R Puzzle: Ballroom

by Susie Glass; dancing by Dave Raines and Kate Ford

I like to think of this puzzle as The World's Most Beautiful Substitution Cipher. Each West Coast Swing dance figure stands for a different letter of the alphabet, or for a space. Figures are demarcated by open position, where the dancers face each other approximately 2 arms-length apart. Each of the 3 clips is a different line of the answer phrase, which is:

Sforzando is the answer you need,
For you to proceed,
To solve this, indeed.

And the answer is SFORZANDO.

The substitutions are as follows:

	push break
a	whip w outside turn
c	basket whip w/ man's spin
d	inside roll to slide
e	under arm turn
f	left side pass with man's turn (second unit)
h	whip w inside turn
i	one handed tuck
l	texas tommy whip
n	turnstyles
o	whip
p	basket whip
r	inside roll
s	left side pass
t	underarm catch throw out
u	push w/ kick ball change to break turns
v	trade places w/ man's spin
w	inside roll w/ she goes/he goes underam turn
y	underarm catch whip with w outside spin
z	push break w right turn for follower compress blah blah

The lines come out as follows:

s	left side pass
f	left side pass with man's turn (second unit)
o	whip
r	inside roll
z	push break w right turn for follower compress blah blah
a	whip w outside turn
n	turnstyles
d	inside roll to slide
o	whip
	push break
i	one handed tuck
s	left side pass
	push break
t	underarm catch throw out
h	whip w inside turn
e	under arm turn
	push break
a	whip w outside turn
n	turnstyles
s	left side pass
w	inside roll w/ she goes/he goes underam turn
e	under arm turn
r	inside roll
	push break
y	underarm catch whip with w outside spin
o	whip
u	push w/ kick ball change to break turns
	push break
n	turnstyles
e	under arm turn
e	under arm turn
d	inside roll to slide
f	left side pass with man's turn (second unit)
o	whip
r	inside roll
	push break
y	underarm catch whip with w outside spin
o	whip
u	push w/ kick ball change to break turns
	push break
t	underarm catch throw out
o	whip
	push break
p	basket whip
r	inside roll
o	whip
c	basket whip w/ man's spin
e	under arm turn
e	under arm turn
d	inside roll to slide
t	underarm catch throw out
o	whip
	push break
s	left side pass
o	whip
l	texas tommy whip
v	trade places w/ man's spin
e	under arm turn
	push break
t	underarm catch throw out
h	whip w inside turn
i	one handed tuck
s	left side pass
	push break
i	one handed tuck
n	turnstyles
d	inside roll to slide
e	under arm turn
e	under arm turn
d	inside roll to slide

Shameless Plug For Dancing: The dance used in this puzzle is West Coast Swing. If you'd like to see what it really looks like without the restrictions of the puzzle, check out a 15M, two minute movie of Dave and Kate really dancing.

Acknowledgements: The author would like to thank Dave Raines and Kate Ford for not only dancing for this piece, but developing the puzzle with respect to the figures and the phrase to use. It was a lot of work and required a lot of time and skill. Kate is a dance instructor and can be reached at wcskate@yahoo.com.

The author would also like to thank Dean Sturtevant for assisting in the production of the videos; Scot Federman for supplying all the post-production video editing resources and expertise, and spending a lot of time editing this film with me (well, mainly Scot did it and I watched!); and Aaron Kitzmiller for the use of his video camera.