Tap Dance Steps: Learn to Tap Dance

Do you love listening to foot-tapping music? Do you feel like dancing when you hear some jazz music beats? Well, then you could try tap dancing because it's so much fun. Who knows, you might end-up becoming like the ultimate word in tap dancing - Fred Astaire!

Tap Dance is a dance form where the dancer's shoes having metal plates - at the heel and across the ball of the foot and into the toe area, hit a hard surface. The feet are tapped in a rhythmic fashion. The most used technique by tap dancers is the variety of rhythms, where they move away from the strict succession of uniformly placed beats. Tap dancers tap their feet in such a way that they sound like percussionists. There is a lot of Irish influence on tap dancing. There are 'tappers', who use their arms and upper bodies to mix their ballet or jazz movements in their tap routines. However, the 'hoovers' concentrate very little on their upper body and mostly use footwork.

Funk, ska, reggae, ragtime, rap, jump blues, progressive rock, jazz and breakbeat styles of music are fundamental to tap dancing. If there is no music, and just the tapping of the foot, it is called clogging. Improvisation is a major aspect of tap dancing along with the choreography, which starts on the first or eighth beat count. The toe, heel and the ball of a foot are the most used parts in tap dancing.

To start tap dancing, you need to have those trendy tap shoes. Then, there are some basic tap steps like brush, flap shuffle and ball change. There are steps ranging from 1 tap sound to 4 tap sounds as well. Here is how one can tap his or her way to learning this enjoyable dance.

You can't dance without some great music. So don't wait, play some good old jazz music and start dancing. Begin by putting your feet together. Then brush a foot forward, making a clear tap sound. Transferring your body weight, step on the ball of the foot which you have put forward and make another tap sound. Repeat the step with brushing the foot backward. This is called shuffle, which combines brushing of the foot forward and backward. Follow it up by brushing forward with the ball of your foot and step on the ball for the flap. Jump up and land on your feet - first on the ball of your right foot followed by the ball of your left foot, succeeded by landing on your right heel and then on the left one.

For the step toe, touch your left toe behind your right foot after you step with your right foot. Then comes stomping. Although similar to stepping, stomping is when you hit your foot on the ground and lift it off. Make sure you place no weight on the foot while stomping. Then you can try the shuffle hop, by doing the basic shuffle with your right foot and then jump up, leaving your foot in the air and then land on the ground. These are some of the few basic steps of tap dancing. Once you get the hang of it, practice and innovation will help you in improving your tap dancing skills.

Apart from practicing by watching the videos available on the internet, your best option to learn tap dancing would be to actually join a class. There you can get a proper and live training. So what are you waiting for, just grab your shoes and get going! It won't be long till you become the center of attraction of any gathering or party!