Instructions for Quick Step Dance

Basic ballroom dance moves give you a foundation for the quickstep.

As far as ballroom dances go, the quickstep is probably the liveliest of them all. A hybrid of the fox trot and the Charleston, among others, the quickstep follows a 2/4 or 4/4 beat. The dance has slightly evolved since its inception in England in the mid-1800s, but still retains its brisk and lively tempo. Even if you aren't a professional dancer, you'll find that learning the basics of the quickstep can be accomplished by almost anyone.

Instructions

1. Stand a couple feet away from your partner with your feet together. If you are leading, extend your left hand and take your partner's right hand.

2. Put your right leg out to the side with your toe pointed outward and put your right hand on your partner's back if you are leading. If you are following step toward your partner and put your left leg out so your toe meets theirs and simultaneously put your left hand on their shoulder.

3. Bring your feet together and turn a quarter of the way backward if you are leading. If you are following you will make the quarter turn to your front.

4. Take two steps to the front if you are leading and to the back if you are following.

5. Perform another quarter turn and take two steps backward if you are leading and frontward if you are following.

6. Take two steps to the side and then two steps forward if you are leading or backward if you are following, and finish with a quarter turn. Be sure to do this in time with whatever music you are listening to.

Tips & Warnings

• Remember when performing the steps that it is a slow-quick-quick rhythm in time with the song that is playing.

References

• DWTS: The Quickstep
• YouTube: Hilton Basic Quickstep