I’m trying my best not to be completely obsessed with dancing. (Which is, admittedly, one of the reasons for not having posted on this website for at least a month!) But I have to admit that it is an addictive activity and I am starting to get a little envious of my brother who dances professionally. And it’s difficult not to dance once you’ve started.
Last weekend I organised Bomb The Bank on behalf of the Swing Dancers of London. A wet and soggy affair, at least 30 dancers came down to the South Bank to dance. I admired their dedication as I sat underneath an umbrella for much of the afternoon, playing the tunes off my laptop and watching my own feet get soaked. It was tremendous fun, and to prove it, look at these guys dancing!
Anyway, I’m looking forward to the next one at the end of this month. All I can say is that I hope it doesn’t snow like today!
But it doesn’t stop there. This past week alone was a chance for me to learn a couple of new dances. At work, there is a weekly class for salsa, one of the more popular dances at the moment in London. So I joined in with the class which started with a Merengue, followed by a Salsa. I impressed with myself: I’m not completely sure that I ‘get’ the music, but I was surprised at how easily I picked up the steps. But I know that it does have something to do with the fact that after nearly two and a half years dancing Lindy hop and jazz steps, new dance steps are coming ever easier to me.
And on Friday, I also joined a tango class at Dragon Hall in Holborn. This dance and music I do ‘get’ more and I love it as it is such an expressive dance. Ever since seeing Al Pacino dance in Scent Of A Woman, and dare I say it, Arnold Schwartzenegger and Jamie Lee Curtis in True Lies, I’ve always wanted to learn to dance tango. And in this one lesson, I did manage to get the ‘basic’ pretty easily. And there I surprised myself again – dancing can be easier than you think. Okay, so I’m still a long way to being any good, but I’m on my way!
Ultimately, I’m looking still to dance socially, but from the two extra classes I did this week, I’m loving the idea that I might some day be able to mix different styles of dancing and improve my ‘vocabulary’. But I’ll still try not be completely obsessed with it all. Dancing for fun is a great feeling in itself and having done aikido competitions as a kid, I doubt that I’d ever want to do much more than dance socially. In spite of this though, I know one thing: it’s going to hard to stop my feet from moving.
And they’ll keep on moving, particularly as I’m off for three days of dancing at the London Lindy Exchange this coming weekend!
Tagged: Bomb the Bank, Dance, Lindy hop, Merengue, Salsa, Swing Dancers of London, Tango