Changing Lives through Dancing by David Woodbury
Arthur Murray Santa Monica
As a ballroom dancer, we are trained to listen to the nuance of the music and expressing that feeling through our dancing. We must hear the highs and lows, the fasts and slows. The beeps, the bops, the stops and the starts.
In an interview with the great pianist, Arthur Rubenstein, he was questioned about his renown “pauses”. “I handle the notes no better than many others. But the pauses; that is where the art resides.” Rubenstein was regarded as one of the greatest performers and regarded as one of the best Chopin interpreters of his time. He played in public for eight decades.
As I listen to Rubenstein, especially on YouTube and Spotify, his pauses cause my heart stop and I pause my breathing. I am transported through his playing.
Many years ago, I attended a dance competition where Nina Samaniego and Carlos Rosario were the judges. Miss Samaniego and Mr. Rosario were then coaches and judges in their careers. I had seen Nina when I was a very young dancer. She had the arms and hands of an angel and Carlos was always on fire with his dancing.
At the end of the event, upon thanking our two judges, the audience began to chant for them to dance for us. After a standing ovation of cheering, Nina finally took to the middle of the floor to the music, “Sabor a Mi”, my favorite bolero. She slowly began to move her hands and arms and 50 years fell from her body. The room was mesmerized as she interpreted the music. Then Carlos ran out and slid his feet across the floor to her and the audience erupted with applause.
The next three minutes of their dancing I will never forget. Magical, musical, transformative, incredible. At the end, everyone jumped to their feet and the ovation brought from tears from both of them. The moments that they stood still and paused and let the music overtake them pulled us all deeper and deeper into the dance. They had us under their spell. Every moment, every movement, captivated the audience.
They marked each moment of silence and breaths in the music and they listened every note of their bolero. These are the two words that come from our combination of the letters “CEILNST”, Silence and Listen. I will always remember that experience, that moment in time watching them has stayed in my heart for all these many decades of dancing. The moments seeing them overcome with the applause of several hundred people who were watching them dance.
Now, at almost 68, I am listening every day for the “still small voice” of which I have included in my most recent blogs. I am actively practicing “silence” daily. It funny, I never seem to have true silence around me, only when the cars are off the road, or moments in the theater when the silence is written into the music. I find that I must “make silence” around me. I just block out all the noise and find a place I can pause, rest, and turn off what is happening to me. In those moments, I listen, and it is glorious.
So, put together the letters and spell Listen and Silence and take a pause. Use this in your dancing, in your relationships, in your faith, in your moments of listening to others.
“Still small voice, I long to hear thee.” Take a pause in your day. You’ll “hear” as never before in your life!
Thanks for reading!
Here’s to dancing in 2024!
David Woodbury