Heartland Swing Festival 2014 – BBQ, Snow, Spinning, Babies

Are We Having Fun Yet? So asks the cutout people at the Des Moines Social Club, one of this year’s Heartland Swing Festival’s venues. Based on the crowd’s enthusiasm and cheer, I would say “yes”.

Heartland Swing Festival is a rare event that places great emphasis on the amateurs. Many amateur events typically nod to the professionals in a special J&J or similar competition, but at HSF we dance with the novice finalists for their finals. That’s it and it’s nice. Also, with some of the team and showcase routines, it feels like these amateurs serve more unique pieces as if they’re untouched by frequent YouTube watching. It’s refreshing.

Heather Ballew and I had a full schedule with 8.5 teaching hours including our special team workshop where we analyze and critique their performances. This year, with a full 90 minutes, we also included swingout technique and aerial coaching where we discussed jumping, landing, and timing. It was productive and fun. My other duties included DJing the Amateur J&J and AnySwing Goes prelims Friday evening. Even with the extra teaching hours, it was a pretty fun weekend mainly focused on teaching.

In between the dancing, there were random interesting moments. Like the time someone told me I might swarmed by pregnant women in the future. Needless to say, I impressed her last year with the care I showed her on the dance floor. Sunday night I was fireman carried down a hall and spun around. Then I hoisted Evan Borst and spun him around. One of these days, there might even be video. And did you know that Des Moines has really good barbecue? Fact check me at Jethro’s and The Flying Mango. Before I leave, check out the winning team routine and a fun class recap:

More is Less is More – thoughts from Zurich

The familiar adage begins “less is more”. My recent Zurich west coast swing teaching experience speaks differently – more is less then is more. Confusing? Allow me to explain.

I taught west coast swing workshops with Elissa Gutterman from Tel Aviv this past weekend. We were both excited to teach with a partner because we mainly teach alone. She teaches 4 different west coast swing level classes for Dance Tel Aviv. I specialize in teaching workshops and classes with local instructors and am often hired to be the principle teacher. It’s tough explaining both roles with, oftentimes, limited resources.

When you get two teachers that intimately understand both roles, leader and follower, two things can happen. One, you can get the never ending talkers. I witnessed this once at a Denver Intermediate workshop. At one point, the instructors had talked for at least 10 minutes, most students were sitting down. Fibonacci sequencers. This is more is more. Two, is where the two teachers complement each other and are content with the other teacher’s explanation. As each is a capable leader, they take turns leading. This is more is less.

As we were complimented on our ability to rarely talk while giving concise instructions and technique hints, you can guess we were the latter. This allowed the students more repetition and practice to music. We were able to focus on individual needs after giving group instructions. Then we could return to the center and remark on what we saw without always consulting the other. More solo teaching experience equaled less time talking equaled more students’ doing. More is less is more.

I would like to thank Nicola Fiaschi for organizing this workshop, Nadja Gross for hosting me and organizing the Bluesli workshops, Elissa for teaching with me, and the many others that made this weekend successful, including all the students and Saturday night’s social dancers.

Tel Aviv, Israel – Get Your Westie On

I visited Israel September 11-18. I’ve been looking for a way to teach and visit there since my Denver friends visited Israel for weddings, relatives, and schooling. Israel seemed foreign and exotic, has religious significance, and I enjoy middle eastern cuisine.

Between Jerusalem markets, sampling fresh halvah, slathering Dead Sea all over myself, hiking the Snake Path to Masada, eating lots of hummus, I taught many classes. This opportunity materialized thanks to Facebook’s Westie Discussion of the Day. I met an Israeli westie named Nur who asked “…. I was wondering while you were touring europe, have you considered visiting Israel:)?” Well, “Israel’s been on my mind for a while.” And “would I be able to teach there if I visited? That would help me such a trip more affordable to me.”

Israel was on! I would be teaching 6 1.5 hour west coast swing workshops for Dance Tel Aviv, run by Rena Scharf Kayat and her husband. I ended up adding an Authentic Jazz class and private lessons to my teaching schedule also. Tel Aviv has a growing and vibrant west coast swing scene. Dancers mainly come from lindy hop and west coast swing. It was definitely fun working with such a mixed crowd of different skills, levels, and dance backgrounds.

What I learned:

1. Israelis are extremely generous.

2. If you like Middle Eastern food, come to the source. It’s worth it.

3. Dead Sea mud has amazing benefits, but don’t slather the wet stuff. The drying process will take too long. Find the clay-like mud.

4. When planking the Dead Sea, do not submerge your face.

5. Those Israeli boys are bold. I haven’t never been asked to dance by leads so often. Way to step up.

6. Israel also has great international cuisine.

7. Give yourself plenty of time at the airport when leaving. Also, if your backpack has many coins from 4-5 different currencies, it will look very very suspicious to airport scanners.

Thanks to Nur for helping set this up and being a great tour guide, Rena for hiring me, Elissa for teaching with me, my two hosts, my drivers, and all the dancers and workshop attendees. Thanks for the dances and great memories.

 

Camp Hollywood 2012

Camp Hollywood was a great event for me. It was great to reteam with my teaching partner, Heather Ballew. Teaching without my regular partner has been difficult for a few reasons, so I was glad to be back in Colorado working and teaching with someone familiar.

We competed in the Open Lindy Strictly, Open Balboa Division, Showcase Division and I competed in the Advanced J&J. The Open Balboa Division went straight to finals and featured a 2 couple chorus battle format.  We placed 5th which was a stunning result in my opinion.

Heather and I made the 5 couple finals in the Open Strictly Division. It was a spotlight format with 12 8’s to each couple. Thanks to someone’s suggestion, we came up with a plank aerial featured in our second outing.

I was very relieved the “1” was already drawn when I selected for Showcase placement. I drew the “2” instead. We had room to breathe and then time to watch everybody else. My pre-routine routine consists of not watching anyone else perform, so I was happy to watch everyone afterward.

I did not place in the Advanced Jack & Jill, but it was a heavily stacked competition with many great dancers. I did better this year than I did last  year. And by that, I mean I showed up instead of jamming at the Tempest Freerunning Academy. I did get a nice compliment afterwards from Mr. Camp Hollywood himself, Joel Plys.

Overall, Camp Hollywood was a great event. It was really good to feel involved again at a national, or rather international, competition. I saw a lot of old friends. It reminded me of how long I’ve been away from the competition circuit. Jonathan Stout’s various arrangements all kicked ass. Tise planked a bit – thank you. I participated in another underground competition. The things I do for Nick Peterson and vintage bathing suit fans. Sheesh!

Edinburgh Blues

Where should I begin? Michelle Davies at EdinBop is great to work with. Don’t call Scotch “Scotch” when in Scotland. Refer to it as Whisky. Stone buildings are awesome.

Scotland has always been a dream destination of mine. There’s something about the Scottish character portrayed in novels and their archaeological remnants. Day 1 greeted me with lots of rain. Through the haze you could see hills backdropping the city. The day brightened through food pursuits, most notably haggis.

Day 2 started slowly, but finished with a walking tour through the Royal Mile and the National Museum of Scotland. Go there if you can.  Later that day, I planned classes with Michelle, trying to get a better grasp of what I should present to the Edinburgh dancers.

Day 3 was Saturday, workshop day! Dancers came from Edinburgh, Aberdeen, Glasgow, and a few other spots. They were quite enthusiastic and asked many good questions, a skill sometimes lacking. Not only are they enthusiastic about taking class, they’re enthusiastic for the visiting instructor to sample as many Scottish beers and whiskys as possible (9+4=13). Well done, good sir.