Flamenco Steps - Basic Footwork

There’s no shortcut to achieving good footwork—just drilling, drilling, drilling. However, all those hours of practice will be completely wasted if you’re using the wrong technique. When drilling, always:

• Make sure you understand the correct technique for each movement

• Start every drill session slowly

• As you speed up, if you feel your technique is slipping, stop and resume at a pace slow enough to do the movement perfectly.

All footwork starts with exactly the same basic leg movement:

Stand in dance position. Keep your knees firmly together. Now lift one foot behind you so your lower leg is at right angles to your upper leg.

Now you're ready to let the leg fall into whatever step you need.

I call this the backswing. If your working knee lifts up in front, even a fraction, you're doing it wrong. I can't emphasise how important it is to get this starting move right.

• Using a good backswing, you can create a great sound with relaxed feet, because you’re using the weight of the leg rather than brute force. (if you're not getting good sound, the problem may lie in your shoes - are they proper flamenco shoes?
• Less effort = better endurance
• A more relaxed foot can move faster

One of the consequences of raising your leg behind you, is that it's quite difficult to hit the floor in front of you. Watch the video to your right and you'll see the dancer moves backwards more than forwards! And that's exactly what should happen.

Actually, for performance, there will be times when you step forward with a dig or a stamp to move around the room. Just be aware that's a variation, not the basic technique.

A dig is done with the ball of the foot, “digging” into the floor. Take a good backswing, then let your foot drop so the ball of your foot hits the floor with a thud. That’s a dig. You can see some good examples in the close-up at the beginning of the video on the right.

Note, there’s no need to put any force into this movement – just let your leg be heavy. You’ll find you get a better sound using this technique, than if you try to drive the foot into the floor.

It’s also possible to do a dig with the heel (Talon). The same technique applies.

When we say “heel” or "toe", we’re usually referring to a sharp strike on the floor with the edge of your heel or the point of your shoe.

From the backswing, drop the foot down sharply. For a heel strike, aim to hit the floor next to the instep or toe of your other shoe. For a toe strike, the point of your shoe will hit the ground behind you.

A common mistake is to put weight on the striking foot when it hits the floor. You can see this happening in the video to the right. Don't do it!

Another mistake is to bring the foot too far forward. As teachers, we often exaggerate a move to be sure our students can see it. The result is that students end up striking the floor way in front of their other foot, as you can see in the video.

Like the dig, stamping is not about driving your feet into the floor. Let your foot fall into the floor as if you’re dropping a hammer.

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If you like this article, come and read more on my flamenco website, Dress for Flamenco.

All text copyright Marisa Wright. Photo by Andrea Balducci.

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