“Things New Students Should Know to Prepare for a Competition” by Devorah Kastner Congrats, you’ve made the commitment to dance in your first Pro-am UCWDC competition! Now what? Here are a few things you should know to better prepare yourself for this exciting new endeavor. What to pack? Country events are fun and casual. Bring comfortable clothes for social dancing. …
Costs & Costumes for new competitors
In this article we tackle COSTS & COSTUMES that you’ll need to consider if you are dancing Country ProAm for the first time! How to register for a competition: Each competition will have a registration sheet or online registration. You will be responsible to register yourself for each competition. Your teacher will help you fill out the registration. You will …
Country Dance for Fitness
Ever notice how people who make movement an important part of their lives tend to be happier, or more content? First and foremost, movement of any kind, tennis, basketball, running, biking, yoga, badminton and bowling all produce “feel better” endorphins that course through our bloodstreams long after we’ve stopped moving. Country Dancing is no different! Moving (a.k.a. exercise, a.k.a POLKA) …
25 country dance terms you need to know
1. Worlds The world championships held the first week of January every year. It’s what everyone is excited about! 2. Overall An overall placement in a division. It requires 5 dances (out of 8) and must include 2-Step, Waltz and one Swing (East or West) plus 2 of the 4 remaining dances. 3. Dance Boots Country boots specifically made for …
Why we compete (confessions of a dancer)
Why We Compete – Confessions of a Country Dancer It may seem like a contradiction, someone seeking spiritual enlightenment spending time and money on competitive country dancing. In fact it might seem downright sacrilegious to believe in oneness, acceptance and non-judgment and then engage in anything as competitive as ballroom dancing where both looks and ability are the criteria for …
7 ways to know if you’re a good country dancer
1 You own country dance boots. Ok lets get this out of the way before the more serious stuff. If you have been country dancing for any length of time you need a pair of awesome dance boots! 2.You realize that neither you, nor your dancing need to be “fixed.” Nothing is ever broken with us. We are all just …
Performance Anxiety – Dealing with nerves
Back in the eighties, a slew of alien movies like Cocoon, Alien, ET and Close Encounters of the Third Kind made all of us nervous about what an advanced “space” civilization might think about our Earthly activities. Were they studying our TV shows? Infiltrating our radio waves? Landing in pastures late at night to spy on us in our sleep? …
Teaching yourself to practice
Anyone who plays a sport or engages in any physical activity knows that practice improves your ability. The human body responds extremely well to repetition. Whether we are repeating positive behaviors, or negative, the body will grow in the direction we give it. In the dance studio, we call it “muscle memory.” Muscle Memory Muscle memory serves us well because …
Dealing with setbacks as a competitor
Setbacks… they are part of the game! Have you ever had one of those weeks when it seems like every part of your life is going along swimmingly, and then suddenly things take a giant leap backwards? That’s pretty much how it went. It’s a long road… It began when I asked my dance coach’s wife, L, to give me …
Training your center for country dancing
Have you ever been to a dance lesson where someone didn’t mention your center? You have to move from your center! Okay. Okay. So we have all heard it before, a million times, already. We know this, but we don’t all do it, or at least not all the time. The truth is that it can take years to really understand what it …
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