice to your students once in a while.
Todd Combs 13:03 Every once in a while every once in a while. I'm nice because I turn around real quick. Yeah. And I and I put them in building TWO
Taras Denysenko 13:13 Oh man, bam, bam,
Todd Combs 13:16 bam. I think I do is probably the one of the main reasons and I slowly touched on it earlier but one, I can't we can't bypass the reason all those other reasons they're there but there's one reason guys are in and guys are in for the confidence. They lack the confidence. And they'll never tell us we know every guy comes in. If he's single, he wants to be more you know, he wants to push himself be able to you know to attract women. Yep. Or or if it's not his main goal to meet women it's it's still a social activity they would like to be able to do even if it's a one day I would like to get married again. And I like to be able to dance with her, you know, so it's not the immediate reason It's pretty close.
Taras Denysenko 14:01 Yeah. But, you know, interesting story. Like we're, again, we're here in Virginia Beach where there's a lot of Navy people here and a lot of single guys. They'll call us they'll be interested in taking lessons. One of the reasons is stress relief because they want some sort of balance in their life depending if they're, they're more of a, what's the word I'm looking for? They just need some balance if they're actual operators or, you know, using firing weapons and doing all that stuff there it's Go go go, you know, they want something that's going to be a little bit more balanced, a little more cultured. Um, but it's interesting talking about the confidence we've had guys tell us they feel more comfortable jumping out of an airplane than they do on the dance floor. Or they feel more comfortable under fire.
Todd Combs 14:56 Yeah,
Taras Denysenko 14:56 then on the floor, so confidence is a big thing. It's can be a scary thing and like, oftentimes when guys, if guys don't know how to dance what is the typical guy do stupid dumb you know? They'll make fun of it. But we all know
Todd Combs 15:10 yeah I love the guys who come in and you can you can tell the that come in with their wives and it used to be much worse in the 90s in the early 2000s but but nowadays it's a little bit more mainstream yeah but yeah the guys who come in and they're kind of goofing off you know they're like oh and they'll just try to quadruple spin the women mm hmm it's because they're the second their competence gets in starts to get shibori they go into guy mode in most most guys do it now older guys don't because they've already been crushed by their wives. They know that it's all over. But the young guys they don't know yet. They don't know yet. So they act goofy and and try to be cool. And then and then and then once they've once they feel like they can accomplish something They're cool, but guys are We are all little boys. And when we can do something, if we even feel like there's not a chance we give up and throw our toys in the ground. I mean, it doesn't matter how old you are, guys, we're just kind of like that.
Taras Denysenko 16:16 Yeah.
Todd Combs 16:16 And then and then you know, we can't do it we're going to give up who are women, they'll persevere you know, they didn't do it, right. They'll just do it again, guys, they start doing it wrong too many times. And they give up so female teachers learn to teach, you know, men, they know, US teaching women and female teachers teaching men it's, it's totally different.
Taras Denysenko 16:36 Yeah.
Todd Combs 16:36 And they, you know, female teachers know, I gotta do this. And I have to do that, you know, to keep the guys in check. But then but then the female teachers, I swear, I think they have it better the guys listen to the female teachers. They do what they say. It's it's like the male students that have a wife and a female teacher, and they do what they say. Whereas when we teach women....Lord, it's "no I don't want to do that. I don't what about this? What about that?" Like, .......? I'm your teacher. Just do what I say
Taras Denysenko 17:08 Just do it now. Just do it do it. Maybe then, man. Yeah, that'll be another episode because we could go on and on about that one.
Todd Combs 17:16 Oh my god, I could do five episodes. It's probably good. We should have a female. We should have a female on this show to try to balance this out. It's gonna be heavy handed on the ladies.
Taras Denysenko 17:26 I could talk about my one student, Amber. Amber if she ever listens to this.
Todd Combs 17:30 Oh, yeah. I'll tell her I'm gonna we're gonna work. We're gonna work on Kiva motion today and we're gonna put you in front of the mirror so you can see what you're doing. "No, I don't want to do that." What do we know? You don't want to do that. You're gonna do what I tell you. That's right. I'm the highly skilled your doctor. No, no, tell your professor school. We're just gonna work on today and in class. "Nah when I do that," Why are we the only ones that have to deal with that?
Taras Denysenko 18:00 I Don't Know, I don't know.
Todd Combs 18:02 Now let's answer the question to Taras. I'll ask you. I'll ask you the question. Okay, the episode you can answer. Taras. Do I need a partner to learn to dance?
Taras Denysenko 18:14 Well, I'm going to answer that question for you in the most uncomplicated way. No.
Todd Combs 18:21 Bam,
Taras Denysenko 18:21 bam,
Todd Combs 18:22 good. You definitely do not need a partner to learn to dance.
Taras Denysenko 18:29 Nope.
Todd Combs 18:31 Never.
Taras Denysenko 18:32 And why is that?
Todd Combs 18:33 Yeah, yeah. So why is that? Why do we not need a partner to learn to dance now here, I'll give you one reason and then terrassa give you another. So when Now, if you're calling a dance studio, and you're saying I want to learn to dance, you do not need a dance party because the studio will supply you with a teacher, right? You're going to have to learn from someone and they're going to give you a teacher and that teacher will be your partner. That teacher is going to teach you to dance that They're gonna be showing you everything so you don't need a partner. Now, the the other good thing about not having a partner, I'll add to this is that you get the teachers 100% of the lesson. If you have senior female and you have your your male partner in, I guarantee the guy's gonna get 70% of that. That teachers time on the first few lessons first, maybe not, you may 1 lesson or two, because the guys have to lead. So the guy is going to get most of the attention. So when you don't have a partner, you're getting 100% of us. Now, if you're learning by yourself, let's say you know if YouTube or something like that, which is more challenging, but if you're learning by yourself, you still don't want to have a partner because you have to learn how to do moves on your own. Before you can ever learn to make a woman do talking to the guys first who if you need if you're before you ever can lead a lady you have to know how to move yourself. Mm hmm. Before you can Everything about moving a woman now if you're a lady wanting to learn to dance, again, same applies you go to a studio, they're gonna have a partner. If you're learning by yourself, they will show you the pattern on of underarm turn, or a salsa basic or a two step basic or a cha cha basic, and then you just need to work on that on your own. So if you can work on the patterns yourself, then you that's what you need to work on. And you don't need a partner for that.
Taras Denysenko 20:27 The second reason why you do not need a partner to learn to dance is because a good teacher will teach you how to lead or follow in general, not just lead or follow your certificate other whether it be your husband or wife, but learning to lead or follow with your significant other is not the best way to learn. Because oftentimes you get into a routine or a specific grouping that you get kind of stuck in and then you just end up kind of dancing through memory.
Todd Combs 20:57 Right. I was gonna say if, if anyone can think back. Like your grandparents, did you ever have those grandparents that when you were younger, that they danced, or maybe it's just an old couple, you knew, they danced. And they look great on the floor. And they look so cool. They look so cute. They did the little stuff. But if you ever tried to dance with him separately, it was a disaster. You could not recreate that cool move with your grandfather with he just kind of moved around and kind of manhandled you to get through it because they had their little thing, which looks great. And I don't want to I don't want to say it's not good to have that. But, you know, in our studio and tarus terrassa Studio, our goal is to teach you to lead, not lead these five steps in a row in a grouping. It's the lead whatever you want, whenever you want to. That's what leading and following it so not getting pigeonholed in that old cute couples scenario which again, looks great That's, that's awesome, but that's not what we're out to teach. You know, we want you to be a dancer. Yeah. Not a routiner.
Taras Denysenko 22:08 Yep. And that's a big thing right there. We want you to learn how to dance. Not just a step, but learn how to dance. You know, and that could be a whole other topic right there to is what is Yeah, what is dancing.
Todd Combs 22:23 Right, right. Yeah.
Taras Denysenko 22:24 But you know, you look at like, talking about routines and groupings, like, Dancing with the Stars, like these celebrities. You know, they they go on to this show, and they learn, they learn a routine and they learn you know, they talk about Okay, they're going to do this week's episode. They're doing the cha cha cha Yeah, well, if the if you were to try to go out to a club and they were like guys is a great Chacha Do you want to talk? They'll be like, Well, I know how to do a crossover Ray to walk around turn to side by side piece to this thing. And that's all I know how to do.
Todd Combs 22:57 Yeah, and they got to play the song.
Taras Denysenko 22:58 You gotta play that. I did on this.
Todd Combs 23:00 Show.
Taras Denysenko 23:00 Yep. Yeah,
Todd Combs 23:01 yeah, yeah people people come in and think those celebrities know how to dance. They don't know how to dance those celebrities have now some of them may have learned before the show salsa but they did not learn how to dance from the show they learned how to do a routine to that song. And with that partner Yeah, you try to you try to you find you know, a celebrity who was on the show or you meet with someone out and ask him to dance. Alright, guarantee it's not gonna go Well
Taras Denysenko 23:28 no. But they do look at you know, these teachers that are on that show they make their students or those celebrities Oh yeah, good. But Oh definitely knows to experience leaders or followers you try to ask them they won't feel good.
Todd Combs 23:42 So going back to why, you know, you learning together only as a bad ideas again, because you only will learn to dance with each other. Now, let's say 80% of the time that's fine. So for most people, they'll go Oh, that's that's fine with me. That's good. And and I'll say you know, like We've talked about we want to make you good leaders and followers that say, okay, even though you're going to dance with each other in life 80% of the time, you're still going to go to a wedding, you're still going to go to a party, you're still going to go on a cruise with friends or something, there's going to be chances or you're going to be around other people who dance Now, if you're that cool guy, that couple like said grandparents and you know how to dance together. People are gonna see you and think you are the man. You're cool. That's when your confidence goes through the roof. That's like, Man, that's right. I am the man. I am awesome. Yeah. And then and then they're gonna go Hey, look, this a song, let's go dance. And then your confidence is going to crash like a like a glass vase. Because you dance with your wife and you're good at that two step. You're good at that salsa with your with your wife, but if you dance to someone else, you know, it's a disaster in in that's, I'd say there's some responsibility Kind of like, What is it? What is what is Peter Parker get told by his his uncle
Taras Denysenko 25:05 with great power comes great responsibility.
Todd Combs 25:10 Yes. And when you learn to dance, you have great power and the responsibility is that you are able to, to make every woman you dance with feel amazing. Yep. To make every guy you dance with feel like he is a good leader. And he there was it was as equally as amazing.
Taras Denysenko 25:28 Yeah.
Todd Combs 25:28 But when you dance with that, that partner and you know someone besides your wife, and or your partner, sorry, and you can't dance with them. There's this level of expectation they have. They just saw you rock the dance floor. They saw you hustle and spin that woman around to you know, big song and it was the coolest thing they've ever seen. And they dance with you and you it's like you can barely walk and they start going. Wait, what? What happened to that guy?
Taras Denysenko 25:55 Yep.
Todd Combs 25:56 So So even though 80% of the time you dance with your wife, you want To be a good dancer 100% of the time. Yep. All right, not 80% of the time totally.
Taras Denysenko 26:05 My parents when they were growing up and when they.....back in the day when they were going out, they would go out to in Buffalo, New York and Rochester, New York, where they met each other. They would go to the Ukrainian clubs and in the Ukrainian community dancing was a really big thing. And a polka band would come on, and they would be dancing polkas or waltzes or foxtrots or rumbas in my mom and dad, they were known as, as a dancing couple, they would always dance together, again that 80% of the time, and because they typically looked good on the floor, the ladies would ask my dad to dance and my dad's gentlemen, he would say yes, but I remember him telling me stories. He would get off the dance floor and he'd be like, ah, I had to carry these ladies around and they're just killing me. Yeah, yeah. And my dad wasn't a trained dancer, but he grew up culturally dance. It, but with his experience that my mom knew that she needed to carry her own way in, whereas some other other ladies had no idea. So we keep they came off the floor. And he, of course, would want to make them feel good. But he wouldn't want to ever dance with him again. So it's always good to be able to learn how to follow anybody. And so, yeah, whether you dance with your significant other, but, you know, when I lead my mom was a funny I led my mom a couple years back and I never danced with her before. And when I let her through a swing, I was amazed that she never took lessons and that she could carry your own weight. She knew what a connection was. She was just kind of never really yeah, it was pretty wild. I mean, she did take some lessons at the studio with back in Rochester when we were still there, but nothing of significance. But so yeah, women have a responsibility or should say followers have a responsibility as well that you have great power. But you have
Todd Combs 28:00 Yes,
Taras Denysenko 28:01 great responsibility.
Todd Combs 28:03 Do they call your your parents "The Dancing Denysenko's"
Taras Denysenko 28:06 they do. That's a thing.
Todd Combs 28:10 To make a logo, it's awesome.
Taras Denysenko 28:12 Dancing with the dentists and goes up
Todd Combs 28:14 "The Dancing Denysenko's". Yeah, so that was that was pretty much the gist. I mean, we wanted to explain, you know why you don't need a dance partner and stop thinking you need a dance partner and go out there. Learn some stuff, call your local studio, learn some basics. And, you know for us and what you'll quickly find out is when the students come in now we want to show them some patterns. But again, anybody I always tell people, I can teach a monkey to do patterns, but I want to teach you to dance I want to teach you to lead movement, lead the lady around the floor with your body, so it doesn't matter if a fast song a fast song is on or a slow song. So get out there and just give it a try. Yeah.
Taras Denysenko 28:59 you'll you'll you'll thank us for it.
Todd Combs 29:02 Alright, the next episode is "The Top 10 Reasons Students Love To Ballroom Dance"
Taras Denysenko 29:09 Only 10
Todd Combs 29:11 only 10. I know Okay, top 30 Okay, reasons. That's the
Taras Denysenko 29:16 top 50
Todd Combs 29:16 Okay, so going in our
Taras Denysenko 29:18 right. All right top tip.
Todd Combs 29:20 Okay, top 10 reasons. Well, we hope you enjoy this episode. We enjoy your feedback. You can find us on Facebook now. We are https://www.facebook.com/AllAboutBallroomDancing/ On Facebook. We have an Instagram, all https://www.instagram.com/allaboutballroomdancing/ on Instagram. And you can contact us at info@allaboutballroomdancing.com I might change it to a Gmail or a Yahoo account just to make it quicker. But right now, info@allaboutballroomdancing.com we'd love to hear your feedback on questions. You have comments anything about ballroom dancing? Let us know what are your thoughts. Facebook us.
Taras Denysenko 30:02 We want to hear that we're here for you.
Todd Combs 30:05 So until next time, keep dancing.
Taras Denysenko 30:07 And we'll see you on the dance floor real soon.
Todd Combs 30:42 If you like our theme music it's called "Do It" by MBB. And you can find this at https://soundcloud.com/MBBOfficial
It’s reverse. So if you
hear it, then you do it. So that That’s what I like, right? Everyone is listening, and then they do it.
Todd Combs 2:04 So first you have me on, I appreciate it. Absolutely no problem. And we were all kind of talking earlier about, there’s a big advantage of having a person run the music who is a ballroom dancer, not just a music, you know, fanatic or something like you. You’re a ballroom dancer, you know, dance. So that
Brent Mills 2:24 It did help. I’ve been dancing since I was 14,
actually, when I started.
Taras Denysenko 2:29 Wow. And how did you really? Yeah, how did you get started? And well, I
Brent Mills 2:33 just happen to have when I got into high school in the ninth grade,
my drama
teacher because I was starting to get into, you know, that type of thing, just so I could get out of math and science and anything else that actually made me think so I was like, yeah, drama easy, while the drama coach happened to be a former ballroom champion, danced on a Blackpool team. Per coach was Roy Mavor who is a very famous cabaret World Champion, choreographer and whatnot. So they did the musical Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. And that requires 14 male dancers. And I was in a little Podunk High School. So dancing was not you know, was not definitely part of the football or athletic league. Let’s say that. So we had to go out and recruit football players and baseball players to you know, dance Seven Brides, which was appealing to them because it was like jumping over logs and the big social, were there throwing the girls around. So it looked cool then. So we did the whole musical ran it. And then when it stopped, you know, we had to learn walls. For a scene, we had to learn lifts. We had learned the polka. So we was over and we were like, well, we like doing this. Can we Do this after school so that drama goes right. But let’s start a little ballroom team after school once a week for an hour. So that started and by the time I was a senior in high school, it was an official club. We had like 36 people in there. We were doing like performances for prom and preference and all that silly stuff. And then after I left, it became even larger, where students from other high schools would come after school to be on that team. And then they finally got their own team coach, and now it’s a state recognized playoff team match every year between probably eight high schools. And you can actually let her now in ballroom dance. You can walk around the hallway with your letterman jacket,
the pickle ballroom dance
icon, really, it is part of the art program now in many high schools and that high schools really started it out that way. Just the artistic part of it. And then the athletic and the competitive side. So it’s actually recognized by the state school board as a, you know, an estate competition. It’s crazy.
Taras Denysenko 5:10 That is totally Incredible
Brent Mills 5:11 Yeah, it was It is incredible and I and I do this I do And now I’d go back every year for the Nationals because they do the youth formation championships over there at BYU and their 20,000 seat stadium and now I get to deliver music for all of them when I used to be on some of these little teams and now it’s just youth and juniors and preteens and I mean, hundreds and hundreds of youth kids now that all in there’s there’s programs in junior High’s now, so it’s gone a long way and progress but that’s how it started. And I just stuck in there and then I started taking privates because my teacher saw some kind of weird potential. And it was just because I was a cheesy performer like not shy. So But I had huge gunboat feats, I probably size 11 and a half. I was very embarrassed. I was pigeon toed. So I had this turn in. So that cured all of that my feet are now size 10 I don’t even know how that happened. And I don’t have the turned in feed anymore. I mean, it was crazy. When my when I was born, my legs were skewed in they were going to break my legs and reset them. They were so pigeon toed, wow. But they’re like, Nah, unless he has a limp. We’re not going to do that. So I just grew up with these crazy turned in feet and very self conscious because they call me pitch and tone and you know, lots of bullying, but, you know, I made it through but that cured all of that. And just, you know, made me Yeah, I think that’s because when I started coaching later in life, I became this foot Nazi they called me the foot Nazi because I was all about turnout and foot placement and just you have to have feed in for that because I had to pay two To my feet when I was in Turkey, I look like right, craziness. But that’s how it all started.
Taras Denysenko 7:05 Well, that’s a pretty incredible testimonial for the benefits of learning how to dance right there for a reason that a lot of us do get involved with it because of something like that. So that’s, that’s awesome. Thanks for sharing that
Brent Mills 7:15 story. Oh, it’s all good. I mean, the cure to anything is repetition, right? The right repetition. So if you if you got a limp, if you got turned in, it’s just you just train your body, your body’s the smartest thing that it has going for itself. And then at all the tools of modern science, you shouldn’t have no problem.
Todd Combs 7:33 Oh, yeah. And I think there’s something to be said about men because a lot of times women come in the ballroom dance world, as you know, as teachers and they did ballet, they did tap, but I don’t know to me, no, no, you have a ballroom background, but I don’t know too many men that said, who came in the dancing say, you know, I used to dance a lot. And you know, when I was five in elementary school in high school, I was dancing snow. Want to be a teacher. Most guys I knew You know, I was going to be, you know, a doctor, I was going to be this or that. And I just came into dancing. And they all think we came in with, you know, perfect awareness of our feet and legs. You know, we didn’t have pigeon toes, and we didn’t have a limp and we didn’t have, you know, problems like that. They just think we all came in, and we’re just bred to dance for some reason. So it’s good that you? Yeah, you’re sharing your physical limitations as a young child.
Brent Mills 8:30 Yeah, it was challenging. It was just funny. You know, the boys are cute when they play baseball. And the girls are cute when they do little ballet, you know, and that’s and that’s kind of the status quo for here in the States. And, but you know, you go to Europe, go to Asia, it’s like, it’s like, literally for both boys and girls, or dancing for boys and girls. There’s not this like, oh, the boys should do this. And the girl should do that. It’s just, you just do it and such a difference between As if you if you grow up with the mentality then it’s then it’s there and everybody understands it but like my high school is so small town that you know any man or boy who danced it was instantly the crappy label that was you know, we know now which is complete ignorance but back then it was like you got tea so much. I got tea so much I got in a fight. I was I was voted my senior year most likely to take a life. That’s that was the prize I got.
Todd Combs 9:33 And they did.
Brent Mills 9:35 Well, they did it as a funny one a spooky one, you know, but like, I was fighting all the time, because all the Hicks in my school were like picking fights with me and they were labeling me and I’m like, Really? You want that label to beat the crap out of you right now? And I would go off. And yeah, and I just they had pictures of me just enraged for him. You know, I mean, I never picked a fight. But like I go ahead, you just Throw that first punch and I will not stop until I’m dead. Or you’re on the floor. I mean, it was. It was crazy, right? I mean,
Todd Combs 10:07 I think that’s a label that all a lot of us male teachers get that, you know, they’ll make fun of you, even if it’s your friends, you know, they’ll make fun of you. Oh, yeah. ruthless are the worst. Yeah, and then afterwards when we’re all going out to a club, who’s getting all the women who’s who’s having to tell the women No, I’m not interested right now I just, you know, I just want to dance just and they’re just sitting at a bar thinking, you know, if I drink three more beers, these women will look at me like, Man, that guy knows how to drink a beer. Here we go. Yeah, go talk to that guy.
Brent Mills 10:39 No, man, you are you are the center focus. And and I don’t know the confidence. So for men, right? It doesn’t matter how old you are young, you could be 72. And if you’re 72, and you’re single and you know how to salsa. I mean, you just let alone stand alone. Stand up straighter. You know what I mean? You just you let people in. The eye because you’re used to that, because that’s all you have to do when you dance with someone. I mean, it’s it’s all around encompassing a better just a presence, rather than I mean, the guys that watch Monday Night Football. That’s all they do. Now I’m all for one night football. So it’s all good. But it’s like the expansion of your skills always lends to more confidence for sure.
Todd Combs 11:28 Yeah, that is very true. And going like you’re saying about Latin clubs. When, when I’m originally from Northern Virginia, Washington, DC area, and we would go Latin dancing. And Latin clubs are interesting, cuz you’ll have, you’ll have if it’s 21 Club, they’ll be 21 year olds, and they’ll be 72 year olds. In a Latin club. You don’t see that and regular clubs and those those old Latin dudes would every woman was in line to dance, because they were old school and just like suave. Yeah, it’s the best. It’s so fun. Yeah. Yeah, where can you get that done? Where can you know work in a 772 year old guy go Hey, I’m going clubbing tonight. Yeah. And we’ll have an endless amount of women to dance with. Exactly. Clubs, dancers. Exactly. Yeah. And also Brent, you went to you went to Berklee College, a
College of Music in Boston.
Taras Denysenko 12:21 Wow. Whoa,
Brent Mills 12:22 because your music is so there’s Berkeley Cal State, which is crazy Berkeley. And then there’s Berkeley with le E. Berklee College of Music from Boston. Like, john mayer went there.
Taras Denysenko 12:35 And Aerosmith guys from Aerosmith, right?
Brent Mills 12:36 Yep. There’s those? There’s a lot of Yeah, yeah. I mean, it’s, it’s known for its guitar department. That’s its main thing that said, that’s their strength. If you if you want to be a guitar player, especially jazz, then that is where all the guitar players go.
Taras Denysenko 12:52 Yeah. Like john Petra Tucci, I think,
Brent Mills 12:54 yeah. And then their next is like, as piano, but yeah, that was That was a full on. I mean, that half of the building was an old hotel. So I mean, I had practice rooms that I literally could barely open the door. And then you have to sit on the bench at to close the door. And then you’re literally could lean up against the back wall while you practice this upright piano in I mean, maybe six by eight just and that’s that was your practice room. You just go in there and they call it the shed. And he’s like, Where are you going? I’m going in the shed. I got a shout out my scales. You got to pass off every scale, every key, every mode and every key. I mean, yeah, so Oh, really? Yeah. It was just a great experience because it was just specialized. This I mean, everyone going there was out to be a professional musician. Because after that I transferred. After two years of there, I just got my diploma. And so I go, I went over to the University of Utah to finish and that program was like everyone was going to be a band teacher. I mean, wasn’t even close to the same intensity or the same focus because everybody in Boston was out like soon as I leave, I gotta make money, you know, where everybody else as a band, you’re like, well, I’m just gonna get a job teaching band, you know, so different mentality and energy, but it was awesome.
Taras Denysenko 14:18 So were you into music? Like, when did you get into music? Um,
Brent Mills 14:22 I don’t know, I remember as a kid, maybe two years old. Three, looking at my older brothers, little piano books. They were like five and four, and five and six. And so I would sit at the piano and I would see time to see the pictures. So I would just look at the picture like say it was a dog and a little boy with a balloon walking. So I would just start plunking on the keys and start telling a story about a boy and a dog and a balloon.
And that is like that. It’s a boy and God.
Ugly, and I would just like pound the keys. I was I was playing no melodies. Let’s Let’s not mistake this that I was like writing music because I’m not saying that I was massacring music, because I’m sure my parents were like, this kid has no talent because I would just make stories up the pictures I saw, which is telling because once I mean jumping ahead 25 years, and I’m getting I got hired at the university to play for their ballet and their modern dance classes. All of a sudden, now I’m watching sequences of movement that I just had to put music to so they can have rhythm. So I could just make up songs and watch something and kind of know like, Oh, yeah, it’s jazzy. I’m gonna play something Jazzy, or it’s quick. So I’m gonna play something slow and make make a contrast or you know, so that’s when I started visually, like, if I see something I literally hear things. So I see someone moving no matter ballroom or modern or whatever. I instantly start tapping my foot. I instantly Just I want to put it to music. So I’ve never been a songwriter as in like, this is my song. And these are my lyrics. Because writing music You know, it’s its own little challenge because it’s not the it’s not the progress of the song or the sequence of chords. It’s the melody that sells a song. Right? So you know, Hound Dog by Elvis Presley. This the chord sequence of hound dog is three chords. So there’s there’s probably thousands of songs with that same sequence. But the fact that he put that hound dog melody, that’s what sold the song. And that’s the hardest thing to do. Because in my brain since I just watched things, and I just put it to music. You know, I’ll change the melody all the time. So it’s hard for me to compose original music because I can’t ever decide because I’ll play I’m like, Oh, I like it this way, and then I’ll kind of play a little bit different. I’m like, oh, wait a second, I like it that way. And it just becomes very challenging. I just like watching and playing freestyle. Like, that’s my, that’s the thing I enjoy the most. So if I could watch a couple start dancing, I could totally compose a music a song while they actually moved.
Or a ballerina,
you know, like I could literally watch them and follow their movement because I kind of know what’s going to happen. Look, I know when they’re going to pause. I know, you know when they’re going to do an over sway. So it’s just easy for me because I have all that vernacular in education and dance. So that’s how it all got started.
Taras Denysenko 17:42 So have you ever created a piece for a dancer?
Brent Mills 17:45 Yeah, many
Oh, yeah. Yeah, many different performances. I mean, I think it arts, one of Arthur Murray in Vegas, Ricardo and Yulia did a rumba and They asked me if I would just follow them and we just play a drum track and I would play piano and I had my bass player play with us. And I think it’s all it’s on video and somewhere I think gay hasn’t from photography.
Taras Denysenko 18:15 Yeah, I think I remember seeing that actually, sir.
Brent Mills 18:17 Yeah. So I was just making it up as they were moving. We didn’t practice. We they just said we want to go at this rhythm. And we just, I just watched them. I just watched them go. And yeah, that syncs up real well, but like when you watch it, I’m I’m literally just making it up. I told the bass player the sequence of the chords, and then we just followed. So that’s, that’s happened. And then I have my own original recordings that I’ve done. And then original covers that I’ve done that at this point. So
Todd Combs 18:50 you’re a musical savant.
Taras Denysenko 18:53 Yeah, I kind of, up, right.
Brent Mills 18:55 Well, I mean…..
Todd Combs 18:56 socially awkward.
Very A musical I mean, it’s like you to a tee. Yeah. It’s good. Emotionally awkward motion awkward. Don’t cry. Brendan’s.
Brent Mills 19:07 Yeah, I get it. I get it I get
Todd Combs 19:12 so now I want to know who is did you have a musical inspiration? Either growing up or Now earlier.
Brent Mills 19:20 Growing up, I remember hearing Rhapsody in Blue when I was very, very
young, like
eight or nine years old and just fascinated. I don’t know what it was about that piece. And that led to I don’t know, I fell on West Side Story. And I watched that as a as a small child as well. And I was just what is this music like, what is this great, you know, music that’s so deep and so just like the prog the chords and everything they use, and so that hooked me into just listening to music. That was Not what my friends were listening to. And then when I was a sophomore, we went to New Orleans for the World’s Fair when they used to have the World’s Fair and we were doing shows down there. So we went to New Orleans for the first time and that was Dixieland jazz is when I just was like, Oh, my Dixieland jazz was it and then that led to Harry Connick. But I was like a sting fan police songwriters, I love Billy Joel and like all their off music as well like their music that you know, not their mainstream so I was always that guy that always had the album’s and listening all the besides. So that’s that’s kind of how it went. But I just had to teach myself piano when I was two, three years old, and then they finally got me lessons that I didn’t like the lessons because they wouldn’t let me play the songs the way I wanted to play them. Because I was already like it. Probably then. My father wasn’t a great kind of jazz pianist. He played a lot on his own just for fun. And I’d watch him do Boogie Woogie. And so that’s how I learned how to improv. And so I just loved making things up. So, which got me out of lots of classes and trouble in high school because I learned how to make things up.
Taras Denysenko 21:23 So that’s cool.
Brent Mills 21:24 So so that’s how that started.
Taras Denysenko 21:26 So you can play keys, but you can you also play other instruments too, right?
Brent Mills 21:32 Yeah. So I yeah, I started teaching myself piano, but then maybe when I was eight, maybe maybe seven. I was with my older brother and his friend had a drum set who had a brother had a drum set. And so they started playing and the brother played this one little groove. And I was like, Oh, yeah, I can play that and it was kind of a syncopated groove. And my older brother couldn’t play it. And then my older brother got a pair drum, some drums. Use drums. And then when he was gone, I would practice I would play, and then come home and I’d get off and then he found out I was playing. And then I don’t know, I just took the drums like it was so easy just to do that was just easy. And so I started playing drums a lot more than piano. So I spent like, my whole youth playing drums at planet fairs. We used to have this drum duel that we’d go to state fair county fairs and do this drum off with this other kid. Yeah, and then it wasn’t until jazz band in junior high. Sorry, in high school, I started I started I switched over to piano. And then I started playing jazz piano in that jazz band. And then when I went to Berkeley, I went over as a percussionist because I had a more of a background and qualifications to get in. But once I got there, I switched to piano just to learn my theory on piano because I already knew the theory and technique of drumming because I did take lessons I was in drama Bugle Corps one summer So, yeah, so that’s when I started piano officially when I got into college at Berkeley. And that’s, and yeah, I play a little bit of guitar, but I can, I can play all the percussion instruments, xylophone, glockenspiel, all those things timpani anything in orchestra. And then and then just piano and I’m not really an organist or because that’s a different technique that I did not take on too. So I was all about real keys like real piano.
Todd Combs 23:34 So, yeah, that’s really that’s cool. Cool.
Brent Mills 23:38 Well, it helped a lot because when I was dancing when I when I graduated with my dance degree and went to New York, someone found out that I was a drummer and then Gary and Dinah MacDonald with a former World 10 dance champions they they asked me if I could just remix some music because back then before the internet, you there had allowed Song or it was a ballroom song he couldn’t change it. Digital software was starting up and so then I can you remix this into me. So I started making music, Latin music for the dancers because I knew how to drum and I knew how to play a conga line and you know, bongos and like, I could mix easy because I knew what Latin music was. So I’m like, yeah, that’s easy to just put a little drum track on it. Next thing, you know, it’s a cha cha, you know. And so that helped a lot because there weren’t a lot of musicians that had a dance background. And there weren’t a lot of dancers that had a music background. So I was lucky that I had a professional experience and training in both, which I could talk all of the dancer talk and so then all sudden, that turned into coaches and teachers, you know, dancers and I didn’t have to bring them over. They didn’t have to come to my house. I would just say they were like, Hey, I love the song. You make a samba mic? Yep. And then I would come back the next day, two and a half minutes Samba show, and I I know what they would want. I know they want the cool beginning they gotta have a big highlight solid ending. I knew what they wanted because that’s what I would have done if I was dancing so they didn’t have to babysit anymore. So now they’re like, this is awesome, because you used to have to go over to a recording studio, sit down with the guy. Have all your cuts ready, you remember so yeah,
the prod I used to edit tape the tape like reel to reel. I don’t know if you guys know what that means.
Taras Denysenko 25:27 Yeah, there’s probably no well maybe some of the listeners well will
Brent Mills 25:30 the reel you had to cut it with a razor blade and you had to use scotch tape to tape it back together and hopefully you got the crossfade right is crazy. Crazy.
Taras Denysenko 25:39 So what was your What was your first musical director gig then?
Brent Mills 25:44 My first gig was us DC the United States dance board championships when it was down in Miami at the fountain blue. And it was 1999 and mild director got put in charge of the music because the former music directors retired. It was a husband and wife team. So he brought down all the music, but he had also chair the competition. So he saw me there because I just had one student, he’s like, can you help with the music because, and I knew him from the tours. And so I just stepped in and just did it for free to help elite, you know, give a break to the guy that was sitting there for 16 hours. And then they asked me back again, and then I thought someone should, you know, modernize this because it’s pretty archaic. So I started doing that and then just one gig after the other than do a gig. And then there’d be judges there that had another other events and they’d be like, Hey, I like your music. So I went from one or two a year. And then we got more and then we the now we do like over 100 and maybe 60 events a year. So I have a lot of them through for that. I send these Guys out and it’s the music that I’ve curated and put together and, you know, I put it together and different levels as far as like, being able to discern, you know, what’s appropriate, because there’s their styles of music that are appropriate for kids for beginners, and, you know, tempo and content as far as like, you know, how what’s portrayed, you know, so you can just blast out some walls with, you know, music that doesn’t really lean towards waltz. It’s just so I was able to kind of filter out some of the songs that didn’t really work, because I wouldn’t have danced to them. So I just throw them out, because I’m like, I will buy one down soon, then nobody wants to. I just thought that way. So that helped a lot. Yeah. So that’s, that’s how it all started in 1999. So
Taras Denysenko 27:49 so when you hear a song for the first time, how do you decide who’s it going to be for what it’s going to be when you’re going to play it?
Brent Mills 28:00 I immediately hear
what the time signature is and the style so I can like if they had the show name that tune or but if they did it reverse into said name that dance when you hear the song. Like instantly I could be like rumba or I could be like as a swing as a West Coast. I mean like it’s so fast, because it’s just that’s how I my brain works now. And so as identify, you know, I’ll be like yeah, it’s a rumba and then it’ll probably change. Oh, my God, never mind is chacha, you know, because the energy changes or whatnot. So, I think I sense the energy of the song. And then once once I’ve known what the time signature is, then it’s easy to say Oh, that even like American waltz versus like a ballroom like international waltz. Like there’s even slight differences that in my brain I use to help. You know, this is better for American style. It’s more lyrical if people will want to move in open way. This is a ballroom when is really good solid beats, it doesn’t drift off anywhere, just stay solid, you know. So, over the years, I learned those little idiosyncrasies for each for each style as well.
Todd Combs 29:14 So I wanted to kind of bring in if students because you know, in this in the show, we’ll have students listening teachers and, and I know some students are going to sit here and think how, what kind of tools are or what can I need help identifying music, right so we can hear music. And, you know, I wanted to kind of go and ask you some questions about timing signature measures bpms and things like that. So, so when if a student said, um, you know, now Now I don’t want to sit here and say what I do, right because you’re the expert here. You know, they’re slow music fast music so what what kind of tools would you say what does this do need to learn?
Brent Mills 29:54 So yeah, so like,
first thing to do is is it To establish speed because speed will dictate a lot of the dances right i mean if you hear it you know very fast swing you can be like organza Lindy see the quick step or jive you know, you can immediately go Okay, I’m gonna go into the slow dance mode, or the medium or swanky mode you’ll you’ll immediately identify that way. So the tempo then that will break it down to like okay, well now does this feel like so slow that it’s nightclub to step? Or is this a little faster where I could get away with rumba or Bolero? Do I Do I hear Latin Congress? Do I hear Latin percussion? So the next is to identify the sounds you’re hearing. Am I hearing strings? You know? So now I’m going to go into foxtrots or waltzes or tangos, you know you so you kind of compile as you hear measures pass each other because everything everybody’s song is kind of a kind of a build or progress. So, musicians when they’re making music, you know, they’re not thinking about dancers, which most people forget. So dance music, every musician unless someone like me or a designated record label that makes ballroom music, they’re not going like, Yeah, man is my song. And I think it’s gonna be a great West Coast Swing to now they don’t even know what that means. So they’re just going this is my song. And this is the way I like to play it. And then we as dancers go, Yeah, I like it too. But it needs to be a little faster because, you know, blah, blah, blah. And it’s our responsibility to change that or to or adjust to that. And it’s funny because a lot of dances will be the expectations are like, well, this song isn’t. It’s too slow. They’ve did it too slow. And I’m like, but they didn’t do anything at all, they just made their song. Yeah, we’re the ones that like it. So, you know, it. I liken it to to musicians, as a professional musician, they write their music or arrange it, produce it record or whatever, though, and then they send it out. So they’re there. They’re in this highway in the, in the right lane. And they’re just they just stay in that lane and they just send out their music and people grab it and they buy it. They don’t whatever. And that’s how they make their money. And then dancers. They’re the same. They’re in the left lane going down the road, teaching their dances, choreographing booking the shows, you know, all those things, but yet they have to move over into that right lane and grab a bunch of music. And then they got to move back over to their left lane to do what they want to do with that music. But those musicians in that right lane, they never come over to the left lane. But there’s so much work in the left lane because dancers need them. They can’t do it without no one has just started moving without any music except for someone that has a problem. So, I mean, there’s some, there’s a few modern, contemporary, you know, pieces that have no music, which are amazing, you know, but they’re specialized. But nine 9% of the rest have some kind of sound, whether it be any kind of sound, but any sound makes it musical. And that’s what invokes you to move. So I’m always of the of the thought of like, I need to find more musicians that can come over to that left lane, and help out the dancers. So I’ve been trying to, like make a network of musicians that, you know, come over here where there’s work where you can edit and you can remix for these guys. I mean, if I had more time, I mean, the situation that it is right now. I’ve just pumped out three new V and these losses. I did it I did a cover of dust in the wind. We have to play that. That’s
that did a Viennese wall to that
Taras Denysenko 33:57 just now that’s cool.
Brent Mills 33:58 Nice. So I mean, I have the time to Do it, you know, but I don’t always have the time because I’m, I mean, I do 45 events a year alone. So that’s just two days home out again, three days home out again. So, you know, if I could get a network of musicians so that’s
that’s how my mental process of like,
as much as people take advantage of the music’s always there, it has to be there because that’s all you got to do. You don’t just take off and start moving. So
Todd Combs 34:33 and I think it’s hard for some people to just for some students come in and they want to just ask us, what’s the magic equation to be able to music identify for ballroom dancing? And, yeah, it’s it’s so challenging, and without some good kind of reference point. I think it’s really challenging for them. So so like one thing you have is you have music Mills live, which is your music service the streaming channels. Yes,
Brent Mills 35:01 it’s like the Pandora for Dance, dance sport. Right? It’s
Todd Combs 35:05 like yeah, there you go Pinto you probably have a way better way to explain it. Yeah Pandora for dance. And especially right now, when as we’re recording this. We are in the Coronavirus lockdown situation. Yep. So we’re all stuck at home, we’re not able to go out. And you do have a special which will last during the lockdown session. So we’ll, we’ll have that on in our in our show notes and you can you know, tell us where to go and things like that. But But your, your service tells us, hey, I want to Foxtrot. This is the foxtrot.
Brent Mills 35:43 Yeah, we decided I decided, yeah, because when we I was making the app. You know, at first we made the app for the phone because all the teachers were using their phones. They’re hooking their phones into the sound system playing from their phones. And but none of their apps were slowing down music Storing and making playlists, the things that you need to do when you have to manipulate music for dance for ballroom especially. So we made the app. And then during that time, unlimited data came about and so everybody stopped downloading and buying music. They just started streaming it. So we’re like, wow, we need to have an alternative. Because there’s two kinds of dancers, there’s dancers that will dance to any music, they just need the right music. And then there’s dancers that love their collection, they pull in the chart and this rumbas they love and that’s their music and they and they love collecting it as a dancer, because that’s what inspires him. Right? And, but we had to kind of serve as both styles because I am like, when I listen to Pandora, I like the steam channel. I’m a fan of sting. And I’m also a fan of musicians that are like staying and if I liked them, I keep them. I don’t subscribe to the sting channel to listen to just sting music, just the styles of sting. So we decided to do like the international cha cha channel, which are all the charges that are in my library at the International speed. So they’re all curated, they’re all phrased, and they’re in the correct tempo. So if teachers that just need new music and rhythm that is correct, they don’t have to keep adjusting or editing. That’s for them. That’s that just gives you Chacha after Chacha or American waltz after American walls, and they’re all from my library, so they’re trusted. There’s songs that I’m using currently in events, so nothing gets stale, nothing gets like where you just can’t stand listening to a song over and over again, like dancers can do they can crush a song and crush the life out of a song. So that’s what that is for. And then the app as itself that functions as a tool to like, collect your music, organize it into different folders, you can save your showcase music for your students. You can create playlists for socials. That’s that’s the other style of teacher that is uses music as a tool. Like I use when I taught I used music as a to make every student a CD, I would make them CD of their practice music so they would go in their car and they could have that right cha cha music at home. And the app was meant to do that is like, if you’re a teacher, you, you know, I would give this app to my students and I would say, here’s a song, you’re gonna load it into your app, and this is the right music to practice to. So now they’re practicing the correct music style, tempo and whatnot. When they’re on their own Plus, it was just a, you know, reminder where they were and where they were training. So it was a great tool. It is a great tool for even students, teachers alike because it can help organize, it can help motivate whether you just need I mean we have an American bronze Foxtrot channel we have 32 channels total. So we even have an American bronze Fox channel which are a little faster internet So, instead of again, trying to speed up music for a bronze student, we have the American bronze Foxtrot channel. So all those temples are a little faster, a little easier to teach and dance to. So with 32 Yeah, lots of choices. Whatever style you do, we got them all even bachata salsa hustle that
those as well.
Taras Denysenko 39:24 And that’s it, you know, that’s, that’s really a great value, because it’s like, just like learning to dance, you got to go through repetition and training your body to move but also, this is a great way to train your ear. So when a student wants to develop music recognition, if they can go to your app, and just your that tempo here, that style of music, then they start to get your training, as well. So that’s like, it’s brilliant.
Brent Mills 39:46 Yeah. And the fact that you don’t know what’s coming next because it is streaming. So you literally challenge yourself to like, start identifying evil, you know, you could even be like, well, I’m in the waltz channel. I know they’re all Walters. However, everyone All starts different some start real quiet, you don’t know what that beat is yet. You know, I mean, that’s another key factor of like ident. Once you know what the dances well, you need to identify when that downbeat is, or, you know, when that measure begins what you were talking about earlier, you know, if you’re in a waltz, you need to know where one two, you know, same thing. So, that’s a lot of practice, because you can just listen to it like the radio, right?
Todd Combs 40:25 Yeah, that’s because when you make a playlist, let’s say, in Spotify or something, you even if you shuffle it, you put it, you know, the songs that are in that playlist, right? You know, so it’s, it’s different, right? You want it, there’s not as much of a challenge in that. Whereas as a teacher, it’d be great to say, go listen to music Mills live. I want you to listen to the foxtrot channel. And I want you to listen to the rumba channel and tell me what the differences are next less. There you go. Brilliant. Yeah, Spock, you know, sometimes spot Trying rumba, you know, there, there can be we know there’s some songs you can do both to their slow Yeah, but you know, there’s some differences. And I’m sure in your, you know, like at the studio sometimes I’ll play. I’ll just be like, you know what, today, let’s play some 80s ballads, you know just really some rockin 80s music and, and and we’re choosing to do a rumba to it or we could choose to do a Foxtrot to it, but it’s not authentic, you know, it’s an authentic Foxtrot necessarily. So, there’s those songs but, but yours is good because you’re really working on the authenticity of what a Foxtrot is, you know, and really understanding them right. So I like that good.
Brent Mills 41:37 Yeah, and that’s and that’s really the primary reason to either collect and manipulate the music as you like, because you have a certain song It needs to be a certain tempo. You know, because the rest of the world, the dance world, even salsa, the the industry of salsa of Tango, the industry of hip hop lyrical jazz ballet. Those are all songs that are pretty much as they hear them, they dance to them. So they’re not stuck on time. They’re not stuck on tempo like, Oh, this I need to speed this up for West, the west side, like West hip hop. Because there’s East Coast West Coast, right? So if they go this is this is too fast for US Coast hip hop, they would look at you like you’re a turkey. They don’t even they be like, we don’t even care about tempo, you crazy, you know, but like, Oh, that’s too fast for our church. I’m not going to do that me, you know, and you’re like, Oh my gosh, because that’s why they the other dancers roll their eyes at us. But you know, once you learn the reason why tempo has been established, then you fully understand there are reasons why you can do jive really slow, or you can’t do foxfire really fast because it turns into another dance. Where hip hop is hip hop, you know, fast or slow, right? There’s not like hip hop, salsa or hip hop bachata. No. So is that distinction that no one really, you know, made no for for the ballroom world because it’s really not the dominant dance shaundra you know, hip hop and ballet, like those are the dominant. So that’s where they get all the attention. Yeah. So,
Taras Denysenko 43:28 you know, it’s really interesting. You said earlier about the right lane in the left lane, right lane, or musicians left lanes or dancers. So you’re kind of unique individual in that you do legitimately ride both those lanes as composing music, and being a dancer and yeah, why what’s also super cool is when we go to some of our competitions, you also are able to do live music with Brent mills and the nine dance band. It’s a great band and a mad respect to provide a live music because there’s there’s a whole other element to dancing to pre recorded music versus live music. Yeah.
So let’s talk a little bit about Brett milson. And your and your live band man that’s,
Brent Mills 44:17 well first of all, I, I would play. I love playing live. I only like playing live as a drummer. I hate playing live as a pianist because there’s 10 fingers that are going to make a mistake at any time at any moment. And it’s nerve racking. And unless I’ve rehearsed for hours and hours, I am a wreck. I so every time you guys have seen me play like the walls for pros. Oh yeah, I’m a mess. I’m a mess in my head. I want to cry a little bit. It’s It’s It’s terrifying. Now drums. You know, who knows I’m making mistakes. I’m just hitting cymbals and tom toms black As long as I keep my rhythm, I am at a party for me up there. So that first and foremost is just thrilling, thrilling, thrilling. The whole nine dance pen that came with that was just Paul Hermanson, one of the MCs that is always emceeing there. You know, our first time we had the band, the corporate took a big chance and they’re like, you can do this. And I’m like, Yes, we can do it. And I, I know how to do it. And so they did. And so the first time Paul was like, well, what’s your band’s name? I’m like, well, we’re not a band. I mean, we’re not a we’re not a band that goes out and does shows on the weekends. These are all musicians that play for Michael Buble and Rod Stewart and all the saline they they’re the they’re the members that are hired when these guys come in to do their like one month show run. Because those big names they don’t really travel with their whole band, they travel with maybe three and then all the rest are locals. They’re locals that can instantly read music, any style, any difficulty. And that’s how good they are. Well, I had a bass player friend who was one of probably the best play bass players in Vegas, and he knows everybody. So when we had to do this, he’s like, no, I got this pianos used to play for elton john, I got this this horn line they play from Michael Buble. Like, so I have these cats that can play anything instantly. So I could be like, bass, mucho and D. And they’re like, boop. And done. And we’re going yeah, like they know. And even if they don’t know it, they’ll just say, yeah, it’s it’s indeed 135 back to six, the bridges four or five, you know, I mean, they’re just like, Okay, got it. Literally with halfway through, you know, a minute, they already have the sequence. So it makes it easier because we don’t have to rehearse and you know, meet three times a week like most bands have to do to practice their gigs because we’re not really playing a concert to to show So we’re just the support for the dancers. So they just need to play a minute and a half. And then we’re done. So it’s like any mirror, have any song everybody knows, you just follow and everybody follows. And then they just follow me. And when I’m done, I fade them out or we find the end spot. And that’s, that’s how that all came about. And and then, you know, we were able to mix. This is what other the bad they were able to mix inside the system. So like we made, we miked everything so all of our sound was coming to the floor where you’ve been hearing music all week, through those speakers, where if you see other bands come in, they bring in their own sound system and all their sound is coming from one stage. So it’s like a concert like it’s all coming from one end. So all the dancers on the other end are getting knocked the energy it’s too far away and it sounds like we’re literally in the sound systems. We sound like the music that’s being played. So I had a lot of people just say like, I didn’t even know it was a band yet until I looked, I thought it was just regular canned music, and then they look up and it’s the band, because we were able to, we integrate it into the sound system, which made a huge difference, because now the dancers Can you clearly hear the rhythm, not get confused from a delay, you know, because we’re on the other side of stage, you know, blah, blah, blah. So,
Taras Denysenko 48:27 and that’s true. I have a I have a student that she competes. We compete at a pro level and I remember dancing, one of our scholarship events and you guys were playing live and I was like, dang, that was a live band. We were just dancing to those musicians you bring on our Oh, second to none for sure.
Brent Mills 48:44 Awesome. I you know, Elisa, my female singer who comes every time. Yeah, she’s she toured with Prince for like, 10 years. That’s awesome. So I mean, she’s in a video with Prince on his knees, while she’s doing like some solo and he’s worshiping Like, that’s how good she is. I mean, just amazing, amazing musicians all.
Todd Combs 49:05 Yeah. And they’re all they’re all cool, cool dudes cuz I remember when we all were playing the guitar guy. I was up with him and we’re, he’s like, you can use my guitar if you want to. And I was like, No, no dude, your guitar looks way, way too expensive for my hands. Yeah, but he was, he was like, um, I think he just assumed I lived in in Vegas. And he was like, hey, come, you know, just let me know. Let’s talk and we can I’ll work with you a little bit. He’s like, for fun. I won’t even charge you know, I was like, dude, you’re the coolest. I don’t live in Vegas. But I wish I did. So he was Yeah, he was just so nice. He offered to help me
Brent Mills 49:44 and they love those gigs. They love the dance gigs because, I mean, it’s just a whole different energy where they’re not having to sit there for four minutes, three minutes. Play all this music and know all the changes. You know, it’s like, show up. Here’s the song list. I mean, we’ll we’ll go through things when we do our sound checks, we’ll make sure like, if we’re doing a new song, we’ll make sure we know what’s going on. But for the most part, it’s really just a meeting. And we’re like, Okay, this set, we’re going to do these songs in these keys, who’s singing? Okay, just watch me. And then then there we go. And then they get it. You know, they love watching the dances. The dances are so grateful and very complimentary to them. And so, to them, it’s just like a bonus gig. I mean, it’s very lucky that I don’t have to drag any. I mean, I have people just waiting at the door like, Hey, man, if you ever need me, I’ll jump in, you know, Steve, like Gilda Marlo sue for Chicago. He’s like, anytime you need me. I’m ready. You know, because they just love playing just like dancers will dance anywhere. musicians that play full time they’ll play anytime, anywhere.
Todd Combs 50:48 Because they love it. And it’s so and you can tell they like I mean, you know, when you’re going out and you’re eating somewhere and a band is playing and everyone’s just eating their own dinner and and not really paying attention. To the band and you’re thinking, This band is is really good and no one’s really appreciating. You can tell like when we have our students out of events. The band is like, man, we love you guys dancing while we’re playing. Because I think a lot of time, I mean, obviously in different venues, you know, sometimes they, you know, when they play a gig at a dance event, I mean, the dancers are 110% and you know, involved. Oh, yeah. And I think they, it’s just a, it’s like a, we feed off each other, we feed off them, they feed off us, but, you know, yeah, I don’t think they always get that kind of participation now.
Brent Mills 51:35 And the other thing is, is that the way the reason that our band has been so successful is that, you know, me knowing that, you know, I’m not going to play a salsa for seven minutes, because everyone’s gonna die. or crazy, wicked fast, cha cha. So right any musician that is not in the debt at all, which are all of them. You know, you We say well, we want chachos and rumbas and swings. Well, you just said to them, swing, so he’s gonna be like Fly Me To The Moon, which is a Foxtrot right? That’s not a swing. to them. That’s a swing. Or if you say, if you say, cha cha, they’re gonna be like Ding, ding, ding, Tintin, Tintin, Tintin fast. I mean, they’ll even Google cha cha, and they’ll get this crazy tempo. So they don’t know they don’t know how fast so you even when organizations hire local bands, they get a lot of complaints, a lot of long tracks too slow for a rumba. too fast for East Coast Swing. So it’s like, I know exactly the kind of music everybody likes grooving to and the tempos. So it just it makes it that much easier. And I’ve even been hired to come in and take a band’s repertoire, I’ll look it up, I’ll look at all their music. I’m like, Okay, these are gonna be your charts, these are gonna be your Foxtrot. You’re gonna play these at 100 124 beats per minute, you’re gonna play these at 90 per minute, you know. And then I can customize their playlists to play them at least the right tempos and length. And that’s been quite successful as well, because they can still have local, but at least some some kind of tutelage to help them. Know that like, no, don’t play your churches that fast, then they’ll always like what I’m like, yeah, it’s at 120. Yeah, that’s really slow. Yeah, to you. So, you know, they’ll learn really fast, but they always want to do it because every time they’ve done it, everybody applies. They all cheer for them. They they can feel like the energy Connect. And that’s the point.
Todd Combs 53:55 So, so cool, big difference. Yeah. Definitely. Now I think we want to get to a section that we’re kind of every time we do an interview, we’re gonna tell we’re going to ask them. What’s your take on? Okay? Like, what’s your take on something so, so now we’re going to go to our what’s your take on section? Four. Brent’s, what’s your take on we’re going to talk about which songs need to be banned from showcases competitions, studio events, any event that you know other people are hearing music now. Just because we want to make your life harder we’re gonna go first even though this interviews about you, we obviously don’t care Yeah, we’re gonna tell you are
Brent Mills 54:44 you you? You You be all about you right now. I get it.
Todd Combs 54:48 Cheers. Yeah, cuz ours. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, it’s right. It’s our show. Yeah, what is the songs are played out. So for me, I have a couple now I have more than this, but I’m going to give you like my worst and I couldn’t decide between the two Mine is Phantom of the Opera. And cellblock Tango like every time I go to an event or if I’m judging a showcase or or doing something for me I don’t think I make a face but when I hear that Oregon play for fan of the opera I’m just like, oh or I see him walk out with the half mask. I’m just like,
Brent Mills 55:20 yeah, you want that you want the mask to catch on fire? I know.
Todd Combs 55:24 Yeah, I want them to really burn right there. And then and then the cellblock Tango, they’ll just you know, it’s so tired of the cellblock Tango, even though, even when there’s a bunch of women dressed all sexy, doing their thing. I still still doesn’t work. It’s not enough. It’s still not enough. Yeah. I hear you. Your pain. You feel my pain. You now you see this stuff. Every week. You have to push the play button and I’m sure your finger doesn’t want to push the play button. It’s like now. I’m not going to do it. You should just you should just boycott it. Yeah.
Brent Mills 56:00 I wish I wish I could turn a crab song into like a Rotten Tomato and then throw it at the dancers. Now, mostly, it’s mostly when it comes to showcases, it’s really the you know, I get that students that are learning they have their favorite music and that they love to move to right. And that is fine. And I understand all of that. But it’s the guidance that should be there for that student. So when they say, I love Phantom, you’re like, well, Phantom has been done nine bazillion times. So the only way we’re doing Phantom is if it’s a funny sketch, something that people would not expect when they hear the expectations of what phantoms they’re gonna get. So, but that requires way more focus, creativity, and you know, sometimes teachers don’t have all that time or don’t have that. All that creative inside them. So I understand that but like to me, I don’t want to ever hear anyone do anything to Greece.
I don’t want to hear
any Moulin Rouge. I don’t want to hear anything from Chicago. I don’t want to hear anything frozen. or really any Disney Princess unless it’s a little child then we shouldn’t be doing right
Todd Combs 57:27 right that’s that’s Isn’t that funny how that’s totally okay. Yeah, when a kid comes out you’re like that’s cool. So Phantom of the
Brent Mills 57:34 Opera cool. Yeah. Phantom No, that’s been done millions of times.
If any pasta doble a Please don’t do pasta Dhobley unless you take a fun song and make possibly, you know, right there’s a lot of disco songs you could do possibly to and that would be fun to watch. But like if you come out with a spine you Connie I mean we always hear we’ve heard a spine you Connie now for 50 years. So it’s not Like it’s different. It’s not like it’s so this is the spiny Connie by 50 cent. No, it’s not gonna happen. So that’s that’s Michael Jackson please no more Michael Jackson. No more Michael Jackson. We don’t need the glove. We don’t need the moonwalk. And we don’t need him you know reminding us that he touched kids not good I was never I was leaving Neverland. The worst thing I’ve ever seen in my life. It’s I mean, it’s Yeah, I had to actually I stopped playing his music laughter I watch that series. I was like, I haven’t seen it Yeah, well if you see if you don’t watch it if you don’t want to have weird feelings when you hear Michael Jackson music because our ever since then I’m just like, This music is amazing. Of course it is. Right? What he did is not you can’t you can’t justify I can’t in my brain. So I’ll see kid groups and Michael Jackson, I’m like, What is wrong with people? Mm hmm.
Taras Denysenko 59:04 I’ve seen studios yesterday that they’re gonna boycott. Like when that when that came out, people are like, we’re not playing it anymore. We’re not gonna do it.
Brent Mills 59:10 It’s too much. It was too much for me. I remember watching that was when I was working at BYU and Nelson. I saw a whole routine to Michael Jackson Medley and all they are all kids. Like this is odd. This is not feel good. But yeah, that is that’s my take it that’s your take on that. The thing that I realized after all these years watching 9 million showcases is that and this is the map more applies to professional show dances as well. You know, you may have a favorite song that you love and that you have connected to, but that doesn’t mean everybody else, and the majority are not going to connect to it. Perfect example. I love the song by a band called sticks. You all know sticks. So Oh yeah. sail away. It’s an amazing song. It tells a story. It’s a whole thing, right? It’s got a whole break in there with all the synthesizers. I mean, come on. Can you imagine the dance? You can? No, you can’t, because there’s no dance to do to Come sail away. But there’s a lot of, but I love the song. But I know that I can’t translate that onto the dance floor. Because I mean, it’s such an epic song, you’d have to have epic movement or something that would everyone relate to but you know, who is from the 80s in the audience, half of the people the other wrestler like what is this song? So he’s talking about sailing in a Navy outfit? I mean, you don’t even know. So if people don’t people don’t realize like if they’re selecting music, if they feel it’s really close to them, they think that everything should be able to be a dance, but it’s not always It doesn’t work that way. Now, if you’re doing it for sentimental reason I respect that and they just want and they love and that’s fine. But it’s when they think that this is something that is moving to others or inspirational or entertaining. Just because it’s they think that’s the song that everybody should connect to is a huge risk, huge risk. So I’ve seen that more than I’d like to say, tick because it just gets awkward, awkward, awkward. I mean, you know, you’re like, Oh, I know me, and, you know, Russians will come over and then all sudden, they’re dancing to Bananarama. like that song went out a long time ago, you know? So, it’s just got there just got it. It’s true. But I mean, it’s just really doing research and you know, finding that piece that you know, speaks to you but also speaks to an audience because if you don’t have the audience, then you’re sorry. cases, it’s called a showcase for a reason you’re given a show. So I don’t want people walking out on your show, or not connecting to your performance. I mean, that’s the key, right? They got to connect to your understanding. So I mean, if it is deep then make it funny. I mean, people love comedy. So people, right if you’re gonna do fan of the opera, then put a mask on and then a speedo. How about that? Now? opera. Anyway.
Taras Denysenko 1:02:33 All right, awesome.
Todd Combs 1:02:34 Yeah, that’s I’m just thinking of the beginning. Unlike a Luchador outfit, maybe that unlike a cape, and a wrestling outfit, since, like, amazing idea.
Brent Mills 1:02:44 And the best performances are when people have taken risks, where they’re like, I’m gonna, I’m gonna just go I’m gonna wear these shoes, or I’m gonna wear this hat and I don’t care. But if you don’t care, then you’re committed. It means you’re committed. Like it doesn’t bother you, which means you’re going to support it. So You know, and even if it’s not the right song for everybody, if you commit to that song, then people are going to connect because you’ve connected
Taras Denysenko 1:03:08 such as Baby shark.
Brent Mills 1:03:10 Baby shark. Perfect. Now, hi. Oh, yes, Travis and Jamie talks the current US, right? They did some of that where I’m like, Oh my god, you know, you almost instantly were like, I cannot really call this and then the way they did it. They just said, Yep. Where is Baby shark? There’s nothing else to do except being a shark outfit. And do the moves. The way they presented best showed as probably in 10 years.
Taras Denysenko 1:03:42 Yeah. I agree. That was funny. totally unexpected. Yeah. Because my, my least favorite one that needs to go away is from Milan, Roxanne. That was okay. Yeah.
Brent Mills 1:03:55 Yeah. painful.
Taras Denysenko 1:03:56 So do you lowered Do you think there’s such a thing as a song being too big to do a dance to.
Brent Mills 1:04:08 Uh, I think before editing, yes, because you can’t commit to that long or to that many style changes or whatever, but like now that you can kind of customize your music, I think every song is possible, where you were there you either put effects in, or you put in a different style of the song. I mean, the music is so readily available, like I can put in flying to the moon and I’m gonna probably get 20 different arrangements just on iTunes. And now I can like, you know, mix and match. You’re not just committed to one piece. So I don’t know that’s a that’s a good question because you know, sometimes I’ll hear music like if I showed as close And all sudden I hear that Oregon like he said, I can’t help but like, Oh my gosh, please No. And, you know, and I’ve done that, I’ll admit, and then the show ends up being amazing and I eat crow. You know, not that I said it to anybody else but in my own way, and I’m like, Well, that was a fast jump of judgment, idiot, you know?
Todd Combs 1:05:23 Yeah.
Brent Mills 1:05:24 Mostly I’m correct, like, Oh, yeah, they just chose a song. That’s the fast the fast. You know, that’s the quick fix. Everybody knows it. Let’s just do it. So there’s enough resources and you know, things to find nowadays that none of that should ever happen anymore. But like I’ve seen, We’re the champions. No one’s done a Bohemian Rhapsody yet. Because, I mean, you can’t cut that song. Everyone knows the song. So I mean, there’s sounds that you know, you’re not going to get away with because you can’t. It’s Too long and you can’t cut it out because people will be mad. Yeah, that’s how I take.
Todd Combs 1:06:10 That was a lot information.
Brent Mills 1:06:12 Yeah, sorry. You’d be surprised how fast people turn when they don’t get the music that they want at that time. You know, it’s just I just get really just annoyed people turn around and look at me, give me the stink eye. And I’m like, Hey, man, I’m gonna play another charge on about five minutes, then I’m gonna play another one and play about 100 more today. So I think we’ll get it right eventually. Yeah.
So
I’ve always said like, if there’s one person that doesn’t like a song that’s going on, there’s probably 10 that really like it. So it’s just the 10 that really like it don’t cheer and, and come up and say things it’s when they don’t like is when they come up and tell you It’s hilarious. Yeah. It’d be like, yeah, fewer standing next to dressmaker and you’re like, a professional goes out and then you’re like, You know what? I don’t really like that dress you made. I like it. It’s just too green. You know what I mean? I don’t like green. Yeah, never do that. You would never do that. But yeah, right. I’m telling you, these guys will come up to me like to attack us sucks. I mean, they’ll say right.
Look at him and give him the bird or
say,
all right, well, it’s only a cha cha. Another one’s coming. You’ll be okay. Yeah, relax. Take a quick lube. Do something smoke. I don’t know you need to relax because it’s not that big of a deal.
Taras Denysenko 1:07:44 But I gotta tell you one quick funny story. We’re my wife and I were competing pro one time Cadillac classic up in Montreal.
Brent Mills 1:07:52 Okay, good. I wasn’t there.
Taras Denysenko 1:07:54 No you were not there. And it was a Mambo comes on. And we’re still relatively new in competing. And one of the more popular couples at the time they were placing really high Gleb
Brent Mills 1:08:11 Gleb Makrov?
Taras Denysenko 1:08:13 Yeah. Gleb Makarov looked at the DJ. And he looked at him and just stopped dancing and he looked at me goes, this Mambo
is an expletive just started coming out of his mouth.
Brent Mills 1:08:27 He don’t care. He okay.
Taras Denysenko 1:08:30 And he was not gonna dance and you know, Wendy and I were like, okay, we’re, we’re gonna start dancing. I don’t care how fast this is. We’re gonna you know, we’re we’re still fighting. We’re so funny. So the guy stopped playing it, and he put a different mumble on and that was the only time I’ve ever seen something like that happened. I’m
Brent Mills 1:08:50 glad though. He don’t care. He He’s, he’ll I’ll see him at calls and he’ll be like, so glad you’re here. I can’t believe this stuff. They play and then he’ll just go off and I’m like, Oh man, I should play over. Don’t play the wrong song for you. You’re gonna massacre me? Oh my god. Yeah. But you know, he’s just he’s very, you know, like, you know, just like we expect someone to teach their student the right steps, the foot placement, you know, he’s expecting like, if you’re gonna be that music guy, you better be a music guy that, you know, cares, that knows what he’s selecting. You know, so. Oh, that is hilarious. I don’t know anyone has everstopped me. That has not happened with I would remember that I would have been traumatized. And I’d probably be in therapy Still, if that happened.
Todd Combs 1:09:41 Well, Brent, can you tell us about where so we’ve established on your app like you know, it’s a great place for students to start to hear proper tempo music. A great place that they can get their ear used to understand What a fox. What is an East Coast Swing versus a Lindy versus a West Coast? You know, with a tempo a good tempo of a Chacha is because that sometimes can be a little crazy. So, where can they go? To get your information? And your your sir? Okay, well, thank
Brent Mills 1:10:18 you. So yeah, you can their app is for Android, or iPhone. You can use it on surface or iPads. And the app you can find in the app stores or the Google Play, just type in music Mills, which is one word, and it’ll show up or you can find our website as MusicMills.net And then we have all the information there for streaming. And the special that’s going on right now our little COVID special because it’s typically 25 to $35 a month for all 32 channels, but we dropped it down to $9.99. Pretty much the cause To, to get people to music because, you know, the dancers can send the lessons and they can video lessons and video chat. But if those students and amateurs don’t have the music that they’re used to, which is the proper music and the timing, then practice becomes, you know, moot. So we decided to let this go at cost and just let people at least have the music while they’re, you know, in quarantine, stay in a home and you know, do that practice that way. And that will keep going until we’re done. And when it’s done, it’ll just cancel itself out will actually cancel everybody’s account that’s on that $9.99 account. And then, because, you know, we didn’t want people to think that we’re capture everyone and then keep them. So it’ll cancel out and then a few if they liked it, then they can sign back up and do the regular, you know, price and whatnot, but definitely helping out that way. And All the instructions are on YouTube. So we have a music Mills a YouTube channel where you can actually see the tutorials on exactly how to download the app. Sign up for the streaming and getting going on your account. So it’s all on the website or our YouTube channel music Mills. There’s the plug.
Todd Combs 1:12:17 Sweet and your MusicMills.net it has your YouTube channel link on there doesn’t Yes, yes somewhere Okay, I thought I didn’t see it right now because I’m browsing your site.
Brent Mills 1:12:29 Yeah. And then you can we got videos up there. We’ve got some of my original compositions. Some fun videos I’m gonna release a couple albums in a couple weeks. I just released Dustin the wind cover I just did as a Viennese waltz. You can find that in iTunes or right now or Spotify. Mostly you can find my music through my my name, Brent Thomas Mills, type my full name into any of those search engines amazon music or iTunes or Spotify those kinds of then my tracks will up there, and you can check those out as well.
Todd Combs 1:13:03 Yes, also. Well, well, thanks, Brent, we appreciate your information on ballroom dancing, music and storage.
Brent Mills 1:13:13 Of course, if anybody has questions, have them, send them in and then we’ll do a follow up and I’m sure people have, they always have questions about, you know, when they listen when they’re not, you know, people hear music, but they don’t always listen. So, right. That’s, that’s the key. Like, I think it’s hilarious. Um, especially the professionals do this all the time. Like, there will always be one couple that’ll think that they’re gonna start moving before the music goes, you know, which is hilarious, because, oh, yeah, why are you moving? There’s no sound. I mean, so it’s odd. And I’m like, Well, how do you know this is gonna start this way? What if it starts really loud? Or what if it starts really quiet? Like you’re not even blending yet? You’re just going off. So I’ll just like take a little longer to press the play button and make it awkward. Second, the gnocchi I’ll just test them like yours still gonna move, come on, just stop. But I don’t really do that very often. But uh, you know, it’s, it’s just like you have to hear it, you have to listen to it. And you establishing like, ah, soft, okay, I’m going to be soft. Oh, Jazzy, I’m going to be jazzy. You know, you don’t just get a standard beat. And everyone is every beat is the same on every waltz. It’s not the tempo is and the content is right. But the way it’s arranged can give us such different levels of performance, technique and, and energy and that’s, that’s what sets you apart. So that’s my walking away advice if you hear it, great, but listen, take a second There’s no rush to start so
that’s what I can appreciate those that listen.
Todd Combs 1:14:58 Yeah, great advice. And yeah, that’s It’s great that you offer them, you know, people have questions because you know what will happen is people listen to this now, and then as we’re going, you know, people I’m sure you listen to podcasts, sometimes you go back to the first one and it’s it’s old, you know, when someone listens to this, we could be out of the COVID lockdown. And, and ask questions, Brent’s awesome, dude. So I’m sure you could ask questions months from now and he would still be able to help
Brent Mills 1:15:24 ya. So if you want to follow up, call me back. Be glad. Obviously, I can chat a lot. And so I apologize for that. That was awesome. You guys are awesome. I appreciate you spread the musical word. That’s what I appreciate.
Taras Denysenko 1:15:38 Yeah, man, as Yeah, musical hacks ourselves. We like to talk to some legit musicians and dancers.
Brent Mills 1:15:44 Oh, you guys are legit. killing it. Thank you guys.
Taras Denysenko 1:15:49 Awesome. Thanks for joining us.
Brent Mills 1:15:50 Anytime, man. I can’t wait to see you guys again. I can’t wait till we get out of here. Till then I know it’s gonna kind of private ties ourselves and make the best of this time, so why not? So I’ll just keep going. We’ll all keep going and then we’ll reset. It’s good.
Taras Denysenko 1:16:09 That’s good. Yep. Yeah,
Todd Combs 1:16:11 exactly. Once again, guys, I appreciate it. And we look forward to seeing you, man.
Brent Mills 1:16:14 Well, I look forward to being on again. So please don’t hesitate to ask or call and I’d be happy to answer any questions. Thanks, guys.
Todd Combs 1:16:21 All right, man. Thank you. Take care. Take care. All right, everybody. We hope you enjoyed this episode with Brent Mills. Brent Thomas Mills of music Mills live and remember his website is music Mills. That’s m i ll. s mills, music Mills dotnet. And he’s amazing, cool guy. We’ve known him for years and he runs all the big competitions, the music. He does, he does everything. And he was really gracious enough when when we got off the phone right at the end of our interview, he said he has some songs that he has not released yet to any of his platforms so it’s so no one knows about him yet. He said, Hey, I’ll give you all some links to, to my new stuff. No one knows yet so, so the check out our show notes, and we’ll put links in there to some of his music that he has not released to the public yet. So check those out. That’s really cool.
Taras Denysenko 1:17:20 And also coming up on our next episode. How appropriate is during this COVID-19 Coronavirus outbreak, everyone has to stay at home. The title of our next episode is going to be Do I need a partner to ballroom dance? And don’t worry if you can’t have a partner, of course you’re going to want to ask your partner for this is going to create opportunity for people who don’t have a partner right now or if their partner maybe is overseas, or is not local to where you’re at. You don’t need a partner to learn how to ballroom dance.
Todd Combs 1:17:49 How many times have you heard someone call in and say, Do I need a partner to ballroom dance? That’s right. Yeah, a lot. You definitely do not need a partner to ballroom dance. You don’t need one. So that is our next episode all about ballroom dancing. What do you got to say to us?
Taras Denysenko 1:18:07 Right, we’ll see you on the dance floor.
Todd Combs 1:18:23 If you like our theme
music and it’s called do it by m BB. And you can find this at https://soundcloud.com./MBBofficial
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
And we’d like to thank MBB for supplying this song called “Do It“. You can find this song soundcloud.com/MBBOfficial
Taras Denysenko 2:15 topics, from music to shoes, even subjects, like when you can wear rhinestones and when you shouldn’t.
Todd Combs 2:23 And what we’re also going to do is we’ll definitely have interviews, we’re gonna interview coaches, we’re gonna interview Yeah, fellow coaches, fellow judges, fellow studio owners, teachers, students, professional competitors, we want to get all their opinions. Because usually when the students come in, they want to know, what are the judges looking for? What are if I’m doing even if it’s in studio doesn’t have to be a big competition. It could just be something you’re doing in the studio. What do What does everyone want to see work? How can I improve it? We’ll we’ll get everyone’s feedback from, from those questions.
Taras Denysenko 3:03 Yeah, that’s the crazy thing is the ballroom world can be a strange and scary place if you’re brand new to it. And even at times, even if you’re not, so that’s what we’re here for. We’re here to help lead. You see what I did there? We’re
like that.
We’re here to help lead you through this strange and beautiful world.
Todd Combs 3:24 Yes. And one of the big things is, obviously, there’s gonna be a lot more students listening to this than teachers and students have questions and we want to know, what are your questions? What do you want to talk about warming? We’ll pull our studios and see what students want to hear but we want to hear outside our studios. Now what do you want to hear us discuss what would be beneficial to you? What kind of questions do you have about dancing? And we know between us we know a lot about dancing. I’m not even trying to be conceited or but this is our This is our craft. You know, we’re really good at what we do. We know a lot about it, but I’m not going to say we knew everything and if we don’t know the answer we know someone who does know the answer. So yeah, I’m not going to say we’re not going to Oregon know every answer but we will find someone who does and will answer it for you. So, the Our email address is info at all about ballroom dancing.com. So, email in your questions, and we’ll talk about them. So, until next time, have fun on the dance floor.
And we’d like to thank MBB for supplying this song called “Do It“. You can find this song soundcloud.com/MBBOfficial
