FIRST STEP: Make sure you know how to follow the beat
When a dancer does not follow the beat of a song this may be due to several factors. The most common cause of the problem originates in the difficulty he or she in feeling the beat of the music. But this is not always essential and not always the only cause of the problem. Sometimes the difficulty also lies in following the beat. Let's look at this first and, if necessary, work on it.
Click on the video to hear a beat marked with a percussion instrument at 60 BPM. In this case, each time the bass drum is hit it coincides with one beat. Here there is no difficulty hearing the beat as it matches the sound we are listening to and there are no other sounds to distract us.
Make sure you have no problems following this beat. Watch the video and try to follow the beat by clapping your hands. You should clap in time with each drum sound. Try to do this without looking at the video, only listening to the sound. If this goes smoothly, we can continue with the next exercise. If you have any difficulty, you should practice until you can do this almost without thinking. Looking at the moving mass can be helpful but, with practice, you should be able to follow the beat without looking.
Take your time. You will probably not be able to solve it in one day and you may need to plan a few sessions to work on it. As this exercise is not too much fun, it is better to do short sessions and take some breaks during the training session. Perseverance and regularity are the best allies of any learning process and especially here.
Please try not to move on until you have resolved this point. Being able to perceive the beat in music is of no use at all if it is not done automatically.
The next step will be to follow the beat with your feet. At first you can simply step on each beat. If this is not difficult for you then you can try to do it with basic Lindy hop steps so that each of your steps matches a beat and the triple step needs two beats. This means that the basic Lindy hop step (step, step, triple step, step, step, triple step) will take eight beats.
Obviously this example shows a very slow beat. It may even be a little cumbersome to follow the basic Lindy hop step at this pace. However, it helps us be sure that we can follow the beat when doing basic steps. If this is difficult you will need to practice until this is possible without any effort. Once you can do this stage without thinking, you can try to do the same thing at a faster beat, at 130 BPM:
When doing it at 130 BMP is not a problem, you can try doing the same exercise, with basic steps, at 150 BMP:
And, finally, at 180 BMP: