3rd World Swing Masters

The 3rd World Swing Masters took place between 6-8 August 2010 at the 4* Grade II listed Palace Hotel in Manchester, UK.

Preparation

For the World Dance Masters Team the “Weekend” started as early as Tuesday! Transporting lighting & sound equipment, computers, paperwork plus MUCH more to Manchester and preparing for what was to be an amazing weekend ahead. Wednesday was the 1^st Official day we could access the venue and the majority of the spaces we were to occupy, so without hesitation or hindrance we descended on the Palace Hotel early to ensure everything was set as soon as possible.

Pedro Machado and his 3 man Pro Dance Floors Team (www.prodancefloors.com) arrived by 10:00am to start unloading, marking and laying the 5 ProDanceFloors we were to have laid in the Grand Room, Whitworth Suite, Buckingham Suite, Directors Suite and Palace Room. Whilst they forged ahead in record time, we were busy planning with the hotel the logistics and planning of the event. Believe us when we say these events are a true team effort and that an unbelievable amount of time & planning goes into it.

No sooner had Wednesday started then it was already Thursday morning. This started with Sam giving Jamie a lovely morning wake up call at 07:00am (URGH). With lots to do we were all of a sudden a flurry of activity, Sam with his iPhone in one hand, Blackberry in the other, Walky Talky headset on and 12 dozen things flying through his mind. DJ Big Dave & his wife Pauline (www.bigdavegastap.com) arrived with even more sound equipment, which had to be transported around the venue and set up. Thank goodness for the lifts! The whole team worked hard all day, Nicola Lafferty, Elizabeth Lafferty, John Lafferty & Sydney Smyth spent all day ensuring all the material was ready to go and the event was ready to go flawlessly as possible.

Airport pick ups, check ins, sound and lighting equipment setup, prop deliveries & set up, registration set up, seating, trophies, dressing rooms, balloons and more. PHEW! And that’s just the start. By now the ProDanceFloor boys had done themselves proud and had all the floors down and fixed in place. 18:00 was nearing and that meant one thing – Masters Elite Show Team practice. As we’re sure any of our Show Team will tell you, at our larger events, they literally have 2 to 3 hours to learn & master the choreography, and often it’s changing as they are learning it. A difference this year was the performance’s choreographers – Superstar Champions Jodie Seedel & Emily Drinkall. To say it was such a professional job is an understatement. The Show Team sweated getting the choreography perfect and we are sure it showed as we had unprecedented positive comments about the Variety show. Many Thanks to Jodie and Emily for doing such a fantastic job.

Warm Up Party

As many of you will know, and some of you won’t, for the 1^st time in it’s 8 year history, World Dance Masters 2010 held an Official Warm Up party in Copperface Jacks under the venue. This was a phenomenal success. With around 75 people expected, we actually had 176 attendees! Hosted by Jamie Whalley, Ed Lawton, Danny Last, Pedro Machado & Rob Fowler this was an 5 hours of fun, dancing, games and singing to get everyone ready for the weekend ahead. The Quiz went down a storm with the eventual winners being ‘Drunken Feet’ from Buckie, Scotland.

Followed by Pedro storming round the room with vodka jelly babies, LOTS of line dancing, west coast swing dancing took place in what was probably the 1^st major amalgamation of both line and swing dancers boogieing the night away. Along with all requests were the great party tracks – Oops Upside Your Head, Time Warp, Hand Jive, Macarena, Grease Medley and many more.

The evening finished at 02:00am with everyone happy and craving their bed, however a select few stayed up and carried on the party in Tempus bar upstairs.

3rd World Swing Masters – Buckingham Suite

WCS commentary courtesy of Lee Easton

We can hardly believe that our 3rd World Swing Masters is already over, without doubt our best event yet. With attendee's from all over Europe, the USA and even Russia it is wonderful to see the growth and expansion of West Coast Swing.

Pros for the weekend were Brennar Goree & Torri Smith, Deborah Szekely & Robert Cordoba, Paul Warden & Catriona Wiles, Lee Easton & Fabienne Henshall and the Fabulous John Lindo. We also saw a lot of the wonderful Rachael McEnaney, who has to divide her time between the WCS room, Competitive Line Dance & Social Line Dance room all weekend, no easy feat we can tell you!

Swing Masters were concentrated in the Buckingham Suite where the lights really helped to build a fun and cool atmosphere.  Each night was themed to create a mood – with Friday being “House of Blues”, Saturday was “Saturday Night Red Light” and finally Sunday “Mello Yellow Smooth Grooves”. The air con worked itself out after the first day (Human error).  Our late night venue was Copperface Jacks where we danced until 4am Friday night extended until 6am on Saturday and on Sunday night we wrangled an extension in the Buckingham Suite until 3am with John Lindo's music closing out the event. Yes it still wasn’t over – many people headed down to the closing party in Copperface Jacks until 5am. The last of us awake saw the first of the staff leaving for home Monday morning.

With a secondary workshop room upstairs we covered a wide range of levels from absolute beginner to advanced and subjects such as Choreography, Basics, Connection, Breaks, Variations, Shag, Musicality and footwork in our WCS classes and 2-step was a scream, hope you all enjoy learning it as I do teaching it.

Show's were fantastic as you’ll read below. It was the first time that Carolina Shag was demonstrated at the highest standard or at all in the UK.  The response from the audience was amazing for every act.  Look out for the poll on-line for your favourite performance.

Swing competitions were a big success with over £800 in cash awarded, trophies, as well as event passes for Europe's coolest events and of course, WSDC points in Novice and Intermediate. Below is the top 5 placing for all divisions:

Strictly Swing -  Novice

5th Paul Buckley & Susan Minor

4th Rob Day & Michelle Fletcher

3rd Grigory Lebedev & Conny Griehsler

2nd Jean-Christophe Saville & Vicky Wood

1st Thomas Escaravage & Virginie Escaravage

Strictly Swing - Open

5th David Higgins & Lisa Jane Ferrie

4th Peter Fradley & Kate Lovegrove

3rd Paul Harris & Anna Lumsden

2nd Steve Hunt & Melanie Boyle 

1st Steve Hall & Sarve Didar

Jack & Jill - Newcomer
5th Abhilash Mathews & Adele Collins
4th Caro Abulin & Emma Bond
3rd Nigel Pontee & Vivi Mentula
2nd Nigel Pontee & Helen Hanlon 
1st Manal & Rachel Martin

Jack & Jill - Novice  
5th Thomas Escaravage & Laura Carvill
4th Grigory Lebedev & Linda Ratcliffe
3rd Rob Lawrence & Kate Lovegrove
2nd lam duy Nguyen & Vicky Wood 
1st Randal Boyd & LeeAnne Forsen

 Jack & Jill – Intermediate 

5th David Higgins & Anna Lumsden 
4th Rafael Quixada & Dora Makhouf
3rd Paul Harris & Katia Avlasevich
2nd Matt Oakley & Sarve Didar 
1st Steve Hall & Naomi Hulbert

Videos of the competition can be found on YouTube

Massive congratulations to all of our winners and everyone that entered. It was nice to see some of the "Line Dancers" crossing over with 3 of them making it to the Novice final.  Also, congratulations to one our "Swing Dancers" who won the Newcomer Pro-Am division in the main line dance competition room.  We hope to see and encourage more and more cross over at the event in years to come.  There is also discussion of a Swing Pro-am division being created for next year! Do you like the idea?  Let us know your thoughts on that via our CONTACT US form.

Finally, a huge thank you to all of you that came and helped us make this a fantastic weekend!

Show Time

Friday

Friday’s Showtime at World Dance Masters is usually centered on West Coast Swing, and this year was no different. Fantastic and superb performances from Paul Warden & Catriona Wiles dancing a smooth WCS, Brennar Goree & Torri Smith performing the Carolina Shag, Lee Easton & Fabienne Henshall dancing their Country 2-Step and finished off with Robert Cordoba & Deborah Szekely, who performed a WCS routine to one of the most famous WCS tracks – “How Long Can A Fool Go Wrong” a sight to be hold with their incredible musicality.

In an addition to the WCS this year, we were also treated to a pirate’s themed performance by Team Unique Vision from Finland who were competing in the Cabaret division which was added to the show which was very well received, and our Showcase Duos competition with duos from England, Scotland and Sweden competing to “Fame”. Check Facebook & YouTube for videos of each performance.

Saturday

Saturday’s show time kicked off with Mr Guyton Mundy from the USA with the kids crew performing a Street Dance to “Imma Be” by  The Black Eyed Peas, followed by Jenny Stephenson’s Studio #1 performing a Street Dance routine, with some of the boys taking their tops of for Beyonce’s “Single Ladies” which had the room in fits of laughter and applause. Not to be outdone Guyton called Jenny out for a dance-off, a great sight watching these 2 power houses of street dance battling it out…Until that is, Jenny brings out her secret weapon, 7 year old Star Spooner. Star battled for her life and finally defeated Guyton who was bowing down to her as the crowd went wild.

Closely following this was Emily Drinkall who performed her Superstar winning Cha Cha with such presence on the floor. A couple who mix line and swing in their careers, Lee and Fab were to take to the floor, performing an exclusive routine especially for Masters. And we weren’t to let up, Sydney Smyth performed her 1^st Place Masters Invitational routine to “Popular” from the hit musical Wicked, which a little help from Mr John Lindo. John then performed a West Coast Swing lead and follow with Rachael McEnaney AND Deborah Szekely AND Catriona Wiles. Is there no end to that mans talent? A popular couple for the weekend, Brennar & Torri performed their 2009 US Swing Open Young Adult 1^st Place routine to “White House” by Vanessa Carlton, a winner from the start.

Finally it was time for the Pièce de résistance – The Masters Elite Show Team. This is always the highlight of the performances, showcasing the huge amount of talent we have within our event. And as we’ve said before, with such little time to perfect it, it’s always amazing to see how polished the group routine is. With so much positive feedback, rapturous applause and continuing buzz on Facebook and YouTube it is undoubtedly our best Show Team demo to date.

Close Party

Following on from the Official Warm Up Party, we also had an Official Close Party, with everyone from competitors, spectators, social line dancers, west coast swing dancers, event staff and everyone in-between letting their hair down. Copperface Jacks was opened at 11pm with DJ Ed Lawton, with the Social Line Dance room staying open until 1am, and Buckingham Suite till 3am, there was something for everyone, and once all the other rooms had closed, Copperface Jacks ran until 05:30am when it was finally time to call a close to the whole event.

If you have any constructive feedback, positive or negative, the only way we can improve our events is via your direct feedback. You can fill in our online survey HERE or contact us through the website HERE.

Finally, we’d just like to say Thank You to anybody who attended and to EVERYONE for your continued support. Make sure you check out Facebook and the website extra regularly to ensure you’re getting the latest up to date information!

Happy Dancing

World Dance Masters

East Coast Masters 2010

The 1st East Coast Masters took place on Saturday 26th June 2010 at Blue Dolphin Holiday Park in Filey, Scarborough. Event Staff for the day were MC Nicola Lafferty, DJ Jamie Whalley, Judges Danny Last, Jodie Seedel & Emily Drinkall, with Anne Buchan & Zoe Powell apprentice judging, scorer Alison Eadie, Photographer Paul Rhoades, floor coordinator Elizabeth Lafferty with John Lafferty on the door. Also making an appearance was Mr Rob Fowler who’d flown over from Spain.

The day kicked off to a great start with a long queue outside for doors opening at 10:00am. With almost 100 solo dance entries as well as Pro-Am, duos, quads & teams it was going to be another busy day. The room soon filled up as practise music was played.

First off the block was Pro-Am, danced by our Pro dancers Anne Buchan and Nic Bartlem & their students. After they’d danced it was apparent that everyone was itching to get on the floor & show us what they’d got.

On to the line dance divisions & heats were danced by Division 4 Junior. It was a great competition with lots of closely fought battles on the dance floor. Following dance 1 it was time for a spot of lunch so a 25 minute recess was in order to allow everyone to grab a bite to eat. With a restaurant, Burger King, Pastry shop, Spar & Smooth stall on site everyone was spoilt for choice.

The break was closely followed by dances 2 & 3 respectively bringing us up to 5:00pm. A 45 minute break for some social dancing took place with everyone flooding Jamie with requests for right then and for the evening social later on. 5:45pm brought around the awards with some surprises & tears of elation. Everything wrapped up right on schedule at 6:30pm an hour break was needed to give everyone the chance to change & the Haven staff the opportunity to set the room for the evening.

At 7:30pm the evening social got underway. This would promise to be probably our most diverse social yet. In a unique twist to our usual set up, the room was not only open to our dancers, but was also made available to holiday makers at Haven, meaning by door open we already had a huge crowd of couples, families & groups intrigued to see what all this line dance malarkey was about. And our dancers wasted no time showing them. Requests included:

Louisiana Saturday Night, Shoes Of Another Man, Latin Crazy, Man in the Mirror, Telephonic, Cha Cha Slide, Rita’s Waltz, Coochie Bang Bang, Sister Kate, Trouble Is, Jesse James, Cha Cha Loco, Jukebox, Good Ol’ Boys, Acapella, Quarter After One, Have Fun Go Mad, Americano, Chill Factor, Tik Tok Drop, With These Eyes, NY Cha, Spotlight, Inside Your Heaven, Broken Heels, Patient Heart, Fuego, Playing With Fire, 5678, Wild Wild West, Drive Me Wild, Swing Your Chains, Ain’t Goin Down, JR Drop, Hands Up, 5,6,7,8 and Cupid Shuffle (9 Times!!!)

Phew! With the majority of requests played everyone was happy. Rob taught a fun little dance, the 16 count "Upside Down" originally choreographed to a the song of the same name by the A*Teens, but instead danced it to the Madagascar version of “I Like to Move It” which also saw not only the Haven guests get up and have a try, but the Haven staff too! He then showed them it could be danced a little more shall we say “funky” to Justin Timberlake’s “Sexyback”. The non dancers definitely had the “Oh My Gosh, this can’t be line dancing” look on their faces!

Onto more social dancing with a break at 9:30pm for the Haven show “Boogie Fun with the Allstars”!!!! A 20 minute high energetic dance routine medley to entertain the youngsters, but would you believe the dance floor was…..you guessed it, completely full of line dancers!

Followed by even more social dancing, we were treated to a live show from one of the Haven Cabaret singers. This went even further to show those non dancers in the room that line dancers really can dance to anything at the drop of a hat. She sang a variety of songs including “9 to 5” (Mojo Rhythm), “Stuck in the Middle” (Walk The Line), “Summer of 69” (Got To Be Funky), Ego (Cupid Shuffle again!). Her set was finished off nicely with The Sway to her rendition of Leona Lewis’ version of “Run” by Snow Patrol.

And would you believe it, even MORE social dancing, with a “demo” by Rob of THE BEAST, being joined halfway by some of our dancers, took us right up to midnight. It was time to say our goodbyes & take our tired feet off to bed.... or to the Galaxy Bar in some cases! We would like to thank our Masters staff for the day, the staff at the Blue Dolphin holiday complex who couldn’t have done enough for us, offer our congratulations to those who competed & extend a huge THANK YOU to everyone who attended.

Don’t forget the 8th World Dance Masters is being held in Manchester 6-8 Aug. Visit our website for information on entry, accommodation & more. 

http://www.worlddancemasters.com

Irish Masters 2010

Another weekend, another event. Nicola and Sam made their way to their respective airports late on Thursday night to arrive into Ireland with enough time to prepare everything that needed preparing for the Irish Masters 2010.

Held in the beautiful Park Hotel, Dundalk, the event was bound to be an exciting one with World Dance Masters' biggest registration of the year so far. Over 220 dancers had registered to compete. The only thing about this bothering the Masters Team was how they were going to manage to get through all the heats in just one day!

Saturday morning arrived quickly enough and Nicola and Sam were up early to make sure all things were in order. On Friday evening Tommy Weafer arrived to set-up for being our fabulous DJ for the day and the Park Hotel staff worked through the night to ensure the venue ballroom was set-up according to our meticulous specifications! All was ready to go and our nerves were calm.....until we saw the queue waiting to come in!!!

The next mission was getting everyone through the door and registered as quickly as possible with thanks to Jason Hill. Job done in 30 minutes, on schedule, even though Sam had lost a good clump on his hair though the stress of having to calculate everyones entry in his head! By 10:30 the hall was packed and we were ready to kick-off with the Pro-Am competition. Our first congratulation goes to our Pros; James McLauchlan, Lee Easton, Fred Whitehouse, Sam Robins and Shane McKeever danced tirelessly for almost 1hr 30mins to get all of our Pro-Am heats done on schedule. What a job they did.

After a very quick two song break our floor co-ordinators Elaine Fox , Jason Hill, Rosita Shekelton and Sharon Kennedy, along with MC Damien Brady, had got all the dancers competing in the heats ready to go. Our judges for the day (Nicola Lafferty, Lee Easton, James McLauchlan, Ann Cunningham and apprentice judges Fred Whithouse, Paul Culshaw and Bernie Lenaghan) were ready to rock and so on came our first heat of Newcomer Juniors. What a performance they all gave. This followed with our other heats in the relative divisions. Placed in between these preliminaries was our newest division - Starter. Over 30 dancers competed in this new One Dance division and oh my, did they get some support from the 300 strong audience. The Starter scoring was produced quickly by our scorer Sam Robins and the Starter awards were done by the end of the heats. Congratulations to all the Starter dancers - you were magnificent and we hope you all come back and compete again. Everyone else, watch out for the new Starter Division next year and get some people rallied up to compete. One dance, three divisions, offered at every competition concluding at Worlds 2011!

At 3:30 we were finally ready to start our Finals. A little late in the day but the time flew by. Thank you to all our amazing staff for their organisation and the wonderful competitors for being ready to go whenever we called them. This was by far the most tense schedule we have ever run and by 19:00 we were ready for all the trophies to be awarded. Now that is called super efficiency!

Finally at 20:00 we started our evening social (Sam disappeared to go and catch up on the England football match for a brief 30 minutes). DJ'd by Tommy Weafer and our very own Nicola Lafferty, everybody enjoyed a wonderful evening of dancing and relaxing until.....well, 03:00!!

And that concluded the Irish Masters 2010. Once again, thank you to EVERYONE for the unbelievable support. Thank you to the Park Hotel for helping make everything run smoothly and a special thank you to Elaine Fox, Sharon Kennedy, Jason Hill, Rosita Shekelton, Damien Brady, Tommy Weafer, David Fiddis, David Marsh, Paul Culshaw, Lee Easton, Ann Cunningham, Fred Whitehouse, Bernie Lenaghan and Gail Cowie (temporary photographer while Sam was too busy!) for all their help and support throughout the day.

For all those coming to Worlds, see you there. For all those not, we hope to see you at the Irish Challenge, 4th September 2010 in Ty Holland!

Scandinavian Masters 2010

The 2nd Scandinavian masters took place in the beautiful City of Stockholm at the SAS Radisson Blu hotel. Event Directors Marianne & Ingemar Kardeskog had invited a great range of staff to the event to cater for all possible tastes. Scott Blevins, Kate Sala, Robbie McGowan-Hickie and Craig Bennett were on hand for the social dancers, and Sam Robins, Nicola Lafferty and Arild Lekanger were there to teach in the Swing Room. As well as a main room for social dancers where the workshops would take place and a swing room, there was a fast track social room for non-stop requests plus super-fast teaches of the dances being taught in the main ballroom! Talk about catering for everyone!

On Friday evening the event began in the main room with a social and workshops from the choreographers. Ingemar and Marcus kept everyone dancing until late with a great mix of music, from beginner to advanced. In the swing room there were beginner workshops from Arild and Sam & Nicola to teach the basics of West Coast Swing and an introduction of West Coast Swing Jack & Jill, where Sam took it upon himself to force everybody in the room to sign up! Pressure...
Saturday started early with a wonderful breakfast and then some great workshops. Dances taught over the weekend included the following; from Scott Blevins we had ‘Trouble Is’, ‘Murder Machine’, ‘Oh Ruby’, ‘Cold Blooded’ and ‘Cha Cha Tonight’. Kate Sala taught ‘Pantaloons’, ‘Yolanda’ and ‘Plan B’. Robbie McGowan-Hickie taught ‘All Cool’, Burn It Up’ and ‘Work It Out’ and from Craig Bennett we had ‘Latin Crazy’, ‘For The Lovers’, ‘Standing In The Shadows’ and ‘Running in the Wrong Direction’.
Workshops in the Swing Room continued with Novice and Intermediate classes, accumulating in a fun Jack & Jill competition. Again, Sam made sure almost everyone in the room had been signed up to compete and even threatened to lock everyone in if someone tried to leave. The competition ran with great success and our winners, Fredrik Wallin & Merete Brandli were presented with two free passes to Worlds 2010. Congratulations to everyone who competed, we hope you all enjoyed the experience.

After a quick break for another great meal, the main room opened for the evening. Kicking off the show for the Saturday night were Sam & Nicola with their West Coast Swing routine, followed by Tiina Aalto and Juho Paivenen from Finland impressing the audience with their Pro-Am Couples routines. Sam and Nicola then finished the show with a mixture of line and couples dancing to the theme of Annie Get Your Gun. Social dancing then continued well into the small hours, and everyone went to bed exhausted but happy after a fantastic night’s dancing.
Sunday morning arrived quickly enough with another busy day. The swing room became the Scandinavian Masters competition room as competitors from all over Scandinavia battled it out to become Scandinavian Champions in Choreography, Pro-Am and Line Dance. The judges included Scott Blevins, Nicholas Cort from Sweden (our newest Masters Judge), Kate Sala and Nicola. They all had a difficult job with all the talent on show. Congratulations again to everyone who danced! You were all magnificent.

Sunday didn’t offer just competition though, the main room held workshops again from Kate, Craig and Robbie all day with lots of social dancing in between. The variety at this event was amazing!
After a long day of competition and social dancing, the awards presented and the dancers all danced out, it was time to say goodbye. Thanks to everyone who attended the event, all of the staff, helpers, DJ’s and Instructors. It takes a lot of background work to put on such a diverse and well run event, so a special thanks to Marianne & Ingemar for such a fantastic job!

Keep your eye out for the launch of the new World Dance Masters website to find out whats happening at the Scandinavian Masters 2011!

Midland Masters 2010

Midland Masters took place on Saturday 22^nd May at Kings Hall, Stoke-On-Trent. The day kicked off bright (very bright) and early for the team at around 08:00. The sun was beaming down all day long meaning the hall looked glorious with slits of sun shining through the window illuminating the dance floor.

Queues were forming as early as 08:45 and by doors opening time there was a queue of at least 200 people waiting to enter. With music playing, sun shining, and everybody in high spirits it looked like it was going to be a great day.

Warm-up for Pro-Am kicked off at 11:00. Unfortunately due to the heat, by the end of warm-up time our dancers and the Pro's were already sweating!! 

Judges for the day were Competition Director and Head Judge Nicola Lafferty, Jodie Seedel, Charlotte Macari and Apprentice Judging was Division 1 Dancer Lauren Forsyth. Scoring for the day was Head Scorer Sam Robins, assisted by Paul Rhoades, with Jamie Whalley as the wonderful DJ. Making up the team for the day were John and Elizabeth Lafferty on the door with Zoe Powell as floor coordinator. A well oiled machine if we do say so ourselves!!

Into the competition it was clear that the day was going to get even warmer inside the hall. Pro's led their dancers around the floor with amazing style, flare & grace. Our dancers and Pro's coped well with the heat; from Newcomer to Advanced, everyone danced fantastically.

With the Pro-Am over it was time to move to the Line Dance divisions. A small break was given for the judges and dancers to get in a final practise before donning costumes and preparing themselves for their 1^st Dance. Amazing. The standard and effort didn’t falter all day. Through to Dance 2 and 3 everyone gave it 100%. A special mention has to be given to our Primary Novice Female, Newcomer Junior Female & Division 4 Junior Female Divisions who had to dance in heats, some dancing as many as 9 times!

After a long dance of dancing it was time to hand out the awards. Lots of surprises and happiness brought the day of competition to a close. But it wasn’t the end of the day. The evening brought about a social with Charlotte Macari & Jamie Whalley. They kept everyone dancing right through the evening with teaches from both Charlotte & Lee Easton. Charlotte taught her own dance "In This Life", a 32 Count 4 Walls Intermediate dance to In This Life by Collin Raye, followed by Lee teaching his own dance “Telephonic” , a 32 Count 2 Walls Intermediate/Advanced dance to Telephone by Lady Gaga ft. Beyonce. This was loved by everyone, very fast & energetic.

New & old dances sat side by side. New favourite “Faith & Desire” followed by “The Beast” is just an example of the variety. The night was finished off by a good ol’ favourite, “Islands in the Stream” with Charlotte & Jamie performing on stage!

We hope everyone had a great day as we know we did. Congratulations to all of our dancers for your continued effort & dedication.

South African Masters 2010

The South African Masters headed its preparations with a good start when Sam arrived 4 days before the event for a little sightseeing. As Wednesday came around it became apparent that our Head Judge, Nicola Lafferty, might not be getting to the event due to that horrible Icelandic volcano so Sam and Event Director Nadia began putting together the contingencies.

Thankfully Nicola managed to get on a flight on Thursday (after getting a free upgrade to Business Class!) and arrived in sufficient time to make the event work as if nothing had happened. Thankfully Nicola still managed to get a full suitcase of costume donations out South Africa. Thank you to everyone who has donated to the cause - everything has been put to great use.

As Friday came along it was time for the first Judging Examinations using the new World Dance Masters Judging criteria. We are very excited to say that South Africa now holds the first ever Level I and Level II World Dance Masters qualified judges. Congratulations to everyone who took them and passed.

The Friday evening social started nice and early at around 6pm with over 100 dancers clearly enjoying the opportunity to dance away to all types of dances. When we say this event caters for every type of dancer it truly does; from absolute beginners to more advanced dancers. We knew from this point the South African Masters was going to be an event that was wonderful to behold.

Nadia Coen and her team went to the hall bright and early on Saturday morning to start with set-up and open registration. Nicola, Sam and Caryl Cusins arrived at around 10:00 to start their preparations for the days judging assignments. The competition started with the events ‘Classic’ divisions (social divisions). What a wonderful experience this was. Over 35 children attended from Broadlands Primary School, a school situated close to the venue, and a dance school in Bela Bela (Limpopo province situated about 250km from the venue), and all danced in their relative age divisions. Learning their dances in between their breaks at school just three weeks prior to the event, the kids were aged between 5 and 13 and all did an amazing job!

At around 12:00 we did the award ceremony for the Classic Youth division so they could go home if they wanted to. Its safe to say that all the dancers were happy with their certificates and awards and we hope to see them back next year!

At 13:00 we started with the rest of the ‘Classic’ and ran straight into the ‘International’ divisions (standard Masters divisions). The standard of competition was wonderful to watch and amazing for a country that doesn’t have access to the best professional tuition like the UK does. Nicola, Sam and Caryl all had their work cut out for them as the dancers showed such an amazing ability. At 18:30 the awards commenced and all the new South African Masters Champions were crowned.

After the awards Nicola and Sam did three well-received demonstrations and after this was completed the breakdown started and everyone began to make their way home.

With the competition complete and all our dancers satisfied, Sunday started with a day of intense technical workshops held by Nicola and Sam. The opportunities for new technical information to be absorbed by the South African dancers are few and far between so they make the most of the time they have with the visiting Judges. After another fantastic day the event was officially over but the fun had only just begun for Nicola & Sam.

On Tuesday they were both treated to 24 hours of South African culture. Starting off at the Monkey Sanctuary, Nicola, Sam and Nadia were treated to a tour of the area by Sarah the Spider Monkey. Being so up-close to these wonderful animals was an experience Nicola & Sam will never forget. But it wasn’t over yet. Next a trip to the Elephant Sanctuary. Another incredible experience. Riding the elephants and even being kissed by them (an utterly disgusting but strangely gratifying experience), the day ended watching the sunset over the mountains from the sanctuary’s sunset point.

On Wednesday they were treated to (or terrified by, in Sam’s case) a Canopy Slide across the mountains. Drifting 140m on a zip-wire across to mountainous caverns 300ft above the ground is something that everyone should do if they get chance.

After a truly amazing experience, Nicola & Sam boarded their flight back to the UK on Wednesday evening and proceeded to get back to reality.

For anyone wanting to experience any World Dance Masters International events who have some spare money and want a holiday at the same time, the South African Masters will give you a lifetime of memories (while getting you one of your qualifying points for Worlds). Check the new website (launching 14th June) for details on next years event, we will make sure that anyone serious in attending gets all the help they need in booking all the activities available to them.

German Masters 2010

With clouds of ash from Iceland, it seemed unlikely that any of our Masters team were going to make it to the German Masters event!  Dancers Lee Easton and Fabienne Henshall were stranded in LA and it was doubtful that Sam Robins & Nicola Lafferty were going to make it either; luckily the air space was reopened and Sam & Nicola were able to make their flights.  German Instructors, Jasmin Oetzel and Joachim Armbruster were on hand to step into the shoes of Lee & Fabienne, so the event was able to go ahead.

Arriving at the venue in beautiful Florsheim (only 10 minutes from Frankfurt airport), Friday afternoon was spent preparing the hall and competition paperwork and having a quick practise of the demos for the show before joining the new BFCW team for an Italian meal.  Josip, Jurgen, Tine, Sabine, Robert & Anke had done a great job of organising the competition and helping Sam & Nicola learn a few words of German! Although Sam studied German at school, he was exceptionally rubbish at remembering any German words and proceeded to instruct with his poor English accent (sorry everyone!!).

Saturday started with a wonderful welcome from the new President of the BFCW, Josip Miolcic, and an introduction to the Masters team.  Nicola started the day with an easy, fun workshop, teaching ‘Swingin’ The Lead’, which then led into the competitors meeting and the competition, starting with the Newcomer and Intermediate divisions.  Joachim Armbruster then took to the stage to teach his dance ‘Oopsy Daisy’ which was very well received, to a fabulous track by the same name sung by Chipmunk.  Jasmin Oetzel then taught the Masters Newcomer Dance  ‘Rockin’ Robin’ and Sam & Nicola taught some basic couples West Coast Swing, followed by Sam teaching the line dance ‘Parachute’.  At this point all the dancers were undoubtedly 'workshoped' out. The ballroom shut down for dinner break and a small show practice.

Saturday evening opened with a cool mix of social dancing from the DJ’s and then it was time for the show.  There were solo demos from Nicola, Sam & Joachim, couples from Sam & Nicola and a couples routine from Sam, Joachim, Nicola & Jasmin to Lady GaGa’s ‘Telephone’. This was definitely an experience to behold....in a reversal of positions, Joachim turned into Lady GaGa with Sam taking up the role of Beyonce!! After the team had had a small recovery (and a small amount of beer) Joachim taught his fun contra dance ‘Homo Dance’ which went down wonderfully (with a large amount of laughing).  The dancing continued until 12.30am and then it was time for bed.

Sunday started with some more workshops.  Jasmin taught ‘Take your Time’ and Nicola taught ‘Kiss & Tell’.  Competition then started for the day with the Novice and Advanced dancers taking to the floor. Another great display of dancing from our competitors! Throughout the Sunday more workshops took place,  including ‘Absolutely Positively’ and ‘Faith & Desire’ as well as recaps of all the dances taught over the weekend. The day finished with the awards ceremony as all the competitors from both days of competition waited to see how they had placed.  Awards over and dancers from all over Germany, Holland and Switzerland began to pack up to begin the long journey home.

Masters would like to thank the BFCW for running the event and to all the staff and helpers.  A special thanks to Tine Knisel who had to organise the event with very little time (including all the stress of placing the contingencies) and to Jasmin and Joachim for stepping in at such short notice and for doing such a wonderful job. The event couldn't have taken place so successfully without these people and Nicola and Sam can't thank them enough!

Keep checking the website and Facebook for updates on when and where the Masters event will be next year! We are definitely looking forward to it. We hope to see you all there too.