Rebound
Beginner Level
The foundation — what every new dancer needs to know
The elastic bounce-back that follows a movement's endpoint — using the body's stored energy to flow naturally into the next action.
Beginner focus
Drop a ball. Watch it bounce. That's rebound. Now do a chest pop — let the pop naturally bounce your chest back to center without controlling the return. That's body rebound. Practice with simple movements: push your hip right, let it bounce back. Push your chest forward, let it bounce back. The key is allowing the return rather than controlling it — let the elastic energy of your muscles do the work.
Tips
- •Think of your body as a rubber band — every stretch has a natural return. Work with that, not against it
- •Practice with a tennis ball: throw it against a wall and catch the rebound. Now imagine your body is the ball and the movement endpoint is the wall
- •Watch advanced dancers in slow motion — they never fully stop between movements. That continuous quality IS rebound
Common mistakes
- •Killing the rebound by stopping each movement dead — this creates robotic, disconnected dancing
- •Over-amplifying the rebound into uncontrolled bouncing — rebound should be proportional to the initiating movement
- •Ignoring the rebound in leading — a good lead uses the follower's natural rebound to flow into the next movement
- •Confusing rebound with aimless wobbling — rebound has direction and purpose
Practice drill
Standing in place: chest pop forward, let the rebound pull your chest back, immediately let that back-rebound push your chest forward into the next pop. Create a bouncing rhythm. Start with 2-count bounces, speed up to 1-count, then to half-count. The pops should feel increasingly effortless as you let the rebound do more work. Then apply the same principle to hip pops, side to side. Three minutes.