How Do We Create Combos?

• You’ve got so many moves under your belt now, what are you going to do with them? 

• Where do you even start? 

• When you have created something you’re happy with, how do you finish it? 

• Is there a blow up in there? 

• Does your combo tell a story, does it take people on a journey? 

• Can you practice it without stopping to think about what comes next? 

• Do you keep getting stuck at the same point every time? 

• Do you have enough stamina to execute it well every time?

• How do you know which combos to keep and which ones aren’t working?

Sometimes starting is the biggest hurdle. Once you do start sometimes you don’t know when to stop. How do you end a combo? Do you need to have a blow up? Does it need to be at the end of your combo? What even is a blow up? That’s another blog for another day…

Problems I’ve Faced

I’ve encountered all of these problems over the years, and more. Sometimes I would remember my combos no problem at practice but as soon as I got to a jam they would go out of my head and out of my body. I would have plenty of stamina at practice but performing under pressure with the adrenaline pumping, the crowd watching, judges judging and my opponent trying to put me off would all take extra energy from me.

I’ve lost battles because I ran out of energy, not because I ran out of moves. I’ve lost battles because I wanted to use new combos but I hadn’t practiced them enough for them to be in my body yet. I’ve lost battles because I crashed in the middle of a set and panicked.

We can’t control many aspects of competition battles: the music, the number of rounds, who your opponent is, who the judges are, what the floor will be like. Worrying about those things take focus away from what we can control: our skills, our stamina, the number of combos we have, how much we’ve practiced them, what we’re going to wear that will make us feel fresh and ready for the day.

Solutions I’ve Found

I’ve learned, adapted and created strategies to combat all these problems. I make small combos that I can freestyle in and out of. For me, remembering shorter combos is easier and more fun than remembering full sets. Short combos aren’t enough for competitions though, so I can choose 3 and freestyle in and out of them. Doing this, I feel prepared but also free to play with the music. Short combos are good for circles, you can go in lots of times and keep your energy high. Short, sharp, effective entries.

Losing a battle because of energy and not skills is really frustrating. But it’s an easy fix, we know how to build stamina. It’s not something I enjoy doing, but it’s necessary. I can find creative ways of doing it so at least I enjoy the process if not the exercises themselves. Low stamina is an easily identifiable factor. 

Feedback

Other times we don’t understand why we lost, so we don’t know what to work on at practice in order to improve. This is when it’s useful to ask for feedback from judges, from your crew, from dancers who practice other styles, from friends who don’t dance - anyone who will give you honest, supportive advice that will help you advance your skills and figure out what areas you need to work on. You never know where the best advice will come from.

I used to get the same feedback from different judges: be more explosive, get faster, know when to change it up a gear. This helped me plan my training sessions and gave me goals to work towards.  

Get used to watching yourself on film so you can study the footage of your battles and training sessions without being too hard on yourself. Sometimes combos feel amazing but don’t have the visual effect you thought they did, or combos don’t feel so good but look amazing. You won’t know unless you watch that footage. 

Practice Full Out Before the Jam

Try out your new combos in practice battles and circles at training with the same energy you would at a jam. It’s better to make mistakes at training than at a jam, that’s what training is for. Sometimes the best combos come out of mistakes - “crash to create”. Build your confidence so that you know you will be able to perform under pressure. At some point we have to make that leap and use our new combos in public, but mixing them in with older material you know inside out can make it seem less scary. 

Learn More

Check out my upcoming 4 week online course, Combo Nation, for a more in depth look at how we create combos.

Learn how to

• Build a catalogue of combos so you never run out during battles

• Leave a lasting impression in battles and cyphers

• Connect your moves into effective combos that will make you look dope on the dance floor

• Stop thinking, relax and enjoy battling and cyphering

• Build stamina and conserve energy so you don’t gas out before the end of a long event

Last of All

Experiment, make mistakes, have fun.