Friday, July 18, 2014

Line Dance Today


A friend and neighbor got me interested in Line Dancing about 15 years ago and it has become my favorite past time and exercise routine.  So much so that I took over being the volunteer dance instructor at our community Club House in our old neighborhood in Florida.  I thought moving to Middle Tennessee and being so close to Nashville, that it would be an easy process of getting a line dance class established.  That has proven to be more difficult than I anticipated.
I am currently the resident Instructor at a great family place, Murph’s Country Music Barn in Cedar Hill, TN. This is a great location and right about midway between Nashville and Clarksville.  The Barn has a Saturday Night Dance with live band and Dance class from 6:30 to 7:30 pm then review of the class during the first band break.

I am happy to announce that starting in September; Austin Peay University will include a beginner class in their Adult Education program open to the community and students. I am fortunate to be a part of this start up program as the Instructor and the plan is to move it through the initial six week program so we can expand to having a beginner and Intermediate program.
You mention Line Dancing and the first thing people say is they don't like Country Western Music or they just don't get into line dancing.  Well, once they see that we dance to everything from Country to Gospel, they tend to think a little differently.
A Line Dance is a choreographed dance with a repeated sequence of steps in which a group of people dance in one or more lines or rows without regard for the gender of the individuals, all facing the same direction, and executing the steps at the same time. Line dancers are not in physical contact with each other.  The earliest folk dances in many cultures were line dances, originating before social proprieties allowed men and women to dance together in couple dances. In early forms men and women often danced in separate lines, but the same dances are often done today in mixed lines.
The Balkan countries, among others, have a rich tradition of line dance surviving to the present. These folk line dances are also performed in the International Folk Dance movement. Folk line dances have many forms: pairs of lines in which the dancers face each other, or a line formed into a circle, or the line follows a leader around the dance floor. The dancers may hold hands with their neighbors, or use an arm-on-shoulder hold, or hold their neighbor's belts.
Although line dancing is associated with country-western music and dance, it has similarities to folk dancing. Many folk dances are danced in unison in a single, nonlinear "line", and often with a connection between dancers. The absence of a physical connection between dancers is, however, a distinguishing feature of country western line dance.

Line dances have accompanied many popular music styles since the early 1970s including pop, swing, rock and roll, disco, Latin, gospel, waltz, polka and Jazz just to name a few styles.

Thanks to choreographers, like Bill Bader, Max Perry, Jo Thompson, Scott Blevins and others, that began to use ballroom rhythms and technique to take line dancing to the next level. Today, you can find line dancing groups all over the world and line dance competition and workshops as well.  This is partly due the great Choreographers/Instructors such as Jamie Marshall, John Robinson, Guyton Mundy, Rachael McEnaney, Rob Fowler, Rona Kaye, Stella Cabeca, Jo Kisner and Ira Weisburd just to name a few of the great people that promote and spread the joy of dancing to the local and world-wide masses.

There are now groups forming that promote line dancing as a way to help decrease cholesterol, high blood pressure as well as weight control.  So you see Line Dancing is not the good ole country steppin you thought it was, there are moves to keep your heart rate up and it’s a great way to meet new friends. Get out there and get those feet and hips moving to the groove.

Keep Dancin’ Larry B

 

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