Mindpoke dance

Given that many a dancer's internet forum serves about as much clarity as a three year old a megaphone, I thought it was time that I expanded the conversation on social dancing into areas where many won't tread, or because of their bizarre rules on posting can't tread.  So here are five conversations we could be having but we don't... 1) where are all the people with disabilities in dancing?  We know why they might be put off, but we also now that there is both commercial sense and genuine appreciation of dancers with disabilities.  We have teachers in our midsts, we have perfectly good venues (deposit what some might suggest) and we have stacks of dancers eager to dance with people with disabilities (hidden or visible).  But they don't come.  What does that say about us? 2) we have still not stopped idiot men "teaching" on the dance floor and most especially teaching drops.  How is this acceptable on a dance ...

Your correspondent Stephen North has been floating around competitions for too many years.  I competed once and had to stop because it made my eyes water. I am fascinated by the process, the atmosphere, the venues and the huge variations in definitions of what good dancing is.   This latter varies with time and place and to a certain extent to how competitive the event is.  I've been to comps in London, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Blackpool, Manchester, Birmingham and each time I'm struck how hard people try to catch that most elusive thing - the perfect dance. Northern Champs this year - under the auspices of Ceroc Addiction, move dot the very splendid Town Hall in Hyde complete with its turn of the last century ceramics intact in the entrance and spacious acoustic and lovely fast floor.  The hall was built 1883-84 and one can imagine thousands of functions there.  Less easy to imagine today are the police cells and magistrates court in the building where murderer...

This blog is one of an occasional commentary on dance events I attend. I'm not affiliated in any way to the dance organisers, I've been to all of the Southport weekenders since Ceroc took over the venue from Jive Addiction in August 2008, including Jive Addiction's last event.  As I've commented before, it is interesting to see how patterns of behaviour have changed.  More people arrive later in the day nowadays - partially because roads seems to be more congested and also because I think more people only leave after work rather than taking the day off.  Similarly more people, it seems, leave on Sunday afternoon and early Sunday evening.  I think the age of the participants is changing upwards and the expectation of the customers is changing too.  Summer SP is normally pretty well gender balanced but this year that seemed to go awry and I was very aware that some of the best female dancers in the country were sitting out through lack of partners.  It woul...